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Section IV, 1891. 
 
 [ 17 ] 
 
 Trans. Roy. Soo. Canada. 
 
 II. — On the Present State of Botany in Canada, loith HHg<jestio)i8 as to promising lines 
 of investifjation, and a projiosal for united efort in systematic observation 
 throughout the several Provinces and Territories. 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 By George Lawson, PhD., LL.D., F.I.C. 
 
 (Read May 27, 1891.) 
 
 At the present time, botanical researcli in Canada depends largeljr upon voluntary 
 service. Even the teaching of Botany of our colleges and iiniversities is left too much to 
 professors overburdened with other duties. The work of research may bo allocated to 
 distinct departments. First, w^e have the investigation of the minute structure of the 
 plant, the forms and modifications of its tissue elements, their modes of development, and, 
 generally, those phenomena that are directly traceable to the action in the living plant of 
 the granular semi-fluid which Hugo von Mohl, nearly sixty years ago, called "protoplasm," 
 and w^as content to regard as simply primordial organic substance concerned in the pro- 
 cesses of cell-development, 
 
 Research in this department requires careful training on the part of the student in 
 the use of th' micToscope and its adjuncts, in staining-, and other rnethods now commonly 
 employed to . ause the tissue elements to reveal their intimate textures, and in the appli- 
 cation of chemical tests to disclose the successive changes in the nataic of the celicon" 
 tents, of the compounds associated with and separable from the protoplasm in the 
 processes of growth, and of the various substances that become secreted or separated from 
 the ordinary active cell-sap, and collect, either in special receptacular cells, or in inter- 
 cellular glandular cavities, or are poured out on the surface. 
 
 "We have also the study of plant organs, formed by the association and union of the 
 tissues into anatomical forms, the physiological actio is of such organs, and, specially, 
 the effects of heat, light, moisture, soil-constituents, and other external agencies in relation 
 thereto, as well as on the plant's activities in general. 
 
 Notwithstanding all that has already been done, there is- still ample room for research 
 in regard to the process of assimilation, or appropriation of inorganic matter, and its trans- 
 formation into organic substance, — two obviously distinct processes that cannot, with our 
 present knowledge, be clearly seiiaratcd. 
 
 The series of changes w^hich the organic matter once formed afterwards undergoes, 
 that is, its .subsequent transmutation or metastasis, now known as metabolism, whereby 
 new and remarkable compounds are produced, is a subject of no less interest, either from a 
 physiological or chemical point of view ; and, inasmuch as its elt'ective study is so recent, 
 it oilers a f /tiie field in whii'h only detached patches have been cultivated. 
 
 The subject of the movements of plants, or rather of their organs, needs only to be 
 mentioned to recall observations already recorded suggestive of the interest pertaining to 
 many that still remain to be made. 
 
 Sec. IV, 1801. 3. 
 
 V 
 
18 
 
 GEORflE LAWSON ON TIIK 
 
 As regards the remarkably multifarious, yet correlative, processes of reprodvictiou in 
 the vegetable kingdom, their phouomeua have been steadily under iuA-estigation, with 
 constantly increasing improvement of apparatus and appliances, for half a century, and 
 the interest and wealth of results only increase with the years. 
 
 Investigation of the subjects to which I have thus brioily alluded can be uuderiaktm, 
 with reasonable jirospect of success, only by those who have enjoyed preliminary training 
 in the more recent modes of investigation, and in the use of the varied forms of apparatus 
 that have been designed to enable observations and experiments to be made with the 
 nearest possible approach to precision. Fortunately, the efforts of our higher educational 
 institutions, not only the universities and professional schools, but high .schools and 
 academies, and also some of our agricultural establishments, colleges and experimental 
 stations, are now being put forth, with fair show of success, to meet the wants of botanical 
 students. Where even a preliminary training only in manipulatior. is obtained, zeal, 
 energy and perseverance may do the rest. 
 
 From what has been stated, it will be obvious that etfbrts to extend our knowledge 
 in the departments enumerated will depend to a very large extent ixpon the practical 
 laboratory teaching at the universities and other public institutions throughout the sev- 
 eral provinces. Where this is provided researches will be undertaken by special and gra- 
 duate students. This kind of university work is the crowning fruit of his teaching that 
 rewards a professor's labours. Every effort should be made to encourage such students to 
 continue their work after leaving college, otherwise the labour spent in college, while of 
 educational value to the individual, may be lost so far as the interests of science are con- 
 cerned. This remark may not be thought entirely out of place when I mention that a 
 friend told me within the last few days that on a recent revisit to Germany, Dr. Stras- 
 burger, the well-kuowu vegetable physiologist, in whose laboratory he had worked in 
 former years, expressed, not his delight only, but his surprise, that his American pupil 
 had really continued to go on with his microscopical work after returning to his American 
 home. 
 
 What I have said in regard to research in the minute aaat omy and physiology of 
 plLuts generally will apply, to a large extent, to an allied department of a still more special 
 character, viz., fossil botany, which, through the indefatigable labours and admirable 
 researches extending over so many years of Sir William Dawson and latterly of Dr. 
 Penhallow, has been so prominent in the publications of the Royal Society of Canada as 
 to command attention to our publication wherever the subject is studied, and attention to 
 the subject wherever our publication reaches. 
 
 After receiving proper training in methods of observation and in the mechanical pro- 
 cesses of pref)aring specimens, the physiological and the palasontological botanists may 
 ( Qtinuc to i)ursue their work at home almost single-handed. It is not so with the system- 
 atic or species botanist. He is continually in need of the assistance of others in multi- 
 farious ways, and, whether monographing a family, investigating the relations of a puzzling 
 species, or tabulating facts for a speculation in geographical botany, he must have con- 
 stant recourse to the observations, collections, libraries and advice of others. 
 
 While, then, the increased fiicilities that are being provided at our universities, or some 
 of them, for the pursuit of the lines of research embraced under the still expressive terms 
 anatomy and physiology of plants, may bo expected to lead to advancement hitherto 
 
 . 
 
PllKSIiNT STATH OF BOTANY IN CANADA. 
 
 19 
 
 miexamplod, it is also to be foarcd that 1^ * direction thus giveu to the studies of college 
 students will tend to lessen rather than increase their attention to field, or what is perhaps 
 best known on this continent ks systematic or species botany. 
 
 The energies of our cf _ge students and graduates will thus, in the future, be with- 
 drawn, not wholly, it is hoped, but necessarily to some extent, from the mere woiJ< of 
 collecting and naming specimens (in itself a valuable educational exercise), and from the 
 practical study of botanical classifiijation and the diagnostic characters of the genera and 
 species of Canadian plants. We may still rely upon an increasing number of amateur 
 workers throughout the country, persons of leisure, and even men laden with professional 
 duties, who, while seeking a well-earned week's rest in a rural district, may tire of admir- 
 ing beauties of field and wood, as if Nature offered a mere dumb show, and perchance 
 turn even to botany books for some whisper of the language she speaks. 
 
 We have now a comparatively new, but rapidly increasing, source of botnnical power 
 in the large army of school teachers and their pupils in our academies and common 
 schools throughout the country, botany being taught more or less fully in most of the 
 provinces. They may well take up the work dropped by college students. 
 
 The collecting of facts, the finding of rare plants, the noting of the occurrence or 
 absence of species in given districts, the recording of their times of leafing, flowering and 
 fruiting, can best be done by residents in the several localities, and, if we could succeed in 
 banding together the educational forces of the country lor this purpose, even to a partial 
 extent, immense service might b(^ rendered to our science with the subsidiary advantage 
 of increasing its popularity by giving a large number who at present do not aspire to be 
 botanists some lot or part in its promotion. I am not unmindful of the excellent work 
 that is being done, often in an unostentatioiis manner, by local societies, signally prom- 
 inent among which, as a thorough working botanical society, we must place the ^latural 
 History Society of Ottawa. But the work now being done by such organizations may 
 be largely aided and supplemented, by a more general effort. 
 
 One great want of Canadian botanists is some easy channel of communication with 
 each other. We have no society, and no publication, that will take cognizance of the local 
 lists and scraps of observation that go to make up botanical periodicals so largely and 
 that prove such fertile material in the hands of the botanical worker. There can be no 
 doubt that the progress of botany in Britain during the present century has been largely 
 due to the facilities of publication offered to even the humblest observers by such publica- 
 tions as Loudon's ' Magazine of Natural History,' the London ' Gardeners' Chronicle,' 
 ' The Phytologist,' of Newman, the short-lived ' Botanical Gazette,' of Henfrey, ' Seemau's 
 Journal,' the ' London Journal of Botany,' and other open records, of which everyone 
 could avail himself for the purposes of giving or receiving information. But we have 
 had no such publication in Canada. Thirty years ago an attempt was made to supply 
 this want of our country by issue of the ' Annals of the Botanical Society of Canada.' 
 That publication, during its brief existence, was chiefly remarkable for its local lists of 
 plants, forbidding and unreadable to all but botanical students. Yet these lists gave it a 
 certain permanent value that caused it to be eagerly sought for long after it was out of 
 print. In the United States we have two ably conducted botanical periodicals, and others 
 in England and continental Europe. All of these may be more or less available to Cana- 
 dian botanists, but we are not able through any of them to be sure that we are really 
 
20 
 
 GEOllGE LAWSON ON TJIK PKKSKNT STA'J'K OF iiOTANY, J'Ito. 
 
 bringing oixr fuels within roach of onr own fellow-oonntrymen, to whom thoy will bo 
 most useful. For Iho printing of the inoro finished class of papers, the publications of the 
 numerous local scientific socit'ties in Canada, now happily associated with the Itoyal, give 
 opportunity, and the volumes of ' Transai^tions of the Ivoyal Society ' itself form the proper 
 repository for such treatises as, by their elaboration or requirements of illustration, extend 
 beyond the capabilities of the local societies. However, mere local lists, scraps, accounts of 
 botanical excursions, unless they are marked by literary merit, or some feature extraneous 
 to the mere record of botanical facts, cannot be expected to be acceptable to any of our 
 existing publications, and thus the valuable facts which they embrace are apt to be lost 
 to science. 
 
 It is with the view of suggesting the propriety of adopting some means for advan- 
 tageously meeting the wants, whose existence I merely require to indicate rather than 
 explain, that I have taken the liberty of now asking the attention of this section of the 
 Royal Society. I do not propose that a botanical periodical shall be established. I hope, 
 however, that some method may be devised whereby immediate publication of every 
 season's botanical field observations throughout Canada may be secured. The completion 
 of Prof. Macoun's great work, the " Catalogue of Ca.nadian Plants," in which the working 
 botanists of Canada have now a valuable guide, seems to be a fitting time for devising 
 some suitable scheme. 
 
 My proposal, or suggestion rather, in Imef, then is, not that the Royal Society shall 
 take any action or new responsibility, nor that this section shall do so, but that its 
 botanical members, and those who desire to associate themselves with them, shall form 
 an organization of the simplest possible kind, for securing such of the results referred to 
 as it may be thought wise to attempt, — to organize a band of gleaners, as it were, follow- 
 ing as far as practicable the model of the old Berwickshire Naturalists' Fiell Club of 
 Scotland, that did really good work under the admira1)ly simple constitution that it 
 should have no rules, no by-laws, no officers, no restraint of any kind, but the implied 
 marching order that, on their field days, the members would A'^oluntarily follow their leader 
 as far as their own indiA'idual wills or inclinations might lead them. Oixr organization 
 would possibly require some bond of union a little stronger than this. I forbear, how- 
 ever, to make any suggestion, even in that regard, further than to say that, if the botanical 
 members of this section will agree to undertake the task and duties of local secretaries in 
 their respective localities of some such prospective organization, a nucleus can be formed 
 which may in time extend into an army of explorers pervading the whole extent of our 
 Dominion. Each local secretary can, in his locality, direct the stream of local observations 
 into the general channel, and thus secure valuable records or material that would other- 
 wise be lost, and within his own range assist and encourage young workers in the many 
 ways known to a botanist. Meetings of all the members of su( h a widespread organiz- 
 ation could never be held at any one point, but it might be practicable, once a year, when 
 "we come up to the Royal Society's annual gatherings, for many of the local secretaries 
 and other nucdear elements, to hold a conference, as is usual with similar clubs and 
 offshoots of, for examjile, the British As£;ociation, — one of which, the old Ray Society, 
 resembled in organization, although not in purpose, very much what is now proposed. 
 But I am more anxious to hear the suggestions of ray fellow members in this section on 
 the points mooted than to put forth any more definite scheme. 
 
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