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SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XII. No. 292. 



point. Laboratory methods were com- 

 menced, and laboratory equipments fol- 

 lowed. But Huxley was mainly a zoolo- 

 gist, and thus not unnaturally it came 

 about that some American biologists came 

 to be developed in a one-sided way, and in 

 some cases came to assume the unfortunate 

 proposition that biology was only another 

 name for zoology. In later years they 

 learned their mistake and for the future the 

 student who hopes for success along biolog- 

 ical lines recognizes that he is committing 

 a fatal error if he does not prepare for his 

 future with a vigorous foundation in plant 

 biology. 



Twenty-five years ago there was practi- 

 cally one American botanist and his man- 

 ual was supposed to be the end of all neces- 

 sary knowledge even though its descriptions 

 often failed to cover variations noted that 

 later botanists have dared to call species. 

 In some remote quarters the momentous 

 question was occasionally presented to the 

 teacher of botany, Is Gray's system really 

 better than Wood's ? but usually there was 

 ] ittle dissent from an af&rmative answer to 

 the question. 



It was in the latter part of this same year 

 (1875) that the first number of the Bo- 

 tanical Bulletin (now the Botanical Gazette) 

 was issued by the enthusiastic professor of 

 natural science of a little college in southern 

 Indiana. It was a four-page sheet without 

 cover containing mainly notes on the local 

 flora of the vicinity of the college and bear- 

 ing little prophecy of its present develop- 

 ment into two volumes aggregating nine 

 hundred pages a year. Five years before 

 The Torrey Club of ISTew York had founded 

 its Bulletin, but for the five years prior to 

 1875 had not produced so many pages as 

 have just been issued in the first five months 

 of the year 1900. Something of the aim of 

 the latter journal in its early days may be 

 of interest at this time. We quote from 

 the first number, January, 1870 : " An at- 



tentive study of plants in their native 

 haunts is essential to the advance of the 

 science, and in this respect the local obser- 

 ver has an advantage over the explorer of 

 extensive regions, or the possessor of a gen- 

 eral herbarium. He can note the plant from 

 its cradle to its grave ; can watch its strug- 

 gles for existence, its habits, its migrations, 

 its variations ; can study its atmospheric and 

 entomological economies ; can speculate on 

 its relations to the past, or experiment on 

 its utility to man. It would be in vain to 

 attempt to enumerate all the points about 

 which a lover of vegetable nature can learn 

 and report something new. Botany, like 

 every other science, far from being ex- 

 hausted, is ever widening its field." This 

 language for the time in which it was writ- 

 ten was an unexpected prophecy, for at this 

 period scarcely anyone looked at botany as 

 a serious subject. It was regarded as a 

 suitable study for misses' boarding schools 

 and a harmless elective in a few of the more 

 enlightened colleges. No facilities were 

 open for advanced work and none was 

 thought of by the college authorities. A 

 botanist to grow must delve for himself, 

 must invent his methods, must acquire un- 

 aided the mastery of his implements of re- 

 search. If, as was usually the case, he was 

 short of means, he must either teach or 

 practice medicine and from his overcrowded 

 hours steal the time in which to devote him- 

 self to the object of his love. With most 

 of us it was a literal exemplification of 

 Agassiz' rule that to succeed as a naturalist 

 one must ' lie hard and live low,' and many 

 in the struggle lost their ambition and went 

 in pursuit of more lucrative subjects. 



The government, except in now and then 

 detailing a botanist and too often an un- 

 trained one on some exploring expedition, 

 had not yet commenced to foster botanical 

 research. There was a botanist, to be sure, 

 to the Department of Agriculture and he did 

 accumulate an extensive collection so long 



