MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



47 



»of great use to palseontologicai worL-ers, but I do not think 

 to the geologists, tinless it were a man like Mr. Clement 

 Reid, who does make for himself very careful com- 

 parisons of fossil with iccent forms. I do not think 

 that the majority of geological workers would go to the 

 botanical gallery ; they would probably go to the 



geological library, and would there consult the works 

 on pjiljBo-botany which are ready to their hand. 



■Only such men as Seward, Solms-Laubach and 

 others, would go and work in the Botanical Depart- 

 ment. If that department were removed I think 

 it would be a great loss from the palneo-botanical point of 

 view. I should like to say also, with regard to the 

 botandcal library, that it is certainly one of the finest to 

 be consulted anywhere, and I may remind you that it 

 has been incorporated into the general library- catalogue 

 which is being printed, and about half of which is now 



. actually set up and struck off. That is an important point 

 to consider. I hope that if the botanical collection and 

 the botanical libraiy have to be transferred to Kew, that 



.at least the authorities at Kew .should be asked not to take 



^away the duplicate books, but that they should leave be- 

 hind a working Kbraiy of botanical works. That would 

 be of great value, even if they took the rarer and less 

 known books, which are not so much consulted except 

 by historical workers. 



1077. Would what you have just said with reference 

 to the use made of the herbarium be met by what might 

 be called a general, illustrative herbarium, pretty full and 



, complete, but not necessarily containing what botani.sts 

 call type specimens ? — I think if a collection of recent 

 plants were left behind in the Museum it would satisfy 



. all the requirements of student workers, if at did not 

 satisfy the requirements of the men of greater research. 

 It would also be extremely desirable that we should have 



. a collection of recent woods for comparison with the fossil 

 woods, and of microscopic sections of recent plant 

 structures for comparison with the fossil ones. Again, 

 out of the very extensive collections of seeds and woody 

 pericarps, and objects of that sort, we ought to have a 

 good series for comparison with the fossil forms, those 

 ■seeds, for exam^Dle, which are most likely to be found 

 in the fossil state. 



1078. Do you mean in the interests of geology, as well 

 as of palreo-botany ? — In the interests of geology, as well 



: as of palseo-botany. 



1079. May I ask whether your Department derives 

 much advantage from the opportunities of consulting 

 personally the staff of the Botanical Department ? — I do 

 not think I can say they have used that opportunity very 

 mxich, because you must bear in mind that 

 that the only botanical assistance I have had 

 has been in the shape of work done by 



. my staff in arrangement, in the registration of specimens, 

 and in the labelling of specimens ; the scientific part has 



' been done by gentlemen outside the department, like 

 Mr. Kidston and Mr. Seward, whom I have been autho- 

 rised to employ. I may call your attention to these cata- 

 logues simply to show that good work has been accom- 

 plished in the department. {The ivitness handed copies 

 of four palccobotanical catalogues to the Committee.) 

 That is the last catalogue of Mr. Seward, which came out 

 this month. The catalogue of Mr. Kidston on the 



-Carboniferous plants goes back to 1886. Mr. Seward's 

 catalogue of the Wealden plants has also been brought 

 out under my charge in connection with the collection. 

 I have asked for a palseobotanical assistant, but have 

 been unable to obtain one on account of the greater 

 needs of the Zoological Department, which the late 

 Director and the present Director both urged as a 

 reason why I should not have a special palseobotanical 

 assistant giyen me. 



1080. Axe none of your present staff fully qualified to 

 ■.grapple with these problems? — iJsot at present. 



1081. {Mr. Godman.) There is one point I should like 

 to ask, and that is, whether you consider the whole of the 

 fossils as in your Department or not ? I understood you 

 considered them in your Department and under your 

 charge, but Mr. Murray considered a portion of them 

 under his charge? — That I can answer most positively. 

 There has been no agreement made whatever by which 

 any part of my collection should be transferred from my 

 ■care, and I have absolute control over the fossil plants, 

 as I have over every other part of the collection under 

 my charge. The Trustees have issued no command to 

 the contrary. 



1082. Might I use the word, and say they were bor- 

 rowed ? — Borrowed merely means that if in the Mkseum 



there is a man working at a special subject, such as in /j,-, }{, 



the case of Mr. L'arruthers, everyone in the Museum I Food ward, 



assists him by allowing him to work over the specimens F.R..S. 



in the department Avhich relate to the subject on which 



he is engaged. Mr. Bather, for instance, is working at -^ ^ov. 1900. 



fos.sil ci-inoids, and everything relating to recent 



crinoids in the zoological department would, I feel sure, 

 be gladly placed at his disposal to enable him to oarry 

 out the work. 



1083. Do you consider they belong to the Geological 

 Department ? — Xot the recent ones ; they would be only 

 lent for the purj)ose of the special reseai'ch, just as we 

 borrow a book from one department and use it in another, 

 and then the book is returned — it is still under the cus- 

 tody of the Trustees. I may mention, if I may be allowed 

 to do so, that several collections besides the ones cited 

 by Mr. Murray have been transferred from one depart- 

 ment to another. For instance, the Searles-Wood collec- 

 tion was given to Dr. John Edward Gray on condition that 

 it was kept together, but when Mr. Searles-Wood died 

 this collection of Crag mollusca was transferred to the 

 Geological Department on the ground that it properly 

 belonged to that Department. The Gilbertson crinoids, 

 and other carboniferous fossils, were also transferred 

 by Dr. Gray to me, on the ground that, although he 

 cherished the idea of forming a palfeo-zoological col- 

 lection in the old days, he had abandoned that idea, 

 and now transferred them to my Department. 



1084. {Professor Balfour.) A propos of these collections 

 of Eobert Brown and Sir Joseph Hooker, they were in 

 the Botanical Department ; are they borrowed by your 

 depaiitment now, or have they been transferred to you ? 

 — They are transferred unconditionally — without any con- 

 dition whatever. I never heard of any arrangement made 

 between the late Director and the present Keeper of 

 Botany in reference to this matter. 



1085. {Mr. Godman.) You look upon that as a perma- 

 nent transfer? — Yes. 



1086. {Professor Balfour.) Was the transfer made on 

 the initiative of the Keeper of Botany ? — Yes. It arose 

 through asking to have the specimens returned to my 

 department that Mr. Carruthers had been working with, 

 he having retired. Mr. Murray said, "I am not only 

 returning you those, but I am returning you the other 

 fossil plants which I have, with the exception of some 

 few illustrative specimens which aae now in the cases of 

 the public botanical gallery, such as the cycads." 



1087. {Sir John Kirk.) I understand you look upon the 

 use of dried plants as subordinate in exemplifying the 

 study of fossil plants, or of less use than the speoimens 

 of woods and fruits ? — Of course, that is merelj- a com- 

 parison of forms in the case of dried plants, comparing 

 forms of leaves of one plant m, say a hortus siccus, and 

 another plant on a piece of shale. That is, of course, 

 one method of using a herbarium, as, for instance, those 

 Salisburias which were long ago placed by the late Dr. 

 iLindley wdth the fronds of ferns, and are now known to 

 belong to the Coniferse. That is a discovery for which 

 we are indebted to a palseo-botanist, M. Gaudin, of 

 Lausajine. iHe worked at these oolitic shale plants, and 

 pointed out to me the actual resemblance, not only in 

 the form of the leaf, but in the venation of the supposed 

 fossil fei-n leaves in the oolitic shale of Scarborough with 

 the living Ginkgo. 



1088. Do you find rather more alliances than specific 

 affinities among the fossil plants and the living plants ; I 

 mean a general representative herbarium would probably 

 be almost as useful as a typical herbarium containing the 

 type species of described plants ? — No doubt, for a student 

 worker. I was referring more to the advanced worker, 

 who might like to use a larger series before he arrived at 

 a decision which would bear the stamp of his determination 

 afterwards. iNaturally, he would like to be quite sure of 

 his determinations, whereas an elementary worker would 

 be satisfied with a mere comparison. 



1089. Would it hamper you very much, do you think, 

 if the type specimens, or the greater part of them, were 

 removed and representatives left? — ^It would not affect 

 my Department materially, although, of course, I should 

 be very sorry to see them go away, because I know as a 

 matter of fact it is a great accommodation to a large 

 number of people to have a collection conveniently at 

 hand. 



1090. {Professor Balfour.) When the Williamson col- 

 lection was purchased, was it purchased by the Botanical 

 Department or by your Deparitment ? — We have each of 

 us a grant, and until the last few years at the end of the 

 financial year the tmexpended balance was returned to 

 the Treasury ; and we had been in the habit, therefore, 



