December 14, 191 1] 



NATURE 



205 



there appears to be some trustworthy evidence that 

 tsetse-flies, including even G. morsitans, can exist in 

 numbers where big game is negligible as a food 

 supply. 



These wider questions are bej'ond the scope of 

 I Mr. Austen's handbook, which, however, contains a 

 Istore of information which will be invaluable to those 

 [who are seeking to free Africa from the tyranny of 

 these dangerous pests. G. A. K. M. 



THE PSYCHOLOGIST AND THE TEACHER. 

 The Psychology of Education. By Prof. J. Welton. 

 Pp. x.\i + 5o7. (London: Macmillan and Co., 

 Ltd., 191 1.) Price 75. 6d. net. 

 T 1 T'H.ATEVER criticism Prof. Welton 's book may 



^ ^ excite, it is undeniably interesting — the most 

 interesting book dealing with its particular problems 

 I hat has been produced in recent years. With great 

 ability and clearness, the author has drawn a map of 

 I'fe. not as the adult lives it, but as it develops in form 

 and complexity from infancy to manhood. The teacher 

 and* the situations with which he deals are in his 

 mind all through. His book is therefore not a treatise 

 on psychology, yet the psychologist's point of view is 

 so dominant that neither does it set forth a theory 

 of education. This Prof. Welton makes clear in his 

 preface. His concern is with the connections between 

 the two— psychology and education— and especially to 

 give a psychological explanation of educational procs- 

 dure. 



The book will surely make a very strong appeal 

 to experienced teachers, for its style is attractive and 

 conspicuously free from abstruse technicalities of ex- 

 pression. Indeed, one is tempted to think that the 

 author has been over-anxious to conciliate the teacher. 

 His opening chapter is particularly addressed to the 

 practical man, who will not fail to note that the 

 psychology which "alone is of worth to the educator" 

 is that "which comes from constant and sympathetic 

 intercourse with children." Although careful reading 

 makes it clear that Prof, Welton means less than he 

 seems to say, it is a mistake, we think, even to seem 

 to imply that all good teachers are willy-nilly good 

 psychologists. There is a distinction between psycho- 

 logical knowledge and a practical acquaintance with 

 psychical relations which comes from experience. The 

 child who uses a brick differently from a ball is not 

 a physicist, nor does social tact constitute a claim to 

 knowledge of psychology. "Every true educator is 

 always making use of real psychology." Is then everv 

 true farmer always making use of real chemistry? 



The restrictions which the author laid upon himself 

 have led to some difllculties. He very rightly protests 

 against the implicit view of so many child psychologists 

 that children are different from men by reason of 

 their incompleteness. 



" Progress is not from a mutilated and incomplete 



mind to one which possesses all its organs. .'\t everv 



Lie of his development, a child's experience is as 



1 and satisfying to him ;is is that of n philosophical 



I'hologist lo him-rll." 



Instead of the sciial .ippr.n.iini- id jiew powers to 

 <!■ K'rmine the ord<i of wliich is the main task of the 

 NO. 2198, VOL. 88] 



genetic psychologist, his aim should be to show how 

 such development is brought about. All this is admir- 

 ably put, and as admirably describes the author's 

 object. 



In his effort to avoid technical language, however, 

 Prof. Welton has not always been able to achieve 

 satisfying analyses of the processes he describes. In 

 his discussion of the nature of imitation, he 

 restricts the use of the word to what most psychologists 

 call deliberate imitation. This is, of course, giving 

 the word a technical sense, for we call monkeys 

 imitative, though we may deny their intention to 

 imitate. It is no doubt to the writings of M. Tarde 

 that Prof. Welton's protest is due. M. Tarde would 

 find an element of imitation in all that we do, and a 

 term which includes so much tends to obscure rather 

 than to clarify thought. Our author has a second 

 objection to the current use of the word in psychology. 

 To call an action imitative when there is no intention 

 to imitate is to describe its external rather than its 

 psychical attributes. There is a certain justification 

 for this criticism, but it is doubtful whether Prof. 

 Welton's way out of the difficulty helps very much. 

 He would avoid confusion by including all the non- 

 volitional forms of imitation under the term assimila- 

 tion — the general tendency of man to assimilate his 

 mental life to that of his fellows. But how does such 

 a term suit a case like that of Preyer's tiny infant 

 who pursed his lips as he watched his father doing 

 so? Surely this is distinguishable in analysis from 

 catching the enthusiasm of a crowd. 



These all-embracing words— assimilation, apper- 

 ception, &c. — are a great difficulty in teaching 

 psychology, and for that reason a precise technical 

 terminology cannot be dispensed with. It is as neces- 

 sary in this subject as in botany, if it is to justify its 

 claim to rank as a science. The whole chapter on the 

 nature of experience is the least convincing in a book 

 which is otherwise extremely readable, and sane to 

 the point of conservatism. No teacher can fail to find 

 much that is helpful in its pages, though he must 

 not expect to get from it an introduction to the 

 methods and results of recent pedagogical inquiry. 

 This Prof. Welton has deliberately left out, e.xcept for 

 a gentle gibe at those who use chronoscopes, ergo- 

 graphs, and other terrible machines. 



The book is admirably printed, and altogether a 

 valuable addition to English educational literature. 



J. A. Green. 



TIMBER AND PAPER. 

 Wood Pulp and its Uses. By C. F. Cross, E. J. 

 Bevan, and R. W. Sindall. With the collaboration 

 of W. N. Bacon. Pp. xi + 270. (London : Con- 

 stable and Co., Ltd., 191 1.) Price 6s. net. 

 "' I ^HE present is a Cellulose Age," remark the 

 *- authors of the book before us. Their state- 

 ment is not made ad captanduni : it will, they urge, 

 survive critical examination. 



Perhaps in their epigram llure is just ;i tiiiLjc of 

 (lie spiiii uhiili makes every mother's goose .1 s\\;i,i; 

 l)ut he that as it may, there is no doubt that cellulose 

 plays a very important part in modern life. In the 



