No. 4.] NATURE STUDY. 21;; 



A number of European countries have begun to realize 

 the importance of agricultural education, and school gardens 

 are becoming a regular feature in the equipment of their 

 schools. Norway, Sweden, Holland, Belgium, Germany, 

 especially Austria, Switzerland and even Russia, have all 

 gotten ahead of us in this important work. So essential 

 has this instruction proved itself, that France, as long ago 

 as 1887, passed an edict making it incumbent upon all who 

 submitted plans for public school buildings to include a 

 plan of a school garden in each, before the plan could be 

 accepted. 



There are some general matters in connection with the 

 management of school gardens in Europe that would not 

 work in this country, and it is well for us that they would 

 not. The master of the school often owns the garden, 

 and the pupils are obliged to weed and hoe, prune and bud 

 and graft, and learn their other practical lessons, with little or 

 no stimulus which comes from ownership of either garden or 

 its products. While this plan may not meet with objection 

 under imperial forms of government, it lacks the one feature 

 which, to my mind, imparts the highest value to the work, 

 and which, at the same time, we need most in this countiy. 

 The ownership by the child of his garden and of his prod- 

 uce furnishes the best possible means of educating him, 

 in a truly fundamental way, in the rights of property. How 

 much, think you, would real estate in Massachusetts ad- 

 vance in price, if in every farm and city lot propert} T rights 

 in agricultural and horticultural property were sacredly ob- 

 served ? If every farmer and gardener in the Commonwealth 

 could sleep of nights and go to church on Sunda} r s with the 

 feeling of reasonable security that his wood lot would not be 

 set on tire, and that his orchard, garden or vineyard would 

 not be molested, what would he not give? I have often 

 thought, during my twelve years' sojourn in the State, as I 

 have seen fruit trees cut down solely to save their owners 

 annoyance, that property in at least the horticultural sec- 

 tions near our towns and cities would rise materially in 

 value on the advent of such a millennial condition. And I 

 think I am far within bounds of reason when I assert that, 



