1904] Nature Study — No. 12. 31 



theoretical and practical lessons on Agriculture. Trained teachers 

 are somewhat difficult to find. Both Boston and Washington 

 have foreseen this difficulty and are preparing young women for 

 garden work, — Boston by means of the Science Department of her 

 Normal School, Washington by a special course for Normal 

 students, given at the school by Prot. S. C. Corbett, Horticulturist 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture. 



The Public Education Association of Philadelphia has been 

 conducting correspondence upon the subject of school gardens, 

 and the letters received seem to show that gardens have been con- 

 nected more frequently with public schools than with private 

 institutions, and that while the work has never been compulsory 

 upon either teachers or pupils, it has proved a popular novelty 

 wherever undertaken, giving healthy out-of-door study. Unfor- 

 tunately the lack of space in great cities restricts the privilege of 

 practical gardening to a comparatively small number of schools. 

 A similar reason and consequently dearth of accessible material 

 have been given for the lack of properly conducted nature-study in 

 our public schools. Europe is in this respect far ahead of America. 

 In Berlin, for instance, special gardens are maintained by the 

 municipality, in which flowers, shrubs, and vegetables are grown 

 in order that specimens required may be daily picked and sent in 

 waggons hired by the city to those schools so situated that garden- 

 ing is an impossibility. It has been suggested and advocated by 

 at least one Associate Superintendent of Schools in New York 

 City, also Mr. Gustave Straubenmuller, that a portion of Central 

 Park be set aside for this purpose, and that specimens from its 

 school garden be then sent daily to schools in Manhattan. Other 

 parks that are used little by the public might fulfil a similar func- 

 tion. This at present seems to be the only solution of the problem 

 of supplying schools with proper materials tor Nature-study. As 

 a new idea this may seem preposterous, but the day of experiment 

 is past ; Nature-study and gardening have become important 

 educational factors, and thinking men and women are devising 

 means to bring them within reach of every child in the public 

 schools. 



Ot the neglect of this subject in our country Mr. Hamilton 

 W. Mabie, in his *' Essays on Nature and Culture," says : " Once 



