Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 27.djvu/773

Rh continuous growth of a plant from the seed. The study of life is a study of events, of dynamics, of catastrophes. The earliest observation perceives the extraordinary influence of the surrounding medium upon the destinies of the living organism. It is not difficult to surround these destinies with such a halo of imagination as shall impress on the mind a sense of the mystery, sanctity—I may acid, the necessary calamities of life—before it has become absorbed in the consideration of living personalities."

The first statement here made contains an error, which, though apparently trivial, involves a serious misunderstanding of the plan of study adopted in my book. Mrs. Jacobi says that, according to the method, "the first object studied is the leaf, and the pupil is brought at once, not only to draw the leaf," etc. This is a mistake. I have not included drawing as a part of the exercise in the study of leaves, have purposely avoided it, and have always insisted that it is a waste of time and a hindrance to the object I had in view. Instead of facilitating, it impedes the work of observation. The aim is, by the observation of real objects, to form the habit of intelligent discrimination, and such a habit can only be formed by numerous and ideated and continued mental exercises, which, with the young beginner, should be as simple and uncomplicated as possible. The method is one of self-instruction, in which the pupil is put upon a search to find out things for himself, and he has to inspect a great number of objects to identify, compare, and describe their special characters. Plants were chosen because of the almost endless detail of varying structure which their parts present, and which can only be made familiar by the examination, comparison, and contrast of a great many of them. This forbids the delay entailed by the drawing of specimens, and to insist upon the practice would defeat the method. The pupil could not draw one specimen in a hundred of those with which it is necessary that he should become familiar.

The idea that the parts of plants must be drawn has been the stumbling-block of teachers in using my books from the outset. It is a mode of evading out-of-door work, the collection of multitudes of plants, and their direct and constant observation and comparison. Mere book science is now condemned, at least nominally, even in the schools; but in place of it we have what is no better, blackboard-science and teacher's talk. My books were made simply for the learner's immediate use as a guide in the direct study of plants, and they have not the slightest value when used in any other way. Yet some teachers have set children to copy their illustrations-with chalk upon the blackboard, while others have themselves copied them for their classes, the books being withheld from the pupils. One eminent superintendent of education gravely assured me that my "First Book of Botany" was a book for teachers and not for pupils; and, in exemplification of this idea, I know an instance of a large school for which one hundred