SCIENCE. 



FRIDAY, MARCH 13, 1885. 



of Professor Penhallow of McGill university. 

 We wish the plan all success. 



COMMENT AND CRITICISM. 



A plan is on foot for establishing in Mount 

 Royal park, Montreal, a botanic garden, to be 

 under the joint care and patronage of Mc- 

 Gill universit}' and the Horticultural society. 

 Those who are familiar with the superb park 

 and its deservedly famous drives will at once 

 understand what an unrivalled opportunity 

 Montreal possesses for giving to its citizens 

 another source of enjoyment. With a water- 

 supply practically limitless, and with every 

 needful exposure to the sun upon its slopes, 

 the mountain furnishes as fine a location for a 

 botanic garden at the north as can be imagined. 

 It is wisely suggested that much prominence 

 be given, in the new enterprise, to the special 

 horticultural and arboricultural features which 

 offer so wide a field for profitable study in our 

 northern climates. 



Of the educational advantages to university 

 students, of a botanic garden and an arbore- 

 tum, it is superfluous to speak, since they are 

 self-evident ; but it may be well to refer briefly 

 to the great value to a community of a botanic 

 garden as a means of culture to the children in 

 the public schools, as well as to the thousands 

 who can find little time, and who have but 

 little inclination, to acquaint themselves with 

 the world of beauty around them. In a 

 properly arranged botanic garden, the groups 

 of plants having different and interesting 

 habits — for instance, the climbers, the insec- 

 tivorous plants, the weather- plants, and those 

 which furnish the principal vegetable products 

 — are visited and carefully examined by many 

 who would otherwise seldom look into the book 

 of nature. We presume that no scientific 

 man can object in any reasonable way to such 

 a method of popularizing science. The enter- 

 prise is fortunately to receive the judicious care 



No. 110. — 1885. 



We have given space to Mr. Cox's long 

 letter attacking our comments upon microsco- 

 pists, because he has brought against us an 

 accusation of unfairness. We can assure Mr. 

 Cox that our expressions were induced by no 

 animus or personal feeling, but were called 

 forth by the tendency, specially marked in 

 this country, to give a separate dignity to 

 microscopy, and to glorify the tool at the ex- 

 pense of the work. The microscope is a tool, 

 like the tweezers or the hammer ; and the sci- 

 ences cannot be divided according to the tool 

 used. That microscopes are so fine and elabo- 

 rate may explain, but does not lessen, the 

 error of regarding microscopy as a separate 

 science. To make microscopy as generally 

 understood, a little petrography is patched 

 together with a little anatomy, some parts of 

 botany, a little crystallography and chemistiy, 

 and some optics. Mr. Cox invites a compari- 

 son with astronomy as the science of what 

 is beyond vision in distance ; but the astrono- 

 mer is not a telescopist, and does not claim 

 that every thing which can be done with a 

 telescope should be grouped together under 

 one science. He recognizes his instrument as 

 his tool. 



The microscope is a noble apparatus ; and 

 one who thoroughly studies all the principles 

 involved in its construction, and invents im- 

 provements in it or its use, is deservedly to be 

 called both a microscopist and a scientific man. 

 Usually the microscopist is, however, confes- 

 sedly an amateur, and gives his attention 

 to very various objects ; while those who use 

 the microscope constantly — the pathologists, 

 embryologists, botanists, petrographers, etc. 

 — unquestionably prefer to be called after the 

 department of science they follow, not micros- 

 copists after their instruments. We think 



