No. 4.] NATURE STUDY. 227 



"Oh, dear me! You must not forget that. And the 

 tongue." "Into how many parts is the thorax of the hy- 

 menoptera insect divided?" "Three parts." "Three 

 parts? How many parts is the thorax of the hymenoptera 



divided into?" "Three parts." "Count them, please. 9 

 "One, two, three and four." "Yes, children, the thorax 

 of a hymenoptera insect is divided into four parts. Never 

 forget that again, children. That is the most important 

 tact for you to remember about the lrymenoptera insect." 



Mr. K. H. Forbush (of Wareham). This matter of 

 teaching natural science, or science study, in the schools 

 was taken up by a score of us years ago and we did our 

 best to get the study Dr. Hodge speaks of into the schools. 

 The movement has been growing naturally now, and we are 

 not getting nature study in the schools, we are getting text 

 books, just as he has said, nothing but text books, and per- 

 fectly worthless text books, many of them. But again, 

 this matter of teaching in the schools without text books 

 results sometimes in something like this : my little girl was 

 asked whether she could write a composition on the horse. 

 I remember a little of it. "1 believe that the horse has 

 four legs, one on each corner ; " and the end of the com- 

 position was like this : " The horse is better to ride than 

 the cow." That is about all the good you get out of that 

 sort of teaching. One more subject which the doctor has 

 touched upon interests me, and that is, the attempt to 

 domesticate or utilize our native insect-eating birds. I am 

 interested in that more than in anything else in the line on 

 which the lecturer has talked this evening, and I think it is 

 the duty of the Board of Agriculture to see that this work 

 is done under its direction. It is in the line of the spirit 

 of the a£rc, and this Board is the body that should attend 

 to it, and see that it is done. It seems to me we ought to 

 find out how to attract these birds, how to keep them about 

 our homes and how to utilize them, and it ought to be done 

 now. AYhile I was working for the gypsy moth committee 

 I spent all my spare time upon something of that kind. 

 The Board has asked me to write something, and I have 

 chosen the way in which my children protect the birds about 



