A Palobotanical Institute at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

Abstract

MORE than two years ago there appeared an article in The Times (August 24, 1911) the title of which was “A Neglected Science: Fossil Botany and Mining”. The chief contents of this article can be summed up as an appeal for the recognition of palobotany, and was indeed thus named in NATURE of August 31, of the same year. The author of the article in The Times criticises “the official neglect of palobotany in this country”. It is admitted that the leadership of some branches of palobotany is found in Britain, but this is stated to be wholly due to the zeal and interest of some private gentlemen and to some professors of modern botany who “spend their whole leisure from their professional duties in the arduous labour of palobotanical research.”