THE EELATIONS OF GEOLOGY. 387 



dacticallv. with the aid of such lecture illustrations as globes and maps; 

 and the instruction must be received by the scholar more or less as an 

 article of faith. The local geograph}, however — and by this I would 

 understand not only the topography of the district, but the geograph}^ 

 of the town or village, the playground, and the ver}" schoolroom itself — 

 should be taught practically at lirst hand, the data being recognized, 

 collected, and classified, the experiments made, and the conclusions 

 drawn, as much as possible })v the scholar himself. 



MAI'S AS MP]ANS AND SYMBOLS OF EARTH KNOWLED(4E. 



It is along this local side of geonomy that some of the most impor- 

 tant advantages will accrue to geology, and not only to geology Ijut to 

 all its associated sciences. One of the most necessary qualifications 

 for the geologist and the geographer, and indeed for all students of 

 those sciences and arts in which facts and phenomena have to be 

 arranged in their order of distribution, is a familiarity with the use of 

 maps and a knowledge of how they are constructed. But one of the 

 connnonest results of the present modes of giving instruction in maps 

 and map making in most schools is to cause this kind of knowledge to 

 become distasteful to the learner. And the consequence is that for one 

 fairly well educated man who can read a good map of his own native 

 district, there are hundreds to whom this is impossible. A detailed 

 topogra])hical map or a geological map is practically a mystery to the 

 average man, and yet the training which would have enabled him to 

 appreciate and enjoy them l)oth might, if given properly in his earl}^ 

 years, have afforded him manv a pleasant and interesting break in the 

 monotony of his ordinary school work. He has doubtless ])een shown 

 in his geographical classes the ordinary maps of the world, and those 

 of the continelits and his own country; he has perhaps copied some of 

 them laboriously in manuscript and very probabh' passed examinations 

 in drawing them from memor}'. But they were always more or less 

 dead things to him, because they dealt with lands and districts which 

 he had never beheld and not with the familiar ot)jects of the school and 

 the home. He has ne\'er seen them grow up before his own eyes, 

 built up from facts collected by himself and his fellows. 



We should like to see the lower classes of all schools making a map 

 of their own schoolroom and playground. We should like to see 

 the scholars at a higher stage studying and exercised in the large scale 

 25-inch map of the locality, with the school in the center; those at a 

 higher stage engaged on the 6-inch ma}) of the neighborhood, and so 

 on. Stage by stage the scholars might pass to the study of the 1-inch 

 map of the district or county. Then, when once th(»se maps had 

 ))ecome famitiiir objects, the learners should bt' taken out on occasional 

 excursions into the country with the maps in their hands, and edu- 

 cated in some of the higher grades of that earth knowledge which can 



