PREFACE. VI 1 



The following interesting passages from liis testi- 

 mony will give an idea of Prof. Henslow's method 

 of proceeding and its results : 



Question. Have you ever turned your attention at all to the 

 possibility of teaching Botany to boys in classes at school ? 



Answer. I have thought that it might be done very easily ; 

 that this deficiency might be easily remedied. 



Q. What are your ideas on the subject ? 



A. My own ideas are chiefly drawn from the experience of 

 my father-in-law, the late Prof. Henslow, Professor of Botany 

 at Cambridge. He introduced Botany into one of the lowest 

 possible class of schools that of village laborers' children in 

 a remote part of Suffolk. 



Q. Perhaps you will have the goodness to tell us the sys- 

 tem he pursued ? 



A. It was an entirely voluntary system. He offered to en- 

 roll the school children in a class to be taught Botany once a 

 week. The number of children in the class was limited, I 

 think, to forty-two. As his parish contained only one thou- 

 sand inhabitants, there never were, I suppose, the full forty-two 

 children in the class ; their ages varied from about eight years 

 old to about fourteen or fifteen. The class mostly consisted 

 of girls. ... He required that, before they were enrolled in 

 the class, they should be able to spell a few elementary botani- 

 cal terms, including some of the most difficult to spell, and 

 those that were the most essential to begin with. Those who 

 brought proof that they could do this were put into the third 

 class ; then they were taught once a week, by himself generally, 

 for an hour or an hour and a half, sometimes for two hours 

 (for they were exceedingly fond of it). 



Q. Did he use to take them out in the country, or was it 

 limply lessons in the school ? 



A. He left them to collect for themselves ; but he visited 

 his parish daily, when the children used to come up to him, 

 and bring the plants they had collected ; so that the lessons 

 went on all the week round. There was only one day in the 



