Febeuakt 5, 1915] 



SCIENCE 



193 



advice, in illustration of whicli may be cited 

 the institution's publications of the " Old 

 Yellow Book " and the " Arthurian Eomances." 



The larger departments of research of the 

 institution are now so well established and so 

 distinctive in their several fields that they 

 might be regarded as so many separate organi- 

 zations except for their dependence on the 

 institution for financial support. They are not 

 uncommonly considered, in fact, as indepen- 

 dent organizations, while several of them have 

 been mistaken for the institution as a whole. 

 Such misapprehensions are inevitable, but their 

 existence suggests a question well worthy of 

 reflection, namely, whether it may not be well, 

 in the course of time, for some, or all, of 

 these departments to sever connections with 

 the institution if they should have the good 

 fortune to receive adequate separate endow- 

 ments. The only concern the institution need 

 have in such circumstances is that of securing 

 to these departments the most favorable condi- 

 tions for effective work. If this object may be 

 best attained by independent foundations, or 

 by affiliation with other organizations, no ob- 

 stacle should be raised against such action. 



But quite apart from these hypothetical con- 

 siderations, the existing relations of these de- 

 partments to one another and to the institu- 

 tion as a whole secure to them a degree of 

 autonomy which could hardly be surpassed 

 under other auspices. The liberties of action, 

 thus designedly and freely conceded, imply 

 corresponding responsibilities not only in de- 

 partmental administration but also in depart- 

 mental exposition, whether by summary annual 

 reports or by elaborate monographs. Accord- 

 ingly, and in conformity with other reasons 

 referred to in previous reports, the following 

 paragraphs aim to give brief indications only 

 of departmental progress, reference being 

 made for instructive details to the reports of 

 the several directors in the current year book. 



In connection with the subject of depart- 

 mental researches particularly, the question 

 is often asked " How can the ' practical re- 

 sults ' attained be popularized and thus ren- 

 dered available to the masses of mankind ? " 

 This is a question too large and too difficult 

 for adequate discussion here, but it is one merit- 



ing studious contemplation in the interests 

 of our successors. It may be recalled that a 

 hopeful paragraph was devoted to this topic in 

 my first annual report, of 1905, but subsequent 

 experience does not seem to justify the optim- 

 ism entertained at that time. It is now plain, 

 indeed, that while as a matter of fact truth 

 is not only stranger but much more impor- 

 tant than fiction, contemporary media for the 

 dissemination of the sensational and the in- 

 tangible are far more numerous and potent 

 than the media for the dissemination of the de- 

 monstrable, and hence permanent, additions to 

 knowledge. And it is equally plain that until 

 there is an increased demand for less of the 

 spectacular and for more of the real, 

 both from journalists and from their readers, 

 there can be little improvement in the popu- 

 larization of discoveries and advances 

 through such media. In the meantime, 

 the increasing value of these researches, now 

 everywhere recognized by scholars, may pres- 

 ently justify the engagement of an expert to 

 popularize not simply the " practical results " 

 but to furnish also what is in general more 

 important, to wit, a clear and concise account 

 of the principles and the methods by which 

 such results are derived. 



DEPARTMENT OF BOTANICAL RESEARCH 



Although the greater part of the work of this 

 department is carried on at its principal labo- 

 ratory at Tucson, Arizona, it is essential to a 

 comprehensive study of desert plant life to ex- 

 plore distant as well as adjacent arid regions. 

 Thus, having published during the past year 

 the results of an elaborate investigation of the 

 region of the Salton Sea, the department is 

 now, among many other activities, turning at- 

 tention to similar desert basins, of which there 

 are several in the western states that have been 

 studied hitherto in their geological rather than 

 botanical aspects. These researches are en- 

 tailing also many applications of the allied 

 physical sciences not heretofore invoked to 

 any marked extent in aid of botanical science. 

 Hence there results properly a diversity of 

 work quite beyond the implications of botany 

 in the earlier, but now quite too narrow, sense 

 of the word. 



