WIDENING OF VISUAL POWER 297 



any department of natural science. Let me take, by 

 way of example, the relation of the student of science 

 towards the features and charms of landscape. It may 

 be said that no training is needed to comprehend these 

 beauties ; that the man in the street, the holiday-maker 

 from town, is just as competent as the man of science 

 to appreciate them, and get quite as much pleasure 

 out of them. We need not stop to discuss the relative 

 amounts of enjoyment which different orders of spec- 

 tators may derive from scenery; but obviously the 

 student of science has one great advantage in this 

 matter. Not only can he enjoy to the full all the 

 outward charms which appeal to the ordinary eye, 

 but he sees in the features of the landscape new 

 charms and interests which the ordinary untrained 

 eye cannot see. Your accomplished Professor of 

 Geology has taught you the significance of the outer 

 lineaments of the land. While under his guidance 

 you have traced with delight the varied features of 

 the lovely landscapes of the Midlands, your eyes have 

 been trained to mark their connection with each other, 

 and their respective places in the ordered symmetry 

 of the whole scene. You perceive why there is here 

 a height and there a hollow ; you note what has given 

 the ridges and vales their dominant forms and direc- 

 tions ; you detect the causes that have spread out a 

 meadow in one place and raised up a hill in another. 

 Above and beyond all questions as to the con- 

 nection and origin of its several parts, the landscape 

 appeals vividly to your imagination. You know that 

 it has not always worn the aspect which it presents 

 to-day. You have observed in these ridges proofs that 



