84 MICHIGAN STATE AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE 



lecture the professor accompanied his presentation of the subject 

 by carefully planned demonstration experiments, greatly to our 

 edification, and occasionally to our amusement. In the labora- 

 tory we plunged at once into the qualitative analysis of unknown 

 substances. We learned to handle chemicals and apparatus 

 by the very simple plan of actually handling them ourselves. 

 Of course we broke apparatus, and blew up things rather often, 

 but finally we learned to be careful, and no one was killed or 

 seriously hurt in the process. 



In marked contrast to chemistry, was the presentation of 

 physics which was wholly a textbook study. We used Olm- 

 stead's Natural Philosophy, reciting and demonstrating (on 

 the blackboard) from its pages, but neither making experiments 

 ourselves nor seeing any made by the professor. 



Surveying was made a living subject for us by the addition 

 to a stiff textbook of a considerable amount of field-work, with 

 compass, transit, and level, and the accurate plotting of results. 



Our geology was still a textbook subject only. There was 

 no thought of the use of specimens of rocks or fossils by the 

 class, nor was there any required field-work in connection with 

 the subject. Yet there were in the Museum on the third floor 

 many such specimens. The idea of their use by the students 

 had not yet taken hold of teachers in American colleges. The 

 Museum contained specimens to be looked at through the glass 

 doors of the cases by the public and occasionally by the students, 

 but such specimens were for preservation, not for handling. 



In zoology we used a textbook, but its required use was small, 

 indeed. The professor (Dr. Miles) loved to talk to us, and he 

 led us in his talks far deeper into the subject than did any 

 textbook of that period. Thus while we got less of detail, we 

 were given broader views and larger generalizations than would 

 have been possible by the textbook method. We always had 

 before us the skeleton of a cow or some other creature, and to 

 it the lecturer recurred for illustration times without number, 



