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I can only mention the remarkable advance that has taken place in 

 plant physiology, and also in the new subject of plant ecology. There 

 should be added plant breeding, which has not only its important scientific 

 aspects in connection with theories of heredity and the origin of species, 

 but has also such enormous practical applications that it is reaching out 

 into the needs of men. 



This gives merely a glimpse of how the old science of botany, as it 

 really was when this Academy was founded, has branched out into its 

 present field of achievement. The student of twenty-five years ago who 

 had studied botany in our colleges and learned just enough about gross 

 morphology to be able to use Gray's "Manual" intelligently, and who re- 

 garded that to represent all there was in botany, would be astonished to 

 see the development of today. 



Following this outline of the expansion of botany in general, I wish 

 to speak of three or four of the most notable advances made in my own 

 special region of morphology, and that is the morphology of vascular 

 plants. To me the most striking feature of morphological progress dur- 

 ing the last twenty-five years has been the breaking down of the old bar- 

 rier set up between what were called cryptogams and phanerogams, the 

 barrier that separated fern plants from seed plants. Not only was this 

 felt to be a solid barrier, but even in universities chairs of botany have 

 been distinguished on the basis of this division of plants. If there is any 

 place in the whole series of plants where there is no gap between great 

 groups it is this very place. I can call attention only to two conspicuous 

 facts that stand out in this connection. One is the discovery a few years 

 ago that certain gymnosperms (cycads) possess fern-like swimming sperms, 

 a feature that associates these seed plants very closely with ferns. The 

 second is the discovery during the present decade of the great paleozoic 

 group of fern-like seed plants. All are familiar with the fact that the 

 coal vegetation was thought to be largely a fern vegetation because the 

 preserved leaves looked like fern leaves ; but it is now recognized that 

 all of these great frond groups of the coal vegetation were seed-bearing 

 plants. In fact, paleobotanists are sure now of only one family of paleo- 

 zoic ferns. 



Another fact of equal interest is the uncovering of the so-called meso- 

 zoic cycads. These have proved to be far removed from the other gymno- 

 sperms in their essential characters. We have a sort of national pride in 



