NUMBER XXXVIII 

 THE NATURALIST'S FOUR QUESTIONS 



THE naturalist's first question, however learnedly 

 he may put it, is one of the child's first 

 questions, asked long before it can speak : What 

 is this ? In how many different tones of fear, of 

 awe, of wonder, of inquisitiveness has this question 

 been asked since man and science began ! Was it 

 not Aristotle's question when a new specimen was 

 brought to him ? - Was is not what Darwin asked 

 first when they sent him one of the barnacles he was 

 so fond of studying ? Was it not the continual 

 question of the naturalists on the great Columbus 

 voyage of the Challenger which discovered the new 

 world of the Deep Sea ? Is it not the question on 

 the lips of every teacher and student of natural 

 history to-day ? What is this ? It seems a 

 " simple question," but how hard to answer when we 

 insist on seeing even the outside of an animal with 

 perfect precision, when we press it farther and 

 farther home, from external features to internal 

 structure, from organs to tissues, from tissues to 

 cells. How intricate the answer becomes as we put 

 one lens after another in front of our own, when 



241 Q 



