comstock] attitude of nature-study teacher IIQ 



said they, 'even young salmon are good eating.' 'Heads I win, 

 tails you lose' was their motto. Thus, what was once two small 

 salmon became united into a single large one and the process of 

 addition, division and silence still went on." And in another 

 admirable story President Jordan says: "So this little Medusa 

 floated around and opened and shut her umbrella for a long time, 

 a month or two perhaps, we don't know how long. Then when 

 morning came, down among the seaweeds, she laid a whole lot of 

 tiny eggs, transparent as crabapple jelly, and smaller than a dew 

 drop on the end of a pine leaf. That was the last thing she did; 

 so she died and our story henceforth concerns only one of those 

 little eggs." 



Another thing for the nature-study teacher to do is to direct 

 the interest of the child so that it shall center upon the hungry 

 creature rather than upon the one which is made into the meal. 

 It is well to emphasize the fact that one of the conditions im- 

 posed upon every living being in the woods and fields is that it is 

 entitled to a meal when it is hungry if it is clever enough to get it. 

 The child naturally takes this view of it. I remember well as a 

 child I never thought particularly about the mouse which my cat 

 was eating; in fact the process of transmuting mouse into cat 

 seemed altogether proper, but when the cat played with the 

 mouse that was quite another thing, and was never permitted. 

 Although no one appreciates more deeply than I the debt which 

 we owe to Thompson Seton and writers of his kind who have 

 placed before the public the animal story from the animal point 

 of view and thus set us all to thinking, yet it is certainly wrong to 

 impress this view too strongly upon the young and sensitive 

 child. In fact, this process should not begin until the judgment 

 and the understanding is well developed, for we all know that 

 although seeing the other fellow's standpoint is a source of 

 strength and breadth of mind, yet living the other fellow's life is, 

 at best, an enfeebling process and a futile use of energy. 



It is probably within the proper scope of the nature-study 

 teacher to place emphasis upon the domain of man, who being 

 the most powerful of all animals, asserts his will as to which one 

 shall live in his midst. From a standpoint of abstract justice the 

 stray cat has just as much right to kill and eat the robin which 

 builds on my porch as the robin has to pull and eat the earth- 

 worms from my lawn, but the place is mine, and I choose to kill 



