464 BOTANICAL WORK OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 



subsequently worked out in the laboratory. In 1872, Huxley organized 

 the memorable course in elementary biology at South Kensington which 

 has since, in its essential features, been adopted throughout the coun- 

 try. In the following year, during Huxley's absence abroad through 

 ill health, I arranged, at his request, a course of instruction on the 

 same lines for the vegetable kingdom. 



That the development of the new teaching was inevitable can hardly 

 be doubted, and I for my part am not disposed to regret the share I 

 took in it. But it was not obvious, and certainly it was not expected, 

 that it would to so large an extent cut the ground from under the feet 

 of the old natural history studies. The consequences are rather 

 serious, and I think it is worth while pointing them out. 



In a vast empire like our own, there is a good deal of work to be done 

 and a good many posts to be filled, for which the old natural history 

 training was not merely a useful, but even a necessary preparation. But 

 at the present time the universities almost entirely fail to supply men 

 suited to the work. They neither care to collect, nor have they the 

 skilled aptitude for observation. Then, though this country is possessed 

 at home of incomparable stores of accumulated material, the class of 

 competent amateurs who were mostly trained at our universities, and 

 who did such good service in working that material out, is fast disap- 

 pearing. It may not be easy, indeed, in the future to fill important 

 posts even in this country with men possessing the necessary qualifi- 

 cations. But there was still another source of naturalists, even more 

 useful, which has practically dried up. It is an interesting fact that 

 the large majority of men of the last generation who have won distinc- 

 tion in this field have begun their career with the study of medicine. 

 That the kind of training that natural history studies gives is of advan- 

 tage to students of medicine which, rightly regarded, is itself a natural 

 history study, can hardly be denied. But the exigencies of the medical 

 curriculum have crowded them out; and this, I am afraid, must be 

 accepted as irremediable. I can not refrain from reading you, on this 

 point, an extract from a letter which I have received from a distin- 

 guished official lately intrusted with an important foreign mission. I 

 should add that he had himself been trained in the old way. 



"I have had my time, and must leave to younger men the delight of 

 working these interesting fields. Such chances never will occur again, 

 for roads are now being made and ways cut in the jungle and forest, 

 and you have at hand all sorts of trees level on the ground ready for 

 study. These bring down with them orchids, ferns, and climbers of 

 many kinds, including rattan palms, etc. But excellent as are the 

 officers who devote tbeir energy to thus opening up this country, there 

 is not one man who knows a palm from a dragon tree, so the chance is 

 lost. Strange to say, the medical men of the Government service 

 know less and care less for natural history than the military men, who 

 at least regret they have no training or study to enable them to take 

 an intelligent interest in what they see around them. A doctor nowa- 

 days cares for no living thing larger or more complicated than a bacte- 

 rium or a bacillus." 



