6o Till: NA TL T RE-STl '/> ) " RE I 'IE IV [ 2 : 4 - FEB ruary, 



1906 



attention. We do not care to sew on the buttons before cutting out 

 the garment. We should show the why's and how's of soil tillage, of 

 plant propagation and growth, and of animal husbandry. The school 

 garden makes the proper laboratory for the first two phases, and will 

 be abundantly serviceable if properly used. But without a little of the 

 theory and of the understanding mind back of the raking and planting 

 there is a question as to whether work in the garden should not fall 

 in the athletic department, instead of in the academic. 



In biological nature work the fundamental principle is the study 

 of the whole life of the organism. Processes, activities, relations to 

 environment and to man, ready recognition of friends and foes with 

 proper remedial measures, constitute some of the minor objective 

 points. But following out the main principle, we find rich fields that 

 are being neglected in the less complete plans of work. 



The whole life of plants means from seed to seed, their winter 

 aspects as well as their summer, and includes the wild as well as the 

 domesticated forms. We do not wish to study plants merely when 

 they are at their best, in the height of summer and of flower. We 

 can't sympathize with things until we know something of their 

 vicissitudes, something of the struggle by which they meet this or that 

 assailant. As Mrs. Comstock says, "To study plants only when in 

 blossom is like speaking to your friends only when they are dressed 

 up." We are likely to miss the most interesting phases anyhow, 

 unless we see the plant through at least one year. The individuality 

 maintained in meeting the various conditions of the year is remarka- 

 ble. Take the one phase, the winter condition of our woody plants. 

 To many people, buds exist only in the spring, and trees stand through 

 the winter all alike, merely leafless specters. But a closer view shows 

 such difference of buds and twigs, in color, shape, covering and 

 arrangements, as to enable them easily to be separated into genera 

 and in nearly all cases into species. In my own work on willows — 

 one of the bugbears of botany — I was able to make out clearer and 

 surer distinctions between the twenty-three species growing around 

 Ithaca, X. Y. , than I have yet found in their summer aspects. The 

 same success is being achieved by Dr. Foxworthy and Dr. Wiegand 

 of Cornell, who are using winter characters in the production of a 

 complete key to our woody plants. 



But our work on plants must not end with simple observation. 

 Observation is only the first step in knowing, and it demands sup- 

 plement by experiment, comparison, generalization and deductive 



