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BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 



copiously furnishes, and by which method he, too, can discover 

 "new species," and obtain prompt recognition. The closet bota- 

 nist performs the further useful service of "revising" intricate 

 families and genera of plants, unraveling the entanglements of 

 previous authors, and making such changes in the classification 

 and names as are best suited to secure the maximum personal 

 credit. 



I need not tell this audience that Charles Darwin belonged to 

 neither of these classes of botanists. A lover of nature, he yet never 

 wasted precious time in the idle pursuit of rarities. Thoroughly 

 familiar with the distinctive characters upon which botanical classi- 

 fication rests, he yet never pursued to any marked extent the inves- 

 tigation of specimens from the hortus siccus. I doubt whether a 

 single species of plant was ever named after him by reason of his 

 having either discovered it in a wild state or detected its specific dis- 

 tinct ness by the examination of its characters. I even doubt 

 whether he possessed an herbarium, in the accepted sense of the word. 

 And yet this man has probably contributed more to our real 

 knowledge of plants than any other single botanist. 



In what, then, have Darwin's botanical investigations consisted? 

 There is a little French book entitled " Voyage d'un Botaniste 

 dans sa Maison," a title which, allowing for the characteristic hy- 

 perbole of the French tongue, suggests the general nature of Dar- 

 win's botanical studies. His researches were conducted in his 

 laboratory, in pots of plants at his window, in his aquarium, in his 

 green-house, in his garden. He worked with instruments of pre- 

 cision, recorded his observations with exactness, and employed 

 every mechanical device for making his results reveal important 

 truths, of which the genius of man would seem to be capable. 



Darwin looked upon plants as Hiring things. He did not study 

 their forms so much as their actions. He interrogated them to learn 

 what they were doing. 



The central truth, towards which his botanical investigations con- 

 stantly tended, was that of the universal activity of the vegetable 



