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ipractical outcome of all this ? What benefit, direct or indirect, do we, 

 :as a people, expect to derive from such an expenditure of time or money 

 •on the part of the individual or of the nation ? Now, while to a body 

 of strictly scientific workers the consideration of such a question would 

 be quite unnecessary, it is possible that there may be, even here, some 

 who have thought over this question from this practical standpoint. 

 And, first of all, I suppose it may be safely asserted that every scientific 

 subject has a twofold aspect, viz.: first, its study from a purely scientific 

 point of view and in the interests of science properly so called ; and, 

 secondly, its economic importance. Thus, if you were to ask the ento- 

 mologist what practical good he expects to derive from the study or 

 serious contemplation of bugs or insects, he would readily say that 

 many of these insects are injurious to the growth or development of 

 certain valuable fruits or grains, and the study of their habits, iheir 

 methods of existence, and the means by which their destruction can best 

 be effected, forms an exceedingly important branch of study, in order 

 that their encroachments may be most successfully resisted or their 

 •extermination most readily effected. So, also, with the ornithologist^ 

 the study of the habits of certain birds, injurious or otherwise to vege- 

 tation, as in the case of the English Sparrow or other species, is con- 

 sidered so important that special investigations in this direction have 

 been undertaken by our neighbors across the line. As regards the pro- 

 blems of geological science, the economic aspect of the question is of 

 special value in many ways ; since upon the character of the rocks 

 beneath the surface depends very largely the agricultural value of soils 

 which have been produced by their disintegration or decay, and the 

 determination of areas suitable for successful settlement and their fitness 

 for the growth of certain important classes of food products. The deter- 

 mination of mineral-bearing belts, and the probabilities of the profitable 

 expenditiu'e of capital in the search for economic minerals, also in great 

 measure depend upon the correct determination of geological horizons, 

 and constitute one of the most important of the practical pi'oblems pre- 

 sented by the sttidy of the science of geology. With many of those 

 who regard scientists, as a class, simply as cranks of a higher growth 

 and as persons who have no clear conception of the objects for which 

 they are working, it is very evident that the consideration of these 



