370 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. IV. No. 90. 



than any which to-day exists in this coun- 

 try. 



Under the stimulus of the last two dec- 

 ades, botany has come to the front in most 

 colleges as a study well calculated to de- 

 velop the powers of observation and the 

 reasoning faculties. Where it still occu- 

 pies the place of a fixed study of a few 

 terms' duration in a prescribed under- 

 graduate course, it is evident that the neces- 

 sary equipment of a department is expressi- 

 ble in the simplest terms — for each course, 

 that which is needed to exemplify by the 

 most direct object lessons the subject se- 

 lected, and enough general and collateral 

 material and literature to complement the 

 work. But the case is somewhat different 

 when, as is now frequent, a considerable 

 option is allowed the student in the courses 

 taken for the baccalaureate degree. Here 

 the temptation exists to secure equipment 

 for the broadest possible series of electives, 

 and it is too often yielded to for the best in- 

 terests of the institution. However liberal 

 one may be in the matter of electives, it is 

 evident, in most instances, that the student 

 cannot afford to devote more than about 

 one-half of his undergraduate time to a sin- 

 gle study like botany, and in this time he 

 can cover only a definite amount of ground. 

 While there is a certain seductiveness in 

 the perusal of long lists of electives in a 

 college catalogue, the serious contemplation 

 of them shows that few, if any, students can 

 hope to take all of the courses of such a 

 list, and as, for the most part, they are gar- 

 nished out in an attractive form, there is 

 likely to be embarrassment in the wealth of 

 subjects, so that, if left to himself, the stu- 

 dent is very likely to select a series of dis- 

 connected but pleasing fragments, rather 

 than the proper links in an educational 

 chain. Experience shows the wisdom of 

 limiting the list of electives to those that 

 there is reasonable probability that the stu- 

 dent can take, and of making the list a con- 



sistent whole, fairly opening up the entire 

 field of botany in such manner as to pave 

 the way for a piece of advanced thesis work 

 at the end, and for specialization after 

 graduation. So far as undergraduate in- 

 struction is concerned, where, as is usually 

 the case, funds are limited, it is here desi- 

 rable, as in the other instance, to limit the 

 scope of the departmental equipment quite 

 closely to the requirements of the courses 

 offered. As the senior thesis work is al- 

 most certain to be a further study of some 

 one of the subjects already elected, the pro- 

 vision for it, in nearly every instance, is 

 easily and quickly effected by a compara- 

 tively inexpensive addition, in each case, 

 to the standard library and laboratory 

 equipment. Such research work as the 

 head of the department and his assistants 

 find time for, as well as such post-graduate 

 work as may be undertaken, can then be 

 provided for in the same manner, piece by 

 piece, with the exception of the final 

 touches, demanding the use of the larger 

 reference libraries or collections, the pro- 

 vision for which is not likely to-be far to 

 seek in the strongest research centers within 

 a very few years. 



Great herbaria, broad reference libraries, 

 and large stores of apparatus and living or 

 preserved material, are possible only to 

 few universities and to the still fewer in- 

 stitutions specially endowed for research, to 

 which alone, indeed, they seem strictly 

 appropriate. For the latter, everj^ shade of 

 breadth of foundation is possible, from the 

 laboratory and library limited to the narrow- 

 est specialty, to the institution founded and 

 equipped for research in any branch of pure 

 or applied botany. Fairly perfect equipment 

 of the former class it is possible to find here 

 and there, to-day, but though the seed is 

 sown in several places, the broadest institu- 

 tions, in their entirety, are still to be de- 

 veloped. 



l^o doubt the first requisite in any such in- 



