The study of botany thirty-six years ago with Asa Gray

BY W. J. BEAL.
Professor of Botany, Michigan Agricultural College.
It is hardly fair to compare the work of botanists and zoologists who were active thirty-six years ago with those now in their
prime. Although often stated in educational journals, it is rarely
comprehended by students of today that a knowledge of these
subjects has advanced more within the past fifteen to twenty
years than in all former years combined.
As a resident graduate, I took my degree at Harvard in 1865.
At that time there were only two persons in America earning all
their living by teaching and other work in botany, and they were
Asa Gray, of Harvard, and D. C. Eaton, of Yale. A considerable
number of other universities and colleges gave a little botany in
the course, but this was taught by persons each teaching several
other subjects. 
How much time was required of undergraduate students in
the study of botany? At Harvard and at the University of Michigan it amounted to a grand total of six weeks of daily work on
one study out of three or four pursued at the same time. I know
of no college in the United States which required students to
devote more than six weeks to botany, save one, and that was the
Michigan Agricultural College, where very nearly a year of daily
work was required. No undergraduate of the institutions named
could elect any more botany than above mentioned excepting at
Harvard, where three or four weeks of daily work might be spent
in identifying plants with help from the teacher.

Dr. Gray assigned lessons in his larger text bock and students
were thoroughly questioned over the ground with an abundant
supply of fresh specimens to illustrate each topic. No drawings
were made on the blackboard. There were four sections of the
sophomore class of about twenty-five each. The time for a lesson
was one hour. Much stress was placed on morphology,-in comparing corresponding parts of different plants with each other.
I must modify my statement of the work in botany at Harvard

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by saying that once during a percid of six years, Dr. Gray gave
a short course of illustrated lectures on geographical botany, a
course not fully appreciated by most students for want of previous
study. This course was elective. The botanical department of
Harvard did not possess a single compound microscope, but had
a costly one in its possession. The field of work at that time open
to botany consisted chiefly in describing and naming and classifying dried specimens which were frequently incomplete. This
is known as systematic botany, but at that time almost no ac-
count was made of the minute structure of the plant as seen with
the aid of a compound microscope, nor was much attention paid
to the various stages of development of the parts. The work
was based on the gross anatomy of plants as seen by a hand lens.
The modes of collecting and pressing herbarium specimens were
crude when compared with that of our best collections of these
times. The reader will note that the time of the botanist of 1865
was chiefly devoted to systematic botany, morphology and the
geographical distribution of plants. These were three fields of
work closely related.
Dr. Gray employed no clerk, but performed a great amount of
"dead work" with his own hands. All letters were written by
himself with pen and ink. He was often brief in his replies, but
in many cases his letters were full of interesting points, anecdotes
and plans of work to be done. His letters were social and confidential, as well as scientific. A girl mounted plants for the herbarium.
A very small number of resident graduates-one to three at a
time-learned botany under the guidance of Dr. Gray. For plant
anatomy we read Mohl on the Vegetable Cell translated; only
this and nothing more, for little else was to be had that was valuable, and this work was laid on the shelf as imperfect and out
of date years and years ago.
We read Lindley's Vegetable Kingdom, identified hundreds
and hundreds of dried plants, when we couldn't get them fresh
from the fields, botanic gardens or the woods. We tried our
hands at original descriptions and made artificial keys. We noted
all the points which characterized the families of plants. Very
little time was spent on plants below the ferns and their allies.

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Let us take one long step in time from 1865 to 1901, and note
a few of the leading points concerning plants that are now demanding the attention of students. New worlds have been discovered and each is now well taught in many colleges. I mentioned three above. We have them still, with additions, and five
at least have been added, viz .: Plant histology, plant physiology,
ecology, bacteriology, parasitic fungi and saprophytic fungi.
Through the rapid development of agricultural colleges and work
in the United States Department of Agriculture, opportunity was
offered to earn money by a knowledge of plants. The universities
soon gave a greater opportunity to elect botany than ever before.
Today I dare not attempt to name or enumerate the hundreds of
persons in this country, all of whom get their living by work
with plants. Progress in every line is most marked, as we might
expect where so many well-trained enthusiasts are occupying so
many different fields. Botany in any of its departments is a
charming and valuable study for pleasure, information, discipline
or culture.
The older botanists of today have been obliged to bestir themselves continually to keep abreast of the times. They consult
each other by letter, in person, or meet in conventions. They
visit a number of the best equipped laboratories of this country
or of Europe and remain as students or remain long enough to
secure many hints that will be of value in work with their own
classes. Without this, they would soon be shelved, or teach the
old botany with none of the new.