92 NATURAL SCIENCE. August. 



interested to see many of these animals set up with Mr. Ward's well- 

 known taxidermic skill ; and no exception can be taken to the fight 

 between an elephant and two tigers, or to the " frightfully thrilling " 

 situation of a native asleep in his hut while a man-eating panther 

 creeps in at the door. These two tableaux are satisfying to the 

 artist, and it is plain that they are none the less attractive to the 

 public. We hope that Mr. Ward will be able to give many more 

 such exhibitions, and we believe that a little more attention to 

 Nature and less subservience to the " Olympian " style of art would 

 bring him in quite as many sixpences. 



Albatross and Penguin Islands. 



In the Victorian Naturalist for January a photograph is given of 

 the nests and young of the Pelican, taken on Penguin Island by Mr. 

 H. P. C. Ashworth. The paper accompanying it deals also with a 

 visit to Albatross Island, and describes the curious " caves," formed, 

 apparently, by the disintegration of soft dykes, which cut vertically 

 through the quartz conglomerate, of which the island is composed. 

 It is to be hoped that Messrs. Ashworth and Le Souef will publish 

 the series of ornithological photographs taken by them while visiting 

 this group of islands. 



Object Teaching in Town and Country. 



Decidedly things are moving. Constantly, some say too con- 

 stantly, we urge the necessity of a return to nature in our methods of 

 elementary education. The art of printing has done much for man, 

 but the printed page too often inserts itself between our eyes and the 

 realities of the world. Our cry, therefore, has always been — less 

 book-teaching, less giving of information, let children learn for them- 

 selves by the old way of the five senses, let science be learned by the 

 individual as it is learned by the race, through observation and 

 experiment. But, as we said, things are moving, and soon there will 

 be little left for us to urge. 



In our April Number we mentioned the addition to the Educational 

 Code that permits the time spent in visits to museums under proper 

 guidance to be counted to the children as time spent in school-work. 

 The account of a meeting at the Whitechapel Museum, reported in 

 our News pages, shows that the teachers are taking this permission in 

 earnest, and that there are at least some curators thoroughly in 

 sympathy with the aims of modern educationalists. But, like the 

 text-book, the museum is only a substitute, and in our editorial of 

 April, we put forward the claims of the hedgerow and the quarry to 

 a place in our system of teaching. We rejoice to see that the 

 prophecy on which we ventured is even now being fulfilled. 



A remarkable and inspiring circular (No. 369) has just been 

 issued from the Education Department to H.M. Inspectors of Schools. 



