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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIV. No. 1138 



be possible to devise some means for in- 

 forming fellow-workers as to the piece of 

 work in hand or proposed to be undertaken, 

 and thus, on the one hand, to avoid waste- 

 ful expenditure of time and effort, and not 

 infrequently the hurried publication of in- 

 complete results, and on the other, to ensure 

 where practicable, the benefits of coopera- 

 tion. 



The various illustrative suggestions 

 which I have made would imply a close co- 

 operation between the schools of botany 

 and colleges and institutions of agricul- 

 ture, horticulture and forestry; to pass 

 from the former to one or other of the 

 latter for special work or training should 

 be a natural thing. While, on the one 

 hand, a university course is not an essen- 

 tial preliminary to the study of one or 

 other of the applied branches, the advan- 

 tage of a broad, general training in the 

 principles of the science can not be gain- 

 said. The establishment of professorships, 

 readerships or lectureships in economic bot- 

 any at the university would supply a use- 

 ful link between the pure and applied sci- 

 ence, while research fellowships or scholar- 

 ships would be an incentive to investigation. 



There is the wider question of a rap- 

 prochement between the man of science and 

 the commercial man. Its desirability is ob- 

 vious, and the advantages would be mu- 

 tual ; on the one hand, it would secure the 

 spread and application of the results of re- 

 search, and on the other hand, the man of 

 science would be directed to economic prob- 

 lems of which otherwise he might not be- 

 come cognizant. The closer association be- 

 tween the academic institution and those 

 devoted to the application of the science 

 would be a step in this direction. 



Our British possessions, especially within 

 the tropics, contain a wealth of material of 

 economic value which has been only par- 

 tially explored. One of the first needs is a 

 tabulation of the material. In the impor- 



tant series of Colonial floras incepted by 

 Sir Joseph Hooker, and published under 

 the auspices of Kew, lies the foundation 

 for further work. Consider, for instance, 

 the "Flora of Tropical Africa," now rap- 

 idly near completion. This is a careful 

 and, so far as possible with the material at 

 hand, critical descriptive catalogue of the 

 plants from tropical Africa which are pre- 

 served in the great British and European 

 herbaria. The work has been done by men 

 with considerable training in systematic 

 work, but who know nothing at first hand 

 of the country, the vegetation of which 

 they are cataloguing. Such a "Flora" 

 must be regarded as a basis for further 

 work. Its study will indicate botanical 

 areas and their characteristics, and suggest 

 what areas are likely to prove of greater or 

 less economic value, and on what special 

 lines. It will also indicate the lines on 

 which areas may be mapped out for more 

 detailed botanical exploration. That this 

 is necessary is obvious to any botanist who 

 has used such a work. A large proportion 

 of the species, some of which may, on 

 further investigation, prove to be of eco- 

 nomic value, are known only from a single 

 incomplete fragment. Others, for instance, 

 which may be of known economic value, 

 doubtless exist over much larger areas and 

 in much greater quantity than would ap- 

 pear from the "Flora." The reason of 

 these shortcomings is equally obvious. The 

 collections on which the work is based are 

 largely the result of voluntary effort em- 

 ployed more or less spasmodically. The ex- 

 plorer working out some new route, who 

 brings what he can conveniently carry to 

 illustrate the plant products of the new 

 country; the government official or his 

 wife, working during their brief leisure or 

 collecting on the track between their dif- 

 ferent stations: the missionary or soldier, 

 with a penchant for natural history; to 

 these and similar persons we are largely in- 



