96 I1.S.C. Proceedings of the Ninth [N.S., XVIII, 
field for botanical investigation is almost unlimited. In addi- 
tion to the perhaps 17,500 species of flowering plants, there is 
a great assemblage of cryptogams, providing an almost endless 
variety of material for research in every phase of botany. 
The peculiar climatic conditions under which our vegetation 
occurs only enlarge and extend the opportunity for study. 
My purpose in this address is to call brief attention to 
what has been done along certain lines both in India and 
elsewhere; to point out the great need for research ; to indi- 
cate some of the lines of study that seem most urgent and 
most likely to yield results; and to urge an increasing 
number of young men to engage in more, more intensive, and 
more effective investigation. To some of my older hearers 
my remarks may seem presumptuous. They know already 
the problems of botany, and are actively engaged in research. 
It is however, to the younger generation that I want parti- 
cularly to speak. There are many young men who have 
recently completed their courses of study, obtained their 
degrees, and entered into their various fields of life work. 
after the degree is obtained, we must conclude that these men 
need all the encouragement we can give them. Too frequently 
they gradually become satisfied with their original preparation, 
the desire for further progress grows dim, and they settle down 
to lives of quiet unproductivity. If some can find in what 
I shall say an incentive to further study and research, I shall 
to think of the latter as “pure botany.” Nowadays it is often 
only “applied botany” that engages the attention of the 
professional botanist, and attracts the interest of the layman. 
e are prone in this hurrying age to demand that scientific 
work yield immediate and profitable results. There is danger 
of forgetting that lying back of applied botany there must be 
an ever enlarging fund of fundamental botanical knowledge 
