Oct. 13, 1881] 



NATURE 



575 



may choose, this sort of training will be of primary importance 

 to them — w ill form indeed the s-urest foundation fc r any course 

 of professional training they may afterwards choose to follow. 



So far I have been considering only the eleu.entary teaching of 

 biology, devoting special atlention to the course I propose to 

 adopt for preparing beginners for the Pass Degree, and with 

 certain additions to the worl;, for Senior Scholarships. It still 

 remains to say something about the course of study for Honours 

 in the biological science?. 



It is enacted in the regulations of the New Zealand University 

 by what seems to me one of the wisest rules in the calendar,' 

 that a candidate for honours in biology must specialise — that is, 

 must choose some special branch of either zoology or 1 otany, 

 and work up that branch as fully as his time and opportunity 

 will allow. He has already, in taking his B.A. degree, proved 

 his general acquaintance with zoology or botany ; he now has to 

 show that, of some limited department of one of these sciences, 

 he possesses more than a mere text-book knowledge. 



Suppose, for instance, that a student selects the group of 

 fishes as his special subject. It w ill be my duty to direct him to 

 the more important works on ichtliyology in the University and 

 Museum libraries, so that while tnling the most recent work on 

 the general subject as his text-book, he may, when desirable, 

 refer to the original sources of information and acquire the habit 

 — most essential for a student of science — of seizing upon the 

 points of real impoitance in a monograph or brochure. While 

 undergoing this course of reading the candidate will dissect as 

 many as possible of the more important New Zealand fishes, 

 making careful notes and drawings of their anatomy, and com- 

 paring his results with the statements he finds in books. 



But it is further en.icted that the candidate for Honours shall 

 send in the results of some original research. In the hypotheti- 

 cal case I have chosen the subject for investigation would most 

 probably be an inquiry into some branch of fish anatomy as far 

 as it could be worked out on New Zealand species — the nervous 

 system, for instance, or the skull, or the digestive organs in one 

 of the groujs, or the detailed anatomy of some single species. 



It is, I think, from this part of the Honours work that the 

 conscientious student will derive the greatest benefit, and it is in 

 the fostering of research on the part of its members that a uni- 

 versity performs its highest duty. Until it asstmies that position 

 indeed, it is oily a step above the high school, differing from 

 it m degree onlj', and not in kind. It is only when original 

 work is directly encouraged, and indeed looked upon as the 

 goal of university life rather than the taking of a degree or the 

 gaining of a scholarship — in other words it is only when know- 

 ledge is not only communicated, but advanced, that a university 

 takes its true place, not as a mere finishing school, but as a centre 

 of sound learning. 



In the case of the advanced student I repeat it is only when 

 his work becomes in some slight degree original that he derives 

 the greatest possible benefit from it. "Every man," says 

 Carlyle, " is not only a learner but a doer: he learns witli ihe 

 mind given him what has been ; but with the same mind he 

 discovers further ; he invents and devises somew hat of his own. 

 Absolutely without oiiginalily there is no man." It is impos- 

 sible to estimate the benefit to a man's whole nature of setting 

 him to puzzle out something that has never been thoroughly 

 worked out before, of putting him upon his mettle to spare no 

 effort in the elucidation of the problem before him, and to "h.ild 

 it crime to let a truth slip." If a man has anything in him this 

 assuredly will bring it out, more than years of absorbing other 

 men's thoughts and verifying other men's results. The problem 

 he has set himself may seem to others quite in.significant, and 

 its solution amatter of no moment — "the pitifullest infinitesimal 

 fraction of a product" — but to him it is all-important — "an 

 ill-favoured thing, sir, but mine own." 



This brings me to the last point I have to touch upon. It is 

 to be hoped that a certain proportion of the students who study 

 biology here may be brought to look upon it not as a means of 

 education only, but as a pursuit to be carried on after leaving 

 the University. It is interesting to notice how much scientific 

 work in England has been and is done by what may be called 

 * I ani sorry to see that the Senate at its recent meeting has adopted a 

 regulation which cannot fail to lower immeasurably the standard of the 

 Honours e,xamination in biology. It is proposed in fact to make th.- candi- 

 date take up a special subject in both botany and zoology. A stu ent, for 

 instance, whose predilections are zoological, and who may never ha- e studied 

 botany at .all. is to make a special study of "some one family of the veac- 

 table kingdom," as well as of some group of animals. The inevitable result 

 will be that one or both subjects will be crammed, and Honours will cease 

 to have their legitimate value, and will become nothing more than a step 

 beyond the Pass Degree. 



scientific amateurs, men who, while engaged in professional or 

 business pursuits, devote their spare time to the advancement of 

 some branch of natural knowledge. And I think I am justified 

 in saying that New Zealand has hitherto been pre-eminent among 

 the Colonies for following out in this respect the traditions of 

 the Mother Country. To say nothing of botany, manygrouj-S 

 of animals have already been thoroughly well worked up, ai.d 

 considerable headway has been made with others; but "there 

 remaineth yet very much land to be possessed," and one may 

 venture to hope that workers from this University will before 

 long begin to swell the Transactions of the New Zealand Insti- 

 tute and the publications of the Geological Survey. Upon any 

 who may have this laudable ambition before them I would ven- 

 ture to urge the advisability — I might almost say necessity — of 

 acquiring a sound ai d exact, although necessarily elementary 

 knowledge of biology as a whole, before begiiming to study any 

 special branch. The work of a man who knows his own limited 

 branch of science, and nothing beyond, is quite sure to be im- 

 perfect, and will most probably be evanescent. The hij^he-t 

 results are only to be obtained by studying a group or a species, 

 not only in and for itself, but in connection with other groups or 

 species, by keeping always in mind the pos-ible connection of 

 one's ow n results with those of others by remembering that the 

 objects one is studying are not isolated things like coins or 

 postage-stamps, but are organisms, whose special characters 

 have been impressed upon them by forces which have been at 

 work from the beginning of all things. 



Finally, it is just possible that some day one of our students 

 may be brought to take up biology as a career. I need hardly 

 say that such a one, besides completing his studies elsewhere, 

 would be probably compelled, unless possessed of private means, 

 to exercise his profession either in Europe or in America, since 

 there is very little chance at present of more than one biological 

 appointment in a decade falling vacant in this Colom'. But a 

 man with a love for his subject and not afraid ol^hrd work, 

 who, after learning all he could learn here, availed himself of 

 the best teaching at home — at London, Cambridge, or Heidel- 

 berg — would, I feel convinced, have every chance of success. 

 He would never get rich ; the present practical applications of 

 biology are not such as insure fortunes. He would have all his 

 life to be satisfied with an " aurea medioctiias" in matters of 

 finance, but he could count upon what is even better than a large 

 income— increasing joy and constant development through a 

 thoroughly congenial life-work. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE 



OxFORn. — The Colleges meet on Saturday, October 15, and 

 the professorial lectures begin the following week. The pro- 

 fessors and lecturers in physics have drawn up the following 

 scheme of lectures and classes for the Michaelmas term : — Prof. 

 Clifton lectures on Wcdne-day and Saturday on tericstrial mag- 

 netism, and Prof. Bartholomew Price lectures .-n Tuesday, 

 Thursday, and Saturday on the dynamics of material systems. 

 Mr. Hayes lectures on electrostatics (treated mathematically). 

 Instruction in iiractical i hy-ics is given daily in the Clarendon 

 Laboratory, under the direction of Prof. Clifton, Mr. Stocker, 

 and Mr. Heaton. Mr. Stocker gives an experimental lecture on 

 elementary mechanics, and Mr. Heaton has a class for problems 

 in elementary mechanics and jihysics. The above lectures are 

 given in the U; iversily Museum. At Queei-i's College Mr. 

 Elliot gives a course on geometrical and physical objects ; at 

 Christ Church Mr. Baynes gives a course on elementary heat 

 and light ; and at Balliol Mr. Dixon gives a course on eltmen- 

 tary magnetism and electiicity. 



On Tue-day the Fellows of Wadham College elected Mr. G. 

 E. Thorley to the wardenship of the College, in place of Dr. 

 Griffiths, resigned. It is understood that Dr. Griffiths will con- 

 tinue to reside at Oxford, and will remain a delegate of the 

 University Press and of the Local Examinations. 



An examination for Natural .Science Scholarships begins on 

 Thursday, October 13, at Exeter and Trinity Colleges. The 

 scholar elected at Exeter will be expected to read for honours in 

 the biological school, and the scholar elected at Trinity will be 

 expected to read for honours in chemistry or physics. 



An election to a Brackenbury Natural Science Scholarship at 

 Balliol College will he held in November. Papers will be set in 

 physics, chemistry, and biology. Candidates may offer them- 

 selves in two of these subject-, and may also take mathematics 

 or an English essay. 



