254 
TITE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 
It is unnecessary to remark that thorough and accurate acquaintance 
with facts of structure is incidentally essential. But to claim the 
larger portion of the student’s time and energy for the work of 
becoming acquainted with the details of structure of all the various 
groups of plants involves, in my view, a very serious misdirection of 
effort. 
“There should he no division of elementary botany into morphology 
and physiology. In advanced work there must, of course, be differen¬ 
tiation, as there must in research, not into morphology and physio¬ 
logy, but into a great number of groups of connected phenomena, 
because of the vast number and complication of the phenomena of 
the plant world. Some minds find their satisfaction in studying 
structure for its own sake, so to speak, and in comparing the struc¬ 
tures studied. Their research will naturally lie in that direction, and 
it is certain to increase, as it has in the recent past already vastly 
increased, our knowledge of the detailed facts of structure of the 
plant kingdom, to reveal unsuspected relationships, and to establish 
probabilities as to the lines evolution has followed. But this know¬ 
ledge in itself,\ considered in relation to the science as a whole, is, and 
must necessarily remain, superficial. Its conclusions even in regard 
to the lines which evolution has followed can at the best never attain to 
more than a considerable degree of probability. And its methods and 
aims can never explain structure in any real sense. For that a study 
of process is essential. 
“ The great development in morphological knowledge, especially of 
what I have called the middle grades of the plant kingdom, and of 
the great groups of fossil plants which belong to these grades, has, as 
we must all recognise, immensely increased our acquaintance with the 
structure of the plant world. It was a natural development of 
interest in the past history of plants, stimulated and directed by the 
acceptance of the doctrine of evolution. Looking back upon the 
history of botany during the past half-century we must be grate¬ 
ful to this movement, and proud of the leading and distinguished 
part our countrymen have played in its development. But I cannot 
think that it has had a wholly good influence on the progress of 
botany, particularly on botanical teaching and research in this 
country. This has remained too long dominated by the ideal of 
tracing phvlogeny, has given far too much time to the detailed mor¬ 
phology of the different groups which make up the plant kingdom, 
and has correspondingly neglected the newer knowledge of process 
which must be the main avenue to a deeper understanding of plants. 
Fortunately there are now many signs of impending change. Mean¬ 
while the younger workers, dissatisfied, especially during the last 
two decades, with the older outlook, have turned more and more to 
specialised physiological research, to mycology or to genetics, with 
their outlets on practical life, but often without the grounding that 
only a thorough grasp of the essentials of the subject can give. One 
of the results has been that botany has to a large extent become dis¬ 
integrated, workers in particular parts of the subject having little 
understanding and less interest in the results of their fellow-workers 
