CHAPTER XI 



WHEN cold and hunger were destroying the physical body 

 of that great hero Captain Scott, he, with fingers numbed 

 by approaching death and the intensity of the antarctic 

 cold, wrote to his wife : 



" Make the boy [his little son] interested in Natural 

 History if you can ; it is better than games ; they en- 

 courage it at schools. I know you will keep him in the 

 open air. Above all you must guard against indolence. 

 Make him a strenuous man." Never was better advice 

 ever given. In what finer way can the faculties of the 

 human mind be unfolded than by studying and taking 

 an intelligent interest in the works of the Creator. When 

 we study Natural History we find order, method, and 

 design in every form of matter, animate and inanimate. 



Our civilisations are founded on the intelligent study 

 of Nature, yet we have not considered the subject of 

 sufficient importance to teach to our children. 



Normal men and women do not deliberately court disease 

 and death. True they take terrible risks, but they do so 

 chiefly because their eyes are blindfolded. They have eyes, 

 but they see not ; ears, but they hear not. They heed not 

 the warnings of their men of science, whose mission it is 

 to scout away in advance and to give due warning of the 

 approach of danger, and the quarter from whence it 



threatens. Now, if we had an army in the field, and if 



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