£904] Nature Study — No. 14. 79 



try to begin everything, and follow all lines of investigation, he 

 would soon be hopelessly stranded and become disgusted at the im- 

 possibility of his undertaking. One should rafher take up a small 

 area, the smaller ihe less his time is, and he may obtain gratifying 

 results. If you cannot take up botany entire, or dendrology, or 

 herpetology or ichtyology, etc., take up a small item in one or 

 more of these, e. g. the study of mosses or lichens or mushrooms, 

 or begin with a family of trees or birds or fishes or insects. 

 There are few, even among the most common insects or birds or 

 mammals, whose life history is entirely and com))letely known. 



Furthermore there is concentration, in which must be in- 

 cluded thoroughness and patience. One must concentrate his 

 mind on the chosen study, and give it his best efforts. He 

 must not be superficial but thorough in his observations. He 

 must not jump at conclusions. That is extremely dangerous. 

 Science does not want it, although many scientific men indulge in 

 it. Science is derived from the Latin scio, to know; it must deal 

 ^\\.\\ facts only. So, painstaking, laborious investigation and ob- 

 servation is wanted, not half-observed phenomena and guesses. 

 Sometimes an infinite amount of patience is required. Think of 

 John Burroughs digging away two or three tons of earth in order 

 to understand the ways of a weasel's underground home! Or 

 Audubon, now in the far west, now in Labrador, now in the limitless 



forests of Kentucky or the impenetrable mangrove thickets of the 

 gulf coast, in heat and cold, observing, sketching, recording. If 

 a bird or insect with which one wishes to become acquainted flies 

 into a thicket or swamp, it will not do to remain outside; it means 

 to follow it up at the risk of ruffling one's clothes and temper. 



Coupled with thoroughness must be exactness. A student 

 may be thorough, not spare himself labor and exertion, and yet not 

 be exact in gettting at his results or recording them. If he sees a 

 certain damage done to a plant by insects, and finds an insect on the 

 plant, it would not do to assume that this is the author of the harm 

 until he sees it at work. The same holds ^ood^ in all other 

 branches. One must have a sense of responsibility, feeling that 

 by inexactness he may cause people to believe and circulate un- 

 truth, which would always be harmful, leaving aside the moral 

 issue. 



And last but not least, a conscientious, patient, systematic 

 student of nature should consider it his duty to make the results 

 0/ his labors accessible to others, to science in general. If a per- 



