THE NEW IDEA DA WNING. 



of nature, that every country school teacher should be 

 something of a naturalist, is not a new one ; it has long 

 been expressed by naturalists and pedagogues ; it was 

 the well known judgment of Diesterweg. But as the 

 State has in its hands the teachers' seminaries, it is its 

 business to see that the teachers shall be accomplished 

 in this direction. It emphatically belongs to every 

 teachers' seminary to have a carefully planned, richly 

 endowed school garden. Austria has already set the 

 example showing that such a garden can be established 

 at the cost of a few thousand florins. 



The idea of the school garden has now dawned upon 

 the modern state, as is visible in its legislation. The Aus- 

 trian public school law of May i4th, 1869, by which her 

 legislation has set up a monument for itself of immortal 

 thought, but one not yet sufficiently estimated, says in 

 Section 63 only this : " In every school a gymnastic 

 ground, a garden for the teacher according to the cir- 

 cumstances of the community, and a place for the pur- 

 poses of agricultural experiment are to be created." 

 Still more significantly and specially were given in the 

 law the instructions for school inspectors of each circle : 

 " To see to it that in the country schools, school gardens 

 shall be provided, for corresponding agricultural in- 

 struction in all that relates to the soil, and that the 

 teacher shall make himself skilful in such instruction." 

 Besides this, the school law requires of the teacher the 

 ability to give instruction in agriculture, and the Aus- 

 trian ordinance upon schools declares expressly in Sec- 

 tion 56 : " Instruction in natural history is indispensa- 

 ble to suitably established school gardens. The teachers 

 then must be in a condition to conduct them." 



