22 



DFPAKTMENTAL COMMITTEE ON BOTANICAL WORK; 



Mr. E. M. 

 Holmes, 



F.L.S. 



8 Nov. 1900. 



have access to it restricted ? — I have hardly given enough 

 thoughit to the subject, but from my point of view it 

 would be very useful if it could be seen on the recom- 

 icendation of any teacher of botany. 



399. You think it should be under certain restrictions, 

 without going into what those restrictions should be ? — I 

 think so. As I pass through the rooms at the British 

 Museum I notice that the people there look round at the 

 specimens in a sort of casual way. Comparatively few 

 really study them. Of course, a few do study them, and 

 they would do that much better if they could see them 

 under slight siipervisicn. 



400. Have you had occasion to study fossil plants at 

 all ?— No. 



401. So that the course you recommend has no re- 

 ference whatever to the use of such a herbarium left in 

 the British Museum for geological and palaeontological pur- 

 poses ? — Geology is to a certain extent outside the work 

 of ordinary botanical students ; it only comes within the 

 reach of just a few, those who live in districts where such 

 fossil plants can be obtained. 



402. From what we said just now, we were taking it 

 as it were for granted that the two collections, if amalga- 

 mated together, should be amalgamated at Kew, but now 

 I have to ask you distinctly the question: Supposing the 

 proposed amalgamation takes place, do you think it should 

 be at Kew or do you think it should fbe at the British 

 Museum in the Cromwell Road ? — My opinion is that it 

 would be preferable at Kew, for this reason, that there 

 are certain plamts wbioh you cannot show in a herbarium, 

 such as the CactL It would be impossible to give the Cacti 

 in a hierbarium, but in gardens like Kew, where they 

 grow the majority of the fleshy plants like Euphorbias 

 and Cacti, Aloe and Stapelia, they can be seen fresh. 

 Tlie fleshy plants, as a rule, are far better seen in the 

 live state than they can possibly be in the herbarium. 

 So that as the two thjigs occur at Kew, I sihould think 

 Kew would be decidedly the best place for really 

 efficient work. 



403. May we give this form to your answer, that re- 

 garding the herbarium as a means of botanical research, 

 it is of importa.nce that that herbarium should be con- 

 tiguous with the collection of living plants ? — That is 

 exactly my meaning. 



404. And for that reason you would prefer, in the in- 

 terests of botanical science, that if an amalgamation of 

 the two collections took place, the place where the two 

 collections were shown together should be at Kew? — ^I 

 think that would entirely express my feeling in the 

 matter. 



405. Do you think that in the interests of botanical 

 science and botany it would be su£Bcient to leave, as you 

 suggest, at the British Museum, a reference herbarium 

 arranged according to the natural orders that you spoke of 

 a little while ago ? — I think that a reference museum for 

 teaching purposes should unquestionably be arranged in 

 the systematic orders of plants. Botanical students 

 want to get some bird's-eye view of the general arrange- 

 ment of plants — that is one of the first things students 

 of systematic botany want to know. 



406. But your proposition entails this, does it not, that 

 everyone engaged in botanical problems, even of a simple 

 character, would have to go to Kew, and cculd not find 

 what he wanted at the British Museum ? — I do not quite 

 understand what you mean by the word problem. 



407. I mean, for instance, the distinct identification of a 

 plant ? — I think in any oase that would be necessary. 

 Even if there was the collection at the British Museum, 

 that there is now, it is still necessary to go to Kew, be- 

 cause there are so many plants not represented at the 

 British Museum. I went there the other day to find 

 out a plant I gathered near Guildford, but they could 

 not recognise it at the British Museum. It was ap- 

 parently a Sinapis. It would be necessary, I think, in 

 iny case, if you wanted to absolutely identify a plant, to 

 consult Kew as well, unless it were a common plant. If 

 it were a common or ordinary plant you might find it in 

 the collection at the British Museum. If it were in 

 some cases a special plant, like one of the Central African 

 plants collected by Welwitsch, you would have to go to 

 the British Museum to identify it, because it would not 

 be at Kew. It wo aid, in the majority of oases, be a 

 waste of time to go first to the British Museum and then 

 to Kew. In the interests of botanical science, and in 

 the saving of time and the facilities afforded, Kew, in 

 my opinion, is the best place to have a National Her- 

 barium. But for teaching purposes, one which would 

 enable teachers to get a good idea of the different natural 

 orders, I think a refereiifo collection somewhere in the 



City would be found to be most useful, and is a thing 

 that is really wanted. 



408. Are there not persons who do not give the whole 

 of their time to botanical study, persons engaged in busi- 

 ness or otherwise for the greater part of th..- day, and wbo' 

 spend some of their leisure time in the stu ly of botany^ 

 who find it a very great convenience to have a collection so 

 near at hand as that of the British Museum, which does 

 not necessitate a long journey? — The dilficuliy is that, 

 as a rule, people who are only amateurs bring specimens 

 which are not sufficient for identification. They certainly 

 cannot identify them themselves as a rule. Of course, 

 in some cases you can identify a plant by a picture, but 

 very often these people are not quite sui'e about it. A 

 great many people send such specimens to the journals^ 

 as to the '"Gardeners' Chronicle," or to our own "Phar- 

 maceutical Journal," and get them named through the 

 editors. That saves an immense amount of trouble and 

 time to tlie botanical estaiblishments. It would be a great 

 waste of energy if the oflicials in botanical establishments 

 had to answer the queries of all sorts of people who bring 

 all sorts of plants, very often do not know where the 

 plants came from, and have no idea of their geographical) 

 origin. It may be a garden plant or a weed they have 

 picked up. A botanist like myself, who knows all the 

 British plants practically by sight, could tell probably 

 from the leaf what the plant is likely to be, and thus 

 save an immense amount of trouble to those establish- 

 ments. I do not think it is possible at any reference col- 

 lection for a visitor who is not a systematic botanist to 

 identify all the plants that he brings. He may identify 

 some. 



409. Do you think it would ibe simply sufficient to have 

 an educational herbarium, such as you have suggested, 

 arranged according to the natural orders, or would it be 

 also very desirable to have a collection arranged geographi- 

 cally also for educational purposes 1 — ^An additional geo- 

 graphical collection might be an advantage, 'but it already 

 exists at Kew. They are arranged geographically tliere. 



410. But I am speaking of such a collection retained at 

 the British Museum or elsewhere for educational pur- 

 poses, not for research purposes ? — ^I can conceive that a 

 collection of types geographically arranged might be use- 

 ful, but a complete geographical arrangement, it seems to 

 me, would be so extensive and so puzzling to the ordinary 

 student that it would be practically useless. 



411. There are at the British Museum certain old col- 

 lections, pre-Linnean collections ; supposing the two col- 

 lections were united together, would you advise that they 

 should go to the united collection ? — -There are also some 

 of the same kind at Kew, but they are known, so +'., 

 speak. At the British Museum one does not always 

 know what there really is. Some years ago a gentleman 

 had occasion to make enquiry, and he found a collection 

 there that had been lost sight of, a very interesting col- 

 lection indeed*. I think if those special collections were 

 put in a separate wing of the building at Kew, where 

 those who have to refer to historical specimens could 

 utilise them, it would be to the best advantage. Some- 

 times a question crops up in this way : you want to ascer- 

 tain what the plant of an old writer really was, because 

 it may be a question of terminology, whether the name 

 given by the old author should be used, or something 

 given since, and on reference to the old specimens it 

 sometimes turns out that it is quite a different plant 

 from what it was supposed to^e. Therefore it is very 

 useful for reference to have the old herbarium close to- 

 the General Herbarium in order to determine questions 

 of this kind. 



412. Supposing the union takes place, you think that 

 they should not be left at the British Museum, but 

 should be transferred to Kew? — ^They would be most 

 useful at Kew, certainly. 



413. The plan which you recommend, of the uniting 

 of the two collections into one complete national collec- 

 tion, would probably entail very considerable expense. 

 Without being able to say what the expense would be, 

 but taking it that it would be great, are the advantages 

 of such a special character as to justify a demand upon 

 the public purse for that expense ? — I think the advan- 

 tages to the scientific public are quite sufficiently im- 

 portant to justify it. 



414. It has been represented to us that in the in- 

 terests of research there is a certain advantage in haviniT 

 two institutions like the one at Kew and the one at the 

 British Museum doing more or less the same work. It 

 is represented that the competition or rivalry between 

 the two keeps both of them more active than either i f 



*This statement (cf. Q. 451, 452, 477 et seqq.) led t> 

 the correspondence given in Appendix IH., pp. 177-179. 



