ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS 3 



agriculture during the financially trying times, however, 

 and the pressure of engagements of a public nature, 

 along with a solid amount of pure laziness, seem to 

 have interfered with the realization of these dreams, and 

 I have only been able to turn my attention to the more 

 utilitarian and practical side of that interesting science. 

 I yield to no one in my admiration of the beautiful 

 in plants — their form and their flowers — or in the 

 extraordinarily interesting expedients made use of for 

 their self-preservation, or in the splendid variety of 

 colour displayed in " the forest of tiniest pale green 

 stems and leaves," or in the more luxuriant fulness of 

 the summer shades, or again in the russet hues of a 

 peaceful decay — the fitting conclusion to the life spent 

 in doing the work for which it was formed. But it 

 has always appeared to me that there remains a distinct 

 and very interesting branch of the subject of plant- 

 distribution, in the consideration of how it is affected 

 by various modes of treatment, natural or otherwise. 

 In walking along a fence dividing a plantation from a 

 pasture, we find a different herbage growing in the shade 

 from that in the open. Even when the plants are not 

 much overshadowed there is a difference on each side 

 of the fence in their variety. Those that do not take 

 kindly to the cropping of cattle and sheep are inconspicu- 

 ous on the one side, but luxuriant on the other. On the 

 other hand, those that grow best on consolidated soil 

 are encouraged by the treading of the stock, but are 

 restricted where the soil is looser. Those who have even 

 casually examined a hill pasture must have noticed the 

 difference in the herbage on the sheep walks from the 

 rest of the pasture, due to this treading. One animal 

 in particular alters the nature of the plant-life of most 

 of the haunts of the plant-collector, namely the rabbit, 

 which is most fastidious in its tastes, and owing to its 

 breeding early in the year has the first bite in the opening 

 spring. Early wild plants stand most in jeopardy. There 



