Page:Makers of British botany.djvu/196

 156 This led to their becoming a recognised article of trade. Large fortunes have been realised in Suffolk by owners of land containing the nodule bed, though frequently occurring at a considerable depth.

In 1848 he advocated the use of phosphate nodules in the "Greensand" beds of Cambridgeshire. These also soon became a commercial commodity.

In 1849, Professor Henslow delivered the inaugural address on the foundation of the Ipswich Museum, the object being, for "Giving Instruction to the working Classes in Ipswich in various branches of Science and more especially Natural History." It affords the best example of his views generally upon the uses of Science, not only as being of indisputable value in all useful arts, but as a means of education by dispelling the then prevailing ignorance and harmful prejudices rife in those days, even among men learned in other subjects at our Universities.

He illustrates his remarks from the chief sciences, as in Astronomy, by its importance in understanding the laws of storms and tides, which Whewell was then studying. Agriculture was touched upon, in showing the importance of a knowledge of Vegetable Physiology, and illustrated by the parasites, yellow Rattle and Wheat-rust. He insisted upon the educational value of accuracy, demanded of the scientist, and the avoiding a priori assumptions and hastily drawn deductions from insufficient data. But even the philosopher himself does not always escape from the imputation; for the farmers at Hitcham were firmly convinced that the "Piperage" or Barberry itself blighted the wheat. The Professor could not convince them that the red colour of the spots on the leaves of the bush was not due to the same fungus as that on the wheat. Indeed, he observes (in a MS.): "It is not likely (as some suppose) that it is due to the influence of Æcidium berberidis." We now know that the farmers were nearer the truth and the botanists were wrong. But one point the Professor established—and I possess his dried specimens to this day—and that was, that the "mildew," a black fungus, subsequently arises from the same substratum or mycelium as the rust. The mildew, then,