ScIENTIFIC AND LITERARY TEACHING IN HiGH SCHOOL PATI 
While we all may recognize these facts, none can but 
acknowledge that the so-called scientific teaching in our high 
schools is in a chaotic condition. In fact, I think the principal 
objections to the science work is due to the fact that very often 
the classes are in charge of some one who has not been trained to 
do the work properly. How often do we find such classes thrust 
upon some one who has no natural aptitude or hking for the 
work, because there is no one else to take them. Not less fre- 
quently are such classes brought into ill repute because the 
teacher who has charge of them is not given the facilities that 
the proper pursiut of the study requires. Too often is it the case 
that the teacher of some branch of scinece in which laboratory 
work is essential, and without which it is but a memory exercise, 
is called upon to do as many hours actual teaching in the class 
room as the teacher of Latin or Mathematics, and then if he fail 
to obtain the results that are expected of him, either he or the 
study has to bear the blame when neither is at fault. 
Then again the proper pursuit of such studies as Botany, 
Chemistry and Physics requires a more or less expensive outfit, 
which school authorities are often loth to give. But they too 
are advancing with the times and we now see the high schools in 
many small towns and even villages equipped with more ade- 
quate chemical and physical apparatus than that possessed by 
our largest high schools of fifteen or twenty years ago. 
The march of progress is irresistible and the tendency of the 
times is unmistakable. The rapidity of its advance will be 
measured by the ability of our science teachers to bring order 
out of chaos. We must decide upon what is the best course for 
our high schools and then work for its universal adoption. Again 
we must not forget that the course of study does not make the 
school. Perhaps in no other department is the teacher so large 
a factor. Our universities should at all times be on the look-out 
for men and women who seem to have peculiar fitness for teach- 
ing these studies and encourage them to take up high school 
work. Pure scholarship and wide learning, while desirable, are 
not the most essential qualities of a good high school teacher. 
Take for instance, the teacher of Botany, He can find no text 
book to put into the hands of his class to which he can adhere 
closely. He must go to Nature for his text book, and have 
the ability to select such types for study as will give his pupils a 
lasting knowledge of the vegetable kingdom. He should be so 
well acquainted with the local flora that he can give his pupils an 
intelligent answer in regard to any specimen they may bring to 
him. He need not be a specialist on Mosses nor Fungi, but he 
should be able to tell one of these from the other and point out 
to his pupils the essential differences between them. He should 
