104 
a very important one has been in active work for some time at Barbados. 
The Curators at these Stations are, for the most part, men carefully 
trained at Kew, and their chief qualification is a thorough knowledge 
of horticultural methods as applied to кле plants. The main object 
in view is to meet the special circumstances of the West Indies at the 
present time, and do all that is possible to а a diversified system 
of cultural industries, and thus relieve them from the results inevitable 
from the fluctuations of prices in the one or two staples to which they 
have hitherto confined their attention. The Botanical Station scheme 
affords indirectly the basis of a federation for purely economic purposes 
likely to be beneficial to all classes of the community. 
As the scheme took root the discussion of details involved a heav 
u 
The task seemed almost hopeless of solving the difficulties success- 
fully by correspondence alone. It ee efore seemed advisable to send 
out to the West Indies a member of the Kew Staif, who by и corse 
experience was well aequainted with die different Colonies, and who by 
oral discussion would be able to remove many of the obstacles in ie 
way of the ser of the scheme. The task was entrusted to Mr. 
Morris, F.L. the Ass istant Director, who before his transfer to 
under which the Imperial Government assented to Mr. Morris’s mission. 
He left England in November last, and returned to Kew at the end of 
February. His detailed report on the present position of the Bota- 
nical Stations is, by permission of the от of State, reproduced in 
the present numbers of the Kew Bulletin 
ROYAL GARDENS, lb to COLONIAL OFFICE. 
SIR, oyal Gardens, Kew, 21 March 1890. 
I mave the honour to Алы the receipt of your letter of 
March 15, in which you inform me of tlie general concurrence ot the 
Secretary of State in the views which { have ventured to express as to 
the measures which it appears to me desirable to take for the А9 
ment of the resources of the West India Islands, by what may be 
veniently described as “ botanical enterprise 
A eal, as you are aware, has heen already gms get in the 
way of the needful o organisation. But though n e been 
spared by this establishment to get matters ho 4 a right ove by 
means of unofficial cor respondenee, I cannot say that I am altogether 
satisfied with the position in which they at present stand. I am driven, 
therefore, to the conclusion that the new system will only obtain the 
of an officer thoroughly conversant with the technical details of an 
administrative problem of this deseription, and well acquainted with the 
successive steps which, duri ing the past eight years, have been taken in 
its development, 
It is for these reasons that I have suggested that the Assistant 
Director should go out to the West Indies next winter. ust confess 
at I am reluctant to deprive myself of the services of the principal 
