128 
NATURE NOTES 
I have mentioned a few cases in which the reasons for the 
forms and shapes, and colours and habits, may be explained 
with more or less probability, but the unsolved problems of 
plant life are almost infinite. To make a collection is no doubt 
interesting, but it is like making a library. What is the use 
of the books if you do not read them ? What is the value of 
a collection if you do not use it? Aristotle said the greatest 
happiness of gods or man was to be found in the study of 
nature ; and I think that one of the wisest of the many wise 
sayings which we owe to this distinguished man. 
The problems of plant life are all but infinite. Great indeed 
as is the pleasure which flowers give to the eye, it is less than 
the delight which they afford the mind. They offer an endless 
series of most interesting mechanical, optical, chemical, and 
other problems. It is not going too far to say that there is not 
a single plant — not even the commonest — of which the whole 
life history, properties and structures are fully known to us — 
not one which would not well repay, I do not say the attention 
of an hour, but even the devotion of a lifetime. 
Sir John T. Goldney, in seconding the motion, said he was 
rather sorry he had been called upon, because he was taking the 
place of a man who could speak much better than he could (Sir 
George Kekewich). He had lived, he said, for nearly a quarter of 
a century in tropical countries, and no one who had lived under 
such conditions could help taking a deep interest in plants and 
animal life. Though he had an uncle who was a distinguished 
botanist, he had learnt nothing of botany before going to the 
tropics, but with the object of interesting some young English- 
men and Scotsmen in the study, he was instrumental in starting 
a field naturalist club, and what he knew of natural history or 
botany was due to going and hearing those young men giving 
accounts and producing specimens of what they had seen while 
on their rambles. He desired to impress upon the Society the 
necessity of teaching young men what good a society like that 
could do. It was impossible to be a botanist without being a 
naturalist, the two things were so closely allied ; in considering 
one they must consider the other. Not only were the study of 
botany and natural history instructive, but they taught people to 
observe. Then, when the power of observation had been 
acquired, the student was not satisfied with merely seeing the 
structure of a plant, he wanted to know its uses and how it could 
be converted to the uses of mankind. Nothing, in his opinion, 
was more interesting than to go out into the fields and have 
flowers and plants explained. In due course the student would 
explain the mysteries to other people. He referred to several 
peculiar plants, including the sensitive plant, which had always 
appeared most remarkable to him. His idea always had been 
that it had the power of withering up when touched, so that a 
horse or a cow, if desirous of eating it, would pass it by as being 
a dead plant. As to wild flowers, he might be taking a selfish 
