66 ; THE MICROSCOPE. May 
The principal motive | have in presenting these sec- 
tions is to illustrate the educational value of the microscope 
in our public schools. Dr. Julien in his interesting ad- 
dress on ‘“‘Microscopy in the Scheme of Education,” has 
advocated in very forcible terms the value of the micro- 
scope in arresting the attention, and developing the ob- 
serving and reflecting faculties of children. While 
formerly it might have been an inovation to introduce 
the microscope into the public schools, now such a step 
might even be regarded with favor. 
Recently manual training has been introduced into the 
schools for boys; sewing and cooking for the girls. Under 
the subject of cookery the teacher was required to teach 
the nutritive value of different foods and to explain the 
“Germ Theory and the Causes of Decay and Decomposi- 
tion in Organic Bodies.” By what process of instruction 
they were expected to develope in the minds of pupils, 
from twelve to fourteen years of age, clear ideas of these 
subjects without the use of the microscope which is not 
on the list of school supplies, is incomprehensible, 
While visiting the cooking teachers’ class one day, the 
teacher was explaining the relative nutritive value of the 
various kinds of flour, dependent upon the different pro- 
cesses in milling the wheat. While her explanation was 
sufficiently lucid, it was difficult to convey her meaning 
to the minds of these city girls, who perhaps had never 
seen a kernel of wheat and probably knew nothing of the 
process of making the flour. In this instance the pupils 
showed listlessness and wandering thought. The teach- 
er turning to me asked if I could furnish a section of the 
kernel of wheat, which when placed under the microscope 
might facilitate a proper understanding of the subject. 
This I agreed to do but found it difficult to properly 
mount a specimen without the starch escaping and cloud- 
ing it. After a trial of four or five days it was found 
that sections could be prepared after slightly softening 
