SCIENCE FOR SCIENCE'S SAKE 93 



must be impressed with the immensity and impor- 

 tance of his subject. When he was talking, I 

 smelled alcohol and I saw a frog in a museum jar. 



Which was right? No doubt each was correct 

 from the personal point of view, but wrong from 

 the other's point of view. I recalled that the little 

 woman only recited what she had done ; the man 

 upbraided her for not doing something else. Per- 

 haps it is easy to advise and to criticize. The little 

 woman was teaching children. She wanted to lead 

 them to love the things they saw. She approached 

 the subject from the human side, for are not the 

 boy and the girl a part of what we call nature? 

 They are not yet tamed and conventionalized. 

 Does not every boy and girl like to go in the 

 fields and ^^get" things? She was not thinking 

 of the subject-matter ; or if she did think of it, she 

 knew that it could take care of itself. All she was 

 thinking of — poor soul! — was to interest and 

 educate the children. And she knew that if she 

 set a subject and followed it day by day the seats 

 would soon be vacant. 



The man was thinking of his college students; 

 perhaps he had not considered that these students 

 already liked the subject and needed only instruc- 

 tion. He forgot that you cannot force a person to 

 choose a thing, although you may force him to take 

 it. His were picked students, one from this town 

 and another from that ; hers were all the pupils in 

 her little community. His pupils had seen and 

 had chosen ; to hers the world was all unseen and 

 •untried. His were the one in a hundred ; hers 



