4 
The Examination of a Witness. 
that no intelligent person can form a true conception of the working 
of a machine until he knows something of its parts and of the 
processes by which complexity has been evolved from simplicity. 
T. F. W. M. Do you then admit that physioloy is worthy of 
a prominent place in an elementary course ? 
W. Yes, the idea that practically all elementary teaching is 
so far dominated by morphology that physiology is disregarded is 
new to me. It is true that some botanists have devoted their 
leisure almost exclusively to morphological problems. “ No man,” 
it has been said, “ can be a pure specialist without being in the 
strict sense an idiot ” : taste or inclination determines what parti¬ 
cular kind of idiocy one adopts. But I am now concerned with 
elementary teaching, and my conviction is that it should be based 
on a dual treatment of plants, morphological and physiological. 
T. F. W. M. But why not, if we may descend for a moment 
to the jargon of the day, “ wash out ” most of the morphology and 
confine yourself to such structural details as are necessary to 
illustrate the principle of division of labour and the general adapta¬ 
tion of plants to land-life ? 
W. The difficulty is to decide upon the minimum amount of 
morphology that is necessary. I maintain that the student ought 
to have some knowledge of the more important morphological 
features as well as an acquaintance with the reproductive phenomena 
of plants selected from each group. To attempt to provide students, 
whose future work will lead them along various and diverse paths, 
with a mere smattering of morphology without giving them at 
least an insight into the vegetative and reproductive phenomena of 
each group would be educationally unsound. If a lecturer is con¬ 
stantly asking himself whether this or that fact is likely to have a 
practical bearing upon a student’s future work and fears to burden 
the minds of his pupils with any theoretical questions connected 
with phylogeny, if I may venture to use the word, lest such questions 
should savour of academicism, he is not likely to produce botanists 
who can adapt themselves to the particular conditions under which 
they may eventually be placed. There is sound sense in Galton’s 
advice to travellers: “Interest yourself chiefly in the progress of 
your journey, and do not look forward to its end with eagerness.” 
A training in which morphology plays a reasonable part has a high 
educational value, and experience has shown that such training pro¬ 
vides a solid foundation for the various applied sciences in which 
botany plays a prominent part. It is true that some of the simpler 
