74  Next  Steps  in  Botanical  Science.  {^£2* '^fm1' 
know  our  science  sufficiently  well  we  can  easily  discern  the  more 
important  parts.  Let  him  whose  knowledge  is  too  limited  to  enable 
him  to  see  over  the  whole  field  step  aside.  Let  him  who  has  no 
adequate  perception  of  the  pedagogical  aspects  of  the  problem  step 
aside.  Then  let  the  select  few  make  a  pronouncement,  subject 
to  periodical  revision.  This  is  the  way  that  scientific  men  should 
settle  the  question.  This  is  the  way  it  will  be  settled  some  day, 
in  the  not  very  distant  future. 
The  Botanical  Stations. — But  the  college  and  university  depart- 
ments are  by  no  means  all  that  are  engaged  in  botanical  work. 
Within  the  past  twenty-five  years  many  stations  have  arisen  in 
which  botanical  investigations  are  made.  Lnder  various  local 
names  they  are  in  fact  "  investigation  stations  "  and  while  their 
results  have  not  been  uniformly  reliable  it  is  a  most  hopeful  sign 
of  progress  that  they  exist  at  all.  Foremost  among  these  are  the 
fifty  or  more  agricultural  experiment  stations  to  which  I  have 
already  briefly  referred,  with  assured  support  from  the  states  and 
the  national  government  for  all  time  to  come,  in  which  botanical 
investigation  forms  no  inconsiderable  part  of  the  work  undertaken. 
Hampered  as  they  generally  were  in  their  earlier  years  by 
incompetent  direction,  and  often  by  still  more  incompetent 
workers,  it  is  gratifying  to  know  that  year  by  year  there 
has  been  marked  improvement  in  both,  and  that  now  many  of 
the  directors  are  men  of  such  scientific  training  that  they  wisely 
use  the  means  at  their  disposal  for  investigations  of  permanent 
scientific  value.  And  if  I  read  aright  the  tendencies  in  these  sta- 
tions, it  will  not  be  long  until  their  scientific  output  will  be  wholly 
reliable,  as  indeed  it  is  now  in  some  cases.  This  condition  will  be 
fully  realized  when  these  stations  are  wholly  under  the  direction 
of  men  of  broad  scientific  training. 
And  here  again  we  have  a  duty  to  perform.  We  must  recognize 
the  agricultural  experiment  stations  as  permanent  parts  of  the 
botanical  equipment  of  the  country.  They  will  be  with  us  in  the 
future,  and  their  results  will  continue  to  be  added  to  botanical 
knowledge.  We  must  accept  them  as  a  part  of  our  scientific  equip- 
ment, and  help  to  make  them  more  efficient.  It  will  not  do  for  us 
to  stand  aloof,  and  decry  their  results  as  not  accurate,  and  as 
agricultural  instead  of  botanical.  When  we  fully  realize  that  we 
have  in  these  experiment  stations  so  many  institutions  of  endowed 
research,  we  shall  not  hesitate  to  welcome  them  to  the  ranks  of 
