210 BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF CANADA. 



countries as in Canada, and thus do not present the same attraction to the 

 Canadian resident, who desires to extend the sphere of knowledge. An As- 

 tronomical Society, for example, would not have the peculiar advantages of a 

 Botanical Society in a country like this. It may be said that now is scarcely 

 the time to commence a Botanical Society, that the country is not yet 

 far enough advanced, that botany is not sufficiently studied, to warrant the 

 establishment of a Botanical Society. It is true that botany has been 

 neglected in this country. While this is a reproach to Canada, it affords 

 no reason why a society should not be established. On the contrary, it is 

 a strong reason why an attempt should be made to form one. There is a 

 patriotic feeling rising up in Canada which is especially strong in the youth 

 of the province, and every well-wisher of Canada must be delighted to see 

 it. Here then is an opportunity, by the establishment of this society, to 

 wipe off a reproach that has long hung over the country, by prosecuting a 

 path of research that has been neglected. The proper method, then, is to 

 begin early to engage in the work, and the society will progress, increasing 

 not only our botanical knowledge, but fostering the taste for its study. 

 Thus, as the science progresses among us, the society will extend, so that 

 we may hope in time to see the germ which we this evening cast into the 

 soil grow up into a goodly tree, spreading its branches over the length and 

 breadth of Canada, which is yet destined to be a great country. 



Professor Lawson pointed out the peculiar sphere in which the botanist 

 is called to labour, the range of his studies, and the means required for 

 their pursuit. It was of great importance that at the outset the real object 

 of the proposed society should be understood. The establishment of a 

 Botanical Garden and other appliances must be regarded as secondary to 

 the great object of the society, the prosecution of scientific botany. Botany 

 is at alow ebb in Canada, at a lower ebb than in most civilised or half 

 civilised countries on the face of the earth. At the close of the eighteenth 

 century only five dissertations on botanical subjects had been published by 

 the whole medical graduates of the great continent of America. Since then 

 the indefatigable labours of such men as Michaux, Torrey, Harvey, Curtis, 

 Boott, Engelmann, Tuckermann, Sullivant, Lesquereux, and especially of 

 one whose name and fame rise above all the rest, Asa Gray, have brought 

 our knowledge of the botany of the United States on a level with that of 

 the best botanised countries of Europe. The Flora of Canada has also 

 been elaborated since then by one who still presides over the destinies of 

 botanical science, not in England alone, for his authority is recognised 

 wherever the science is pursued. But during a period of nearly thirty 

 years very little has been added to our published knowledge of Canadian 

 botany. Information respecting our indigenous plants must still be sought 

 in the work of Sir William Hooker, issued from the Colonial-office in Eng- 

 land, in 1833. That work, founded as it necessarily was on dried speci- 

 mens carried home by passing travellers, afforded to the botanical world an 

 admirable example of how much could be made out of slender material 

 when in good hands. Unimpeachable as a work of science, unsurpassed in 



