BOTAXIC GARDENS. 15 



with reference to the physiology and ecology of plants, is based 

 chiefiy on the results of investigations carried on in botanical 

 gardens and laboratories situated in the northern hemisphere 

 between the parallels of forty and fifty-five degrees. In the 

 herbaria it has been possible to study normal specimens of pre- 

 pared plants from the equator to the poles, and consequently the 

 systematic relationships are much better known than any other 

 characteristic. Morphology has shared these advantages to some 

 extent. 



In the study of the physiology, ecology, and other branches of 

 the science in which living plants are necessary, attention has been 

 necessarily confined to those indigenous to a zone fifteen degrees 

 in width, extending across one small continent and half way across 

 another, together with introduced species growing under more or 

 less abnormal conditions in gardens and conservatories. As the 

 science progresses it is becoming more and more apparent that 

 many of the generalizations based upon investigations carried on 

 under such circumstances are incapable of general application^ 

 and that before a permanent foundation f or the science can be 

 laid, research along all lines must be extended to include the most 

 highly developed f orms, in the primitive habitat of the plant king- 

 dom, in the tropics. The principles of the relations of plants and 

 their relations to the animal kingdom may only be attained by 

 the study of undisturbed communities of plants in the natural 

 groupings resultant from the struggle for existence. Here are 

 to be found such rapidity of growth and metabolism that the 

 adaptive possibilities of the organism reach their highest ex- 

 pression. 



The centers of botanical activity in Europe are so far removed 

 from a tropical flora that only occasionally does a transatlantic 

 investigator find time and opportunity to extend his researches 

 to include normal tropical forms. To do this he must visit 

 Buitenzorg or some other garden nearly half way round the 

 world. 



The center of botanical activity in America has at its very 

 doors a tropical region (in the AVest Indies), unsurpassed in every 

 feature, which may be reached in four or five days from any im- 

 portant city in the country. The establishment of a laboratory 

 and garden in any convenient locality would not only be of un- 

 told value in the general development of botanical science, but it 

 would place within easy reach of the investigator or graduate stu- 

 dent in American universities facilities unequaled by that of any 

 other country. 



The European botanist would also find a laboratory in the- 

 American tropics much. more easily accessible than those of the 

 antipodes. The foundation of such an institution would be of 



