308 TRANSACTIONS OF THE HORTICULTURAL 



fourteen, thus laying the foundation for a more extended course 

 in flowering plants than is now possible in the high schools, and 

 giving more time for microscopic work, thus allowing us of the 

 high school to go on with Cryptogamic's Botany, or to build the 

 basement story of the structure, above which would come the 

 elaborate experiments in cross-fertilization, &c, of the agricul- 

 tural college, and the original lines of investigation of the 

 scientific department of the university, making a super-structure 

 that would be a national blessing. Horticulture can furnish the 

 school with the plants, and the school in turn would yield her 

 best thought for the benefit of the garden and the J arm, and 

 higher and better than all, the minds of our youth would be 

 drilled to think consecutively, to draw logical conclusions, and to 

 be better and more useful citizens. 



Parallel to this course in botany, is another, in which the re- 

 ciprocal usefulness of school and garden is equally apparent. 

 Zoology, the study of animal life, can and ought to run parallel 

 to botany, the study of plant life. The following is a course of 

 study for seventh and eighth grade work which can be practically 

 employed here in Illinois. Such courses have already been made 

 for those who live upon the sea-shore, and in some respects, per- 

 haps, the sea-side schools have the advantage of us ; but available 

 specimens are in abundance about us for guiding the child-mind 

 and creating a habit of observation. The prairies of the west 

 furnish an abundance of animals, as of plants. The thing for 

 Young America to do is to observe what is going on around him, 

 whether he live upon the desert, the prairie, or the sea-coast. 

 But, in order to lead pupils, the teacher himself must be 

 equipped, and must have prepared his work for the class. The 

 questions of each recitation must be naturally led, from the 

 simple to the complex; the recitations must be naturally ar- 

 ranged, and the course of study must follow the same law. 

 This kind of questioning is the peculiar characteristic of the true 

 science lesson. Each question, each recitation, each new topic, 

 must be an important part of one complete course of study. 



Let us begin our study of animal life in the seventh grade with 

 the common earth-worm, first noticing its external characteristics, 

 and drawing it in parts, and, as a whole, using it as s. topic for 

 oral description by each member of the class, closing the recita- 

 tion by a talk to the class in regard to its habits, under what 

 circumstances it is beneficial, and when injurious to vegetation, 

 of course bringing out the fact that it is a strict vegetarian, not 

 particular whether its morsel of food be dead or living vegetable 

 matter, whether its meal comes from the embryo shoot of a 

 Canadian Thistle seed, or a young seedling turnip or cabbage. I 

 think that in the common school about five recitations can be 

 profitably spent in this bit of fish-bait. Finally place the animal, 

 together with five or six others, in a tin can well packed with 



