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 oceanic tracts of the globe, or of its minor subdivisions into zones and countries, or of its great mountain and river systems. Into all these phenomena there enter an element of vastness, a magnitude of relations, and a scale of diversities, which are little more to the childish mind than if they were described to it in a language not understood. Maps, of course, are helpful, but they are only symbols which the pupil is incompetent to translate into reality. It matters nothing that all the statements of geography may be true; they are true to the pupil only as verbal statements made on authority. All that it can do is to memorize words of description, which is the lowest and most worthless work of education. An English gentleman, who was once riding on horseback in the country, was accosted by a boy, who offered, for a penny, to tell him all the capitals of Europe. When he had done, the gentleman replied, "Here is your penny, and I will give you another if you will tell me whether they are animals or vegetables." "Animals," replied the boy, promptly. This is, no doubt, an extreme case; but it illustrates what is very generally true in the school-study of geography—that the pupils have no adequate ideas of what the words mean.

The difficulty with geography is, that it does not rouse children to think, and cannot furnish them with materials for the exercise of reason and judgment, because, for this purpose, the things reasoned about require to be immediately accessible to thought. Without going so far as Mr. Mill, who declares geography in schools to be an absurdity, we are profoundly convinced that the current teaching of it to young pupils is absurd. It should be postponed to the later stages of study, when the mind has attained a considerable degree of maturity, and then, by means of globes, a general conception of the great features of the earth may be acquired. This will form a suitable preparation for that subsequent reading upon the subject which Mr. Mill suggests.

spoke, in the June number of of the advantages that would arise from connecting the scientific exploration of the several States with their higher educational institutions. We have been since reminded that this is an accomplished fact in at least one of the States, and we hasten to give credit to Minnesota for having taken this new departure in scientific education. It is one of the youngest States in the Union, and a generation ago was but a land of savages, an indefinite tract in the great "Northwest Territory" beyond "Ouisconsin," beyond the distant Mississippi, that we now see taking the lead of the older States in organizing the new education by devoting her university to the comprehensive and practical study of Nature. This step has been but recently taken, and its benefits are prospective; but, if thoroughly carried out, there can be but little question of the advantages that must arise to the people of the State. By a law of 1872, to provide for the geological and natural-history survey of the State, the Board of Regents of the University of Minnesota were charged with the duty of organizing the work, and the Professors of Geology, Chemistry, Botany, and Zoology, of that institution, are the chief officers in carrying on the investigations in these departments, while money appropriations and land-grants are liberally voted to sustain the work, which is broadly laid out and clearly defined.

There is to be "a complete account of the mineral kingdom as represented in the State, including the number, order, dip, and magnitude, of the several geological strata, their richness in ores,