July 11, 1902.] 



SCIENCE. 



59 



field. Botanical investigations, however, 

 will always play a more or less important 

 part in all matters pertaining to the sub- 

 ject, especially systematic studies of the 

 tree floras and the application of these 

 studies to questions having to do with re- 

 forestation and the protection of existing 

 forest areas. The applied botanical work, 

 in connection with future problems in phar- 

 macology, will be considerable. Systematic 

 studies of plants used iu pharmacy, the 

 introduction and cultivation of such plants 

 with a view to increasing their usefulness, 

 all come within this scope of applied bo- 

 tanical research. The study of tropical 

 plants, which has already been referred to, 

 is also bound to play an important part in 

 the near future in the. matter of the devel- 

 opment of our insular possessions. As yet, 

 we have very little satisfactory informa- 

 tion as to the possibilities of tropical agri- 

 culture, especially as concerns our own 

 eountry; and it would seem that some of 

 the first problems will have to do with 

 systematic studies of the field to determine 

 existing possibilities, with a view to apply- 

 ing them in the near future in a practical 

 way. There are numerous practical ques- 

 tions having an important bearing on all 

 tropical work, which must receive atten- 

 tion before any final conclusions can be 

 reached in regard to the successful grow- 

 ing of crops in these regions. These ques- 

 tions have to do with the interrelation of 

 the plants themselves to the development of 

 the existing system of tropical agriculture, 

 ■so that really a systematic study of our 

 tropical floras would seem one of the first 

 requisites offering a key to the future 

 solution of other and more general prob- 

 lems. 



Bacteriology, in its relation to surgery 

 and sanitation, has passed out of the field 

 of applied botany, but problems will still 

 arise. Systematic studies of the bacteria 

 may be essential to the successful prosecu- 



tion of certain phases of this work. It is 

 hardly necessary to refer to these questions 

 in detail, and I may therefore conclude this 

 somewhat hasty and general sketch of the 

 possibilities of applied botanical work, as 

 we see them, by again calling attention to 

 a fact which becomes more and more evi- 

 dent as we look into work of this nature, 

 and that is, how thoroughly we are all 

 dependent on others for aid, not only in 

 our own field of science, but other fields 

 as well. Like our social fabric, science for 

 science's sake and applied science are be- 

 coming more and more a delicately compli- 

 cated system, capable of endless harmoni- 

 ous expansion if viewed aright, but leading 

 to possible endless discord if handled 

 wrong. How essential, therefore, that the 

 broadest spirit of tolerance should be cul- 

 tivated, for no matter how small or how 

 humble a piece of real work is, somewhere 

 and some time it may be made to form a 

 part of an harmonious whole. Wliile this 

 is a practical age, and while the demand is 

 heavy for practical results, we should not 

 forget that there are ages to come after 

 us — ages that may demand something dif- 

 ferent from what the majority of us are 

 producing now; and for this reason the 

 laborer in some obscure field should not be 

 forgotten, for it perhaps may be that his 

 work, now little known or understood, may 

 in the future take its place in the building 

 up of mankind. 



B. T. Galloway. 

 U. S. Department of Agricuxture. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 



Histoire de I'Oiservatoire de Paris de sa Fon- 

 dation a 1793. Par C. Wolf. Paris, Gau- 

 thier-Villaxs. 1902. Pp. xii+392; 16 

 plates. 



If there had come down to us from the au- 

 thor of the Almagest a detailed account of the 

 home of the Alexandrian school, the dimen- 

 sions and cost of its buildings, their arrange- 



