SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 577. 



ing in its numerical strength, 'stimulating 

 in its general program, and affording 

 through adequate subject organization all 

 of the advantages for which special and 

 separate meetings had been arranged. 



The Society of Naturalists itself had 

 long exemplified a good model of combined 

 organization by occupying on its own gen- 

 eral program only such time as was ac- 

 tually required for the transaction of 

 routine business, an evening when the 

 president's address followed a dinner, and 

 one afternoon devoted to a discussion of 

 some subject of broad interest, by capable, 

 well-informed speakers. All of the rest 

 of the time was devoted to meetings of the 

 afSliating special societies. 



At the Chicago meeting the discussion 

 turned upon the future of the American 

 Society of Natiiralists in view of the pro- 

 posed invasion of its meeting time by the 

 Association for the Advancement of Sci- 

 ence. Having been invited by the execu- 

 tive committee to participate in the dis- 

 cussion, I confess that I went to Chicago 

 undecided whether to urge the sacrifice of 

 all that the separate meetings of the 

 Naturalists seemed to stand for, or the 

 transfer of these meetings into the sum- 

 mer season — vacated by the association. 

 I have never attended so large a meeting 

 at which conditions were so favorable for 

 personal conference without the formation 

 of cliques as at the Hotel del Prado, where 

 every post-prandial cigar was the occasion 

 of a general discussion participated in by 

 the officers and other members of the asso- 

 ciation and the society, or of comparison 

 of ideas with individuals representing every 

 phase of interest involved. I had ex- 

 pected to find a feeling of irritation on the 

 part of those most vitally interested in the 

 society, at the coup which the association 

 had effected, and was not unprepared to 

 hear private suggestion that action should 

 be advised adverse to meeting in connection 



with the association. On the contrary, 

 whatever irritation may have been felt was 

 kept out of sight, every one was disposed 

 to try to realize the greater thing's that 

 close union promised if effective, and my 

 own mind clearly shaped itself into ap- 

 proval of the effort to secure for Convoca- 

 tion Week each year a great national meet- 

 ing representative of American science as 

 a whole. The public discussion did not 

 show dissent from this conclusion. - 



In deciding to try to meet with the Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science, 

 the American Society of Naturalists did not 

 for a moment contemplate passing out of 

 existence or into desuetude. On the con- 

 trary, the decision led to its prompt reor- 

 ganization on a national basis correspond- 

 ing to its name, with provision for eastern, 

 central and perhaps other branches, one or 

 more of which should meet as the nucleus 

 of the society in affiliation with the asso- 

 ciation, according to the place selected by 

 t!ie latter for its own meeting. 



The second participant in the Chicago 

 discussion began his remarks by quoting a 

 resolution prepared for a business session, 

 in which provision was proposed for the 

 organization of a central branch of the 

 American Society. My own opportunities 

 for conversation with botanists of this part 

 of the country had been many and favor- 

 able, and I felt that I presented their opin- 

 ion also when I stated my belief that an 

 organization of the botanists under such a 

 central branch was desirable and probable. 



Before adjournment, the Chicago meet- 

 ing of the Society of Naturalists made 

 tentative provision for the organization of 

 a central branch, and as a member of the 

 organization committee for this branch I 

 am pleased to see the success that has at- 

 tended the effort to provide for an annual 

 naturalists' meeting within reach of every 

 worker ea'st of the Rocky Mountains. That 



= Science, N. S., 15: 241-255. 



