July 13, 1900.] 



SCIENCE. 



57 



contribute isolated and disjointed facts and 

 observations will ever be called blessed by 

 coming generations in more than an under- 

 tone, that appellation being reserved for 

 those who have builded from as well as 

 hewn out their material, and for those who, 

 even without directly contributing to ob- 

 served facts, have justly valued the facts 

 ascertained by others and have grouped 

 and shaped and utilized them. 



If it could be done within the time that I 

 have proposed to occupy, I should like to 

 consider in detail the entire matter of pub- 

 lication, which is in need of much more 

 thought and concerted action than has yet 

 been bestowed upon it. I fear that the 

 amount of time and thought devoted to the 

 publication of the results of a given piece of 

 research work is often disproportionately 

 small, the fact that they are published at 

 all apparently serving the author's purpose 

 without much regard to the manner in 

 which they are brought out. Publication 

 facilities at one time were few and not read- 

 ily obtained, but to-day the trouble is rather 

 that they are so numerous and so generally 

 available that even matter unworthy of 

 publication can easily be brought out, and 

 that the authors of meritorious articles are 

 tempted not to look far before publishing 

 their work, but to drop it, hit or miss, into 

 the nearest press, without correlation with 

 other comparable matter or even with the 

 articles to which it stands in juxtaposition, 

 and with too little thought of the conveni- 

 ence of those who are to use it. It some- 

 times happens, too, that in their zeal they 

 issue simultaneously or otherwise copies of 

 their manuscript to several societies or jour- 

 nals, so that the original place of publica- 

 tion of the article is now and then rendered 

 very questionable. 



I should not wish to seem captious in 

 making these statements, for nothing is fur- 

 ther from my purpose than destructive criti- 



cism ; but in view of the growing amount 

 and complexity of scientific publication, I 

 believe that the real needs of the users of 

 botanical literature demand more careful 

 consideration than they have heretofore re- 

 ceived, and that this consideration will 

 easily lead to a number of reforms which 

 are perfectly within the power of both au- 

 thor and publisher. 



Eeference has been made already to the 

 fact that a majority of periodicals are of very 

 mixed contents. So far as societies are con- 

 cerned, the greater number of these bodies 

 have originated primarily for the develop- 

 ment of local interests, and of necessity 

 these interests have been varied. For their 

 own direct purposes, the heterogeneity re- 

 ferred to works very little harm, and 

 for the bibliographer it is the less trouble- 

 some because the very condensation of the 

 miscellaneous matter in a local publica- 

 tion places a large part of it where ife 

 would naturally be sought. The direct 

 purpose of the publication provisions of 

 nearly all such bodies being not only to 

 secure, the permanent recording of obser- 

 vation but to furnish the means of build- 

 ing up a library by way of exchange, it 

 is probable that the partly undesirable 

 mixed contents of the larger number of so- 

 ciety publications will continue still for a 

 very long time, but it is encouraging to no- 

 tice that some of the greater foreign socie- 

 ties have long since differentiated along 

 main lines in their publication, while within 

 recent years a further specialization has 

 been effected in a number of others, notably, 

 for our own country, the California Acad- 

 emy of Sciences, and such differentiation is 

 easily foreseen in others as their member- 

 ship and activity increase through the for- 

 mation of sections, each devoted to some 

 particular science, the more strongly repre- 

 sented and active sections being almost cer- 

 tain ultimately to secure the separate pub- 

 lication of their matter. 



