TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF ADVANCE IN BOTANY 



Bruce Fink 



GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS 



One can scarcely delimit a science or any subdivision of a 

 science exactly. Moreover, botany has enlarged, shifted posi- 

 tion, and advanced so rapidly within recent years that it is not 

 standardized so definitely as some other sciences. It is not 

 strange, therefore, that botanists are not certain regarding the 

 limitations of their science, or those of its various subdivisions. 

 Who can locate a line of demarcation between morphology and 

 taxonomy? Experimental morphology passes into physiology. 

 Physiology grades imperceptibly into ecology, and some workers 

 do not distinguish plant ecology and plant geography. Other 

 illustrations will suggest themselves. 



Though the artificiality of all attempts to define the limits 

 of a science is recognized, some analysis of botany and its sub- 

 divisions must be made. Following largely the historical order, 

 botanical science may be said to consist of plant taxonomy, 

 morphology, physiology, ecology, and breeding. Plant pathology 

 is botany in so far as it deals with host or with causal organ- 

 ism with respect to taxonomy, ontogeny, and normal or abnormal 

 morphology and physiology. Paleobotany, on its botanical side, 

 considers mainly morphology and phylogeny ; when it turns to- 

 ward stratigraphy, it becomes geology. Bacteriology is botany 

 with respect to its taxonomy, morphology, and physiology ; but 

 the limits of our paper preclude special treatment of this sub- 

 ject. Agriculture, horticulture, and forestry are botany in part ; 

 but each one contains much that is not botanical, and their con- 

 sideration would carry us too far afield. 



On account of the vastness of modern botany, no botanist 

 attempts to cover the science, except in its broad outlines. It 



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