The Popular Science Monthly, June, 1900: Vol. 57, May, 1900 to October, 1900Various
Science
The Popular Science Monthly, June, 1900: Vol. 57, May, 1900 to October, 1900
Various
Science -- Periodicals; Technology -- Periodicals
The second floor is given over to an exhibit of types of all of the
more important families and tribes of plants, from the simplest and
most minute, to the highest and most complex. Specimens, models,
fruits, seeds, drawings and photographs are used to bring the principal
facts clearly before the observer. A set of swinging frames running
parallel to the cases containing the types of the flora of the world,
are used to display specimens of the plants found within a hundred
miles of New York City. A number of special microscopes have been
constructed for the purpose of forming a perfect exhibit, which will
enable the visitor to see some of the more salient features in the
minute structure of some of the plants in the cases.
[Illustration: THE MUSEUM.]
The third floor contains the library, herbarium and laboratories. The
library occupies a stack room extending to the rear of the middle of
the building, two small storerooms and a large circular reading-room,
under the illuminated dome. Here are assembled the botanical books
of Columbia University, as well as those accumulated by the Garden,
now numbering more than eight thousand volumes, with no reckoning
of unbound separates and pamphlets. The collection of botanical
periodicals is nearly complete, and the library is especially rich in
literature concerning the mosses, ferns, and the flora of North and
South America.
The main herbarium occupies a room in the east wing, eighty-five by
forty-seven feet, and connected with it are storerooms and offices
adequate to its administration. Windows on all sides of the main
room and skylights give ample illumination. The number of mounted
specimens on the shelves is not less than three quarters of a million,
including the herbarium of Columbia University, which is deposited
here in accordance with the agreement between the two institutions.
The collection is especially rich in fungi, embracing the collections
of Ellis and other eminent mycologists. A large amount of material of
great historic value in connection with the work of Dr. John Torrey and
the earlier botanical development of America is included. Accessions
are being made to the herbarium at the rate of fifty to a hundred
thousand specimens annually.
[Illustration: IN THE FOREST.]
The laboratories consist of a series of rooms facing northward and
westward, with special facilities for taxonomic, embryological and
morphological investigations. Physiological and photographic darkrooms,
the experiment room for living plants and chemical laboratories
offer especially ample opportunities for the record and development
of practically all phases of plant physiology. The laboratories,
library and herbarium are open to the graduate students from Columbia
University, in addition to those from other institutions of learning
who may register directly at the Garden. The latter, in return, have
the privileges of students at Columbia University.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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