EDITORS TABLE. 



39* 



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 phenom- 

 ena there enter an element of vast- 

 ness, a magnitude of relations, and a 

 scale of diversities, which are little 

 more to tho childish mind than if they 

 were described to it in a language not 

 understood. Maps, of course, are help- 

 ful, 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 illus- 

 trates 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 materi- 

 als for the exercise of reason and judg- 

 ment, 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 post- 

 poned to the later stages of study, 

 when the mind has attained a consid- 

 erable degree of maturity, and then, 

 by means of globes, a general concep- 

 tion of the great features of the earth 



may be acquired. This will form a 

 suitable preparation for that subse- 

 quent reading upon the subject which 



Mr. Mill suggests. 



SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION IN THE FAR 

 WEST. 



"We spoke, in the June number of 

 The Popular Science Monthly, of 

 the advantages that would arise from 

 connecting the scientific exploration 

 of the several States with their high- 

 er 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 Mis- 

 sissippi, that we now see taking the lead 

 of the older States in organizing the 

 new education by devoting her univer- 

 sity to the comprehensive and practical 

 study of Nature. This step has been but 

 recently taken, and its benefits are pros- 

 pective ; but, if thoroughly carried out, 

 there can be but little question of the ad- 

 vantages 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 Re- 

 gents of the University of Minnesota 

 were charged with the duty of organiz- 

 ing the work, and the Professors of 

 Geology, Chemistry, Botany, and Zool- 

 ogy, of that institution, are the chief 

 officers in carrying on the investigations 

 in these departments, while money ap- 

 propriations and land-grants are liber- 

 ally 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, or- 

 der, dip, and magnitude, of the several 

 geological strata, their richness in ores, 



