PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 7 



was the Colonial Botanist of South Australia, and he 

 undoubtedly inherited the talents which he displayed from 

 the time when in 1875, he became Botanist to a Board 

 appointed to deal with the diseases of plants and animals. 

 He had a varied experience as a young man, partly in the 

 gold-fields of Victoria, partly in New Zealand and finally 

 in Queensland, where he interested himself in private 

 business. In 1881, he was appointed Colonial Botanist and 

 was enabled to devote all his time to a subject for which 

 he was peculiarly adapted. From 1874, publication suc- 

 ceeded publication from his pen, and the descriptions of 

 new plants followed one another in such rapid succession, 

 that it is difficult to estimate the total number of additions 

 that he made to the Queensland flora. They are certainly 

 very considerable. As his last publication appeared in 

 April 1915, he may be said to have died in harness, on June 

 25th, 1915, at the advanced age of 88 years. 



Part II. — Science and Industry. 



We are on the eve of an industrial change and there are 

 signs that science is about to receive some of the recog- 

 nition that is due to it. The war has shown that in the past, 

 we have neglected many of our opportunities when we 

 have allowed the enemy to make so much headway in cer- 

 tain industries. This would never have occurred had we 

 been alive to the fact that our primary and secondary 

 industries must rest upon a purely or upon a partially 

 scientific foundation. There are few that are independent 

 of science. 



Our dependence upon Germany for the bulk of our anilin 

 dyes has shown the British Government, more forcibly than 

 any other thing could have done, as that industry has a 

 purely scientific basis, that the Nation has erred in its 

 neglect of science. Although the value of the dyes imported 



