versity, were, as
a rule, keen and anxious to learn; he could not wish for better
students.

83,674. (Mr. Gupta). He desired one service, because he thought it was
most degrading that certain men, although they were doing the same work,
should be classed in a Provincial Service, while others should be
classed in an Imperial Service. The prospect of the members of the
Provincial Service were not at all what they ought to be, and that was
the reason why the best men were not attracted to it.

PROF. J. C. BOSE AT MADURA

On his way back to Calcutta from the Fourth Scientific Deputation to the
West, Prof. J. C. Bose visited Madura, 14th June 1915. The Tamil Sangam
presented him with an address. In reply Dr. Bose made an important
speech, in course of which he said:--

I am no longer a representative of Bengal nor have I come to a strange
place, but as an Indian addressing the mighty India and her people. When
we realise that unity of our destiny then a great future opens out for
us.

It may be we may theorise and attribute to the plants all the
characteristics of the animals; but that will be merely theory: there
will be no proof. There are certain classes of people who think that
plants are utterly unlike animals and some hold that they are like
animals. The mere theory is absolutely worthless in order to find out
the truth. We have to find by investigation, by means of researches, by
means of proofs, that one is identical with the other. We have not only
to drop all theory but we have to make the plant itself write down the
answers to the questions that we have to put to them. That was the great
problem,--how to make the plant itself answer and write down answers to
the question....

If the plants are acted on by various medicines and drugs like
ourselves, then we can create an agent or a spokesman on which we can
carry out all future investigations on the action of drugs. Then there
is opened out a great vista for the scientific study of medicine. And
let me tell you medicine is not yet an exact science. It is merely a
phase of tradition. We have not been able to make medicine scientific.
Now by the data of the influence of drugs on the fundamental basis of
life, as is seen in the plant, we shall be able to make the science of
medicine purely scientific.

In travelling all over the world, which I have done several times, I was
struck by two great characteristics of different nations. One
characteristic