466 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIV. No. 352. 



eral interest. No department of our sub- 

 ject is more intimately associated with 

 every other. ISTo other branch of botany 

 so completely underlies all phases of botan- 

 ical work. For what botanical investiga- 

 tion does not depend for its value upon a 

 correct identification of the plants with 

 which it deals ? An accurate, lucid and 

 complete classification of plants is thus the 

 only secure basis upon which botany as a 

 whole can rest. What is the present 

 strength of this all -important foundation ? 

 Is it built upon rational principles ? Should 

 we build on or tear down and reconstruct ? 

 Is it nearing completion or does it represent 

 as yet only the earliest stages of the desired 

 structure ? These are questions scarcely 

 less significant to the physiologist, ecologist, 

 pathologist, horticulturist or pharmacist 

 than to the systematic botanist. 



In surveying the taxonomic work of the 

 last decade we see on every hand evidences 

 of great and increasing activity. Small 

 genera have become large ; easy groups 

 have become intricate. Thin periodicals 

 have grown marvelously fat — in pages, not, 

 alas ! in pecuniary receipts. The number of 

 regular and irregular publications has vastly 

 increased. Species have been made by the 

 thousand. No previous period of similar 

 length has turned out such a bulk of sys- 

 tematic literature. It is true that this 

 copious and now decentralized publication 

 is of all degrees of merit, yet no one would 

 wish to deny to it a reasonably high aver- 

 age, of excellence. I speak, of course, of 

 those papers which aim at the record of 

 serious research. From these considera- 

 tions and in the presence of this ex- 

 traordinary activity there can be no doubt 

 that systematists are making flattering 

 progress in at least one direction ; they are, 

 namely, recording a huge number of facts. 



Facts, however, can be accumulated much 

 faster than they can be sorted and arranged. 

 They are, to carry out our figure, only the 



bricks for the structure, and to be effective 

 building material must be laid in a firm 

 mortar of law, organization and proper as- 

 sociation. The chief difficulty which now 

 besets our subject is the overwhelming accu- 

 mulation of uncorrelated facts, unmono- 

 graphed species, disjointed observations, 

 preliminary and fragmentary records. The 

 summit of our structure, instead of present- 

 ing a fairly clear and firm surface for further 

 construction, seems to be buried at many 

 points mountain-deep by disorderly heaps 

 of loose bricks, in their way excellent build- 

 ing material, but so carelessly piled together 

 as to impede rather than assist those who 

 are earnestly endeavoring to bring order 

 into this threatened chaos. Let no one 

 understand me as discouraging the accumu- 

 lation of facts — even very small facts — re- 

 lating to the classification of plants. We 

 do not know half enough even about the 

 commoner species. I would merely urge 

 that those who publish should take far 

 greater pains to present their facts in an 

 orderly and lucid way, with reasonable 

 terseness and in such a manner as to show 

 clearly their relation to preceding observa- 

 tions in the same field. This is the first 

 possibility for advance in systematic botany 

 and, if I mistake not, many other branches 

 of research are in like case. 



In this matter of presentation the natural 

 sciences seem to be at a peculiar disad- 

 vantage. In belles-lettres a work of crude 

 literary form is damned. Authors, if they 

 would be read, must cultivate a good style. 

 But in the natural sciences, if a work only 

 presents some new and valuable facts it 

 must, in spite of the crudest form, be pur- 

 chased, read, reviewed, quoted, and the 

 author is often flattered by the seeming suc- 

 cess of a paper which may have been little 

 better than an imposition upon his col- 

 leagues. Some improvement may undoubt- 

 edly be accomplished if the scientific public, 

 especially editors and reviewers, can be 



