136 



Appendix 1 : 



of plants as would supply a " sound foundation upon whiei 

 the science of botany can be usefully established," arise 

 from his estimating the science of botany as limited to 

 that particular department of it to ■which ihe has devoted 

 his life, and in which he has done important service. 

 The profound study of plants is, in ihis view, " their 

 accurate determination and practical classification," and 

 he states that he requires for its prosecution nothing 

 more than an exhaustive herbarium of the fragments of 

 plants supplying (the diagnostic characters at present 

 employed for distinguishing genera and species, with a 

 complete library and staff of officers. This is, in my 

 opinion, a very defective estimate of the science of botany, 

 and of the materials required for its advancement. 



Rdbert Brown took a very difi"erent view of tih^e pro- 

 found study of p'lants, and in the Botanical Department 

 of the British Museum he tried to develop that masterly 

 grasp of the science whicih is to be found in his works, 

 by illustrating, as far as possible, the structure of all the 

 parts from the lowest to the highest, both existing and 

 extinct. Accordingly, the N'ational Herbarium, large as 

 it is, forms 'but a part of the botanical collections. The 

 specimens placed in the outer rooms, which exhibit chiefly 

 the form and structure of the stems and roots of plants, 

 are as necessary a part of the purely scientific collection 

 as the dried foliage and flowers in the herbarium. While 

 such specimens "excite the interest" and) "gratify the 

 curiosity" (and, what is more important, instruct the 

 minds) "of the general public," these are very far from 

 being their principal, still further from being their only 

 purpose in a botanical museum, as Mr. Bentham appears 

 to imply. The scientific investigaitor, whose notion di 

 systematic botany is somewhat larger tlian ascertaining 

 the technical name and order of a plant, consults these 

 specimens as he does the herbarium. It is, therefore, 

 a mistake to suppose that they, "w'hen once placed, re- 

 quire no further handling." 



The purely scientific collection of the British Museum 

 consists of : — 



I. The Henbarium, comprising — 

 a. The General heiflDaxium. 

 h. The British henbarium. 



c. Various separate small and complete herbaria of 

 historical interest. 



II. The Structural series, comprising — 



a. The fruit collection. 



h. The collection of gums, resins, and other natural 

 products. 



c. The general collection, exhibiting the form and 



structure of plants, and consisting of the larger 

 specimens oh'iefly exhibited to the ipublic ; and 



d. The microscopical preparations, illustrating the 



minute structure of recent and fossil plants. 



2. The limitation of the science of botany to the plants 

 now existing on the earth is another grave defect. No 

 subject has recently received more attention from 

 biologists than the relation between existing andl extinct 

 plants and animals. Every philosophic estimate, or 

 systematic classification of the one kingdom or the other 

 must include the fossil as well as the recent. This is 

 fully acknowledged and acted upon, by zoologists, and no 

 better illustration can be adduced than Professor Huxley's 

 "Introduction to the Classification of Animals" (1869). 

 In botany, also, in the standard and only complete Genera 

 Plantarum, by Endlicher, the fossils are ranged in their 

 systematic position with the recent plants. It is true 

 that the Genera Plantarum now in progress, of which 

 Mr. Bentham is one of the authors, ignores all extinct 

 plants. This retrograd'e step is in enitire accordance 

 with the views expressed by Mr. Bentham in "IN'ature." 

 A systematic account of the Lycopodiacece, which took 

 no notice of the arborescent forms of the palseozoic age, 

 or of the Cycadece, which ignored the numerous forms 

 and remarkable variations of this order in the secondary 

 rocks, would be obviously very incomplete and unsatis- 

 factory. In forming a collection to supply a sound 

 foundation for the science of botany, it would be as 

 reasonable to exclude the plants of any existing botanical 

 province — say Australia — as to omit those which 'have 

 existed at any particular period of the earth's 'history — 

 say that of the Wealden. 



3. The distinction which Mr. Bentham draws between 

 a herbarium " for the close study of plants " and one for 

 their "rapid determination without dissection" is most 

 undesirable, and, in my opinion, practically impossible. 

 No botanist has so extensive an acquaintance with the 



Linneau 

 Collection, 



vegetable kingdom as to be able to make "a close 

 study," in his necessary work, of every group of plants 

 he may be naming or arranging ; he must in many groups 

 make a "rapid determination without dissection." If 

 Mr. Bentham's distinction were in force, and the two 

 herbaria he proposes existed, he would himself, when 

 rapidly naming some of the important collections which 

 have passed through his hands, have often been driven 

 from the great scientific collection to work in his single 

 specimen herbarium with the " general naturalist," " the 

 palaeontologist," and "the mere amateur." Every 

 systematic botanist is at first, and more or less aU along, 

 a " comparer " of plants. The man who begins as a mere 

 comparer, naturally becomes a close student under the 

 influence of the collection he is consulting, and the 

 workers he encounters in that consultation. 



4. Mr. Bentham's single specimen herbarium is chiefly 

 intended for the palaeontologist, and, in addition, he 

 proposes to provide him with "separate collections of 

 leaves and fruits, ... so arranged as to enable 

 them to be rapidly glanced over," and these, it is added, 

 "would be most useful." No better testimony to the 

 utter worthlessness of such materials for the purpose 

 proposed can be adduced than the criticisms of Mr. 

 Bentham himself, on the evidence for the existence of 

 the natural order Proteaceoe in Europe, from leaves 

 found in Tertiary strata. Mr. Bentham was specially 

 fitted to deal critically with the hundred fossil species 

 referred to this Order, as he had just made the analysis 

 and detailed descriptions of between five and six hundred 

 Proteaceoe. The Order is also the -best fitted to test the 

 value of the leaf characters on which the fossils had Proceedings 

 been referred to it, because, as he testifies, it "is one Linnean 

 of the most distinct and most clearly defined amongst igyg*^*^' 

 phanerogams," and is without " a single plant inter- p. ix'xxv. 

 mediate in structure between that and the nearest allied 

 Orders." With regard, then, to the leaves of this Order. 

 Mr. Bentham says : " I must admitthat there is a certaii* 

 general facies in the foliage of this Order that enables 

 us, in most, but not in all, cases, to refer to it with p. ixxxviii! 

 tolerable accuracy — leafy specimens known to have come 

 from a proteaceous country, even without flowers or 

 fruit^ — but as to detached leaves, I do not know of a single 

 one which, in outline or venation, is exclusively charac- 

 teristic of the Order, or of any one of its genera." I 

 cannot reconcile this declaration by Mr. Bentham, to 

 the Fellows of the Linnean Society, as jtheir President, 

 in May 1870, with the statement published by him 

 within a year thereafter, that such a collection of 

 detached leaves, not for a limited and exceptionally de- 

 fined Order, but for the whole vegetable kingdom, 

 "would be most useful." 



I must further observe, that Mr. -Bentham has over- 

 looked the fact that a large proportion of fossil plants 

 have been determined from their internal structure, that 

 is, on evidence which no mere herbarium, however 

 extensive, can supply, far less one for rapidly determin- 

 ing plants without dissection, or a collection of detached 

 leaves. The palaeontologist requires the most extensive 

 collections possible for his work, and he must be a work- 

 ing zoologist or botanist. All such work done by mere 

 "geologists," and on such data as Mr. Bentham proposes 

 to supply, would always deserve strong condemnation. 



II. In considering the matters naturally flowing out 

 of Mr. Bentham's paper, and the views I have now 

 expressed, I venture first to submit the reasons which 

 make it desirable, in my opinion, to retain the two 

 herbaria as separate and independent institutions. 



1. The two herbaria already exist, and are, to a con- 

 siderable extent, parallel collections. Mr. Bentham, 

 whose extensive private herbarium formed the founda- 

 tion of the public herbarium at Kew, declared, in 1858, 

 "that a great portion of the additions to the Banksian 

 herbarium, since Sir Joseph's death, are duplicates of 

 those already at Kew." As the Banksian plants form 

 less than a quarter of those now existing in the British 

 Museum herbarium, the duplicates would be, according 

 to Mr. Bentham, labout three-fonrthte of the whole. 

 Sir William Hooker, also, whose large collections form 

 the great bulk of the Kew herbarium, testified, in 1858, 

 that " the Museum specimens . are to a great extent 

 duplicates of those at Kew." And the present Director 

 of Kew Gardens corroborated this statement at that time. 

 In 1860, Sir William Hooker further said, in reference 

 to the transfer of the National Herbarium to Kew, as 

 affecting the herbarium there, " To Dr. Hooker and 

 myself it literally and truly can be a matter of no 

 consequence." 



2. The two herbaria have been under different manage- 

 ment, and, to some extent, express different results of 



E,etuni to 

 House of 

 Commons, 

 >fo. 126, 

 nth March 

 1S59, p. 7. 



Return to 

 House of 

 Commons, 

 No. 126, p. 3. 



Evidence 

 before the 

 Select 

 Committee 

 on the 

 British 

 JJuseum, 

 1860, p. 100. 



