12 BOTANY 



trade. We should, instead, go to the shop and there learn to 

 work with the tools of our trade. So, in the pursuit of scientific 

 work, we must learn to use the tools with which nature has pro- 

 vided us, — our hands, our eyes, and the thinking mechanism, our 

 brains. As Louis Agassiz, the famous naturalist said, " Study 

 nature, not books." 



Classification of Facts Observed. — The knowledge we gain by 

 observation is worth very little to us or to any one else unless we 

 use our brains to classify it and to apply it. We must find out 

 what different facts mean as related to one another. 



Single isolated facts about the color, coats, or markings found 

 on the coats of a kidney bean mean but little to us if we cannot 

 correlate these observ^ations w^ith others and relate them to scien- 

 tific truths already learned. A great many men, working for long 

 periods of time, have gathered together a large number of single 

 isolated facts, have correlated these facts, and then have given to 

 the world discoveries of world-wide importance. A careful boy 

 or girl may, by his own painstaking work in science, find out 

 some fact that is new, and in a small way make a discovery. It 

 is one of the most interesting things about science work, that it 

 has in it the spirit of discovery. 



Morphology. — It is evident that, in order to understand the cause 

 of the regular movements of a clock, it would be necessary to take 

 the wheels apart and to find out the structure of the different 

 pieces composing the works, so as to see how these parts are re- 

 lated to each other. In the study of biology it is usually found 

 best to begin with the study of the form and structure of the 

 parts of an organism; this study is called morphology. 



Physiology. — After we have discovered in the clock the form 

 and structure of the different wheels and cogs and the relation of 

 one to the other, we are in a position to put them together again 

 and to find out how they move and what causes the movement: 

 to study the use or function of each part. The study of the uses 

 or functions of the parts of an organism is called physiology. 



The Experiment. — In order to study physiology, and indeed 

 most sciences, we frequently have to make use of an experiment. 

 There are always three steps in a complete experiment. Beginners 



