132 First Conference 



one of the earthworm's burrows; a shelf of birds' 

 nests whose tenants have crossed the seas; an empty- 

 wasps' nest ; and a skein of gossamer, to see how long 

 it will last. 



With these to begin with, we have material for 

 many pleasant studies, and problems for a lifetime 

 of thinking and research ; but without these, or their 

 hundred - and - one analogues, our natural - history 

 lessons will certainly be seasonally inappropriate, 

 and are likely to result in little more than vanity 

 and vexation of spirit. 



Refraining from further illustrations, I wish to sum 

 up the strongest arguments in favour of the seasonal 

 method of study — arguments which have been 

 strengthened by what I have seen of school work 

 in this exhibition. 



In the first place, the seasonal method is doubtless 

 racially primitive. Before all books and schools the 

 children faced the problems of their surroundings as 

 they came, reasserting themselves with insistence 

 year after year in the ceaseless seasonal pageant. 

 One cannot read a paper like Professor Chamber- 

 lain's Primitive Nature- Study, or a book like Mr. 

 Frazer's Golden Bough, without being impressed with 

 the grip that the march of the seasons had upon 

 simple minds and undulled senses, without being a 

 little ashamed, to take a small obvious case, when 

 we contrast some of the picturesque Indian names 

 for the months, instinct with reality, with our dull 

 names, say, for the four months after August. 



In the second place, though I cannot at present 

 elaborate the point, the seasonal method of study is 

 in harmony with the earliest education of the child, 



