238 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



little to do with the lives of a majority of the 

 pupils ; but Nature study is a cultural study which 

 develops the child's normal instinct to become ac- 

 quainted with the objects by which it is sur- 

 rounded. 



As the schools are now conducted, the tendency 

 is to stunt and suppress this fundamental char- 

 acteristic of all healthy children. The complaint 

 is frequently made that the schools educate chil- 

 dren away from agriculture ; the fact is, the tend- 

 ency is to develop the conventional and the arti- 

 ficial instead of the fundamentally natural. Agri- 

 culture happens to suffer most because farming is 

 a business that has most to do with the forces of 

 nature which produce life and growth and indis- 

 pensable commodities a business founded on the 

 sciences. For a long time there was a gap between 

 the public schools and the colleges filled in New 

 York and in other of the older States by acade- 

 mies of a high grade. The large number of 

 private schools which prosper because they under- 

 take to fit pupils for entrance to college, indicates 

 that the gap has not been satisfactorily bridged by 

 the public High School. Considered from the 

 needs of the rural population, the gap is a chasm. 

 Now the attempt is being made to organize the 



