214 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE.—1917, 
termination, to know why a certain name has been bestowed and to give in 
Latin a brief diagnosis of a genus or a species. A certain knowledge of Latin 
is also important for the profitable study of our own and several other lan- 
guages, so many words being derived from it; but I consider it almost a 
criminal waste of time to spend the best days of our school or college life in 
so mastering any dead language that we could give an oration in it, except for 
those who aim at a classical professorship. It is more necessary that we 
should have a better acquaintance with one or other of such modern languages 
as French, Italian, or Spanish, for any of which some knowledge of Latin is 
most helpful, or of German, so replete is it with biological information, but 
still more so that we should have a thorough knowledge of that most neglected 
language in the teaching curriculum of our own country, English, at least in 
higher education. 
With reference to Latin, I will just touch upon one point in my own 
education. Of course I was first put to Cesar’s ‘ De Bello Gallico.’ I utterly 
failed with it, owing probably to complete lack of interest. In a higher class 
I was given Virgil’s ‘Georgics’ to translate and soon took an interest in it— 
in its four books treating of the cultivation of the soil and the management 
of fruit trees, of cattle, and of bees. The moral seems to be that the teacher 
should first learn the bent of mind of his pupils and should modify his teaching 
accordingly, 
I presume that most of you have, or may some time have, children to send 
to school, and may have some influence over their education. You are more 
likely to know their capabilities than are the teachers to whom you send them, 
and you should make use of this knowledge for their benefit, 
With regard to the teaching of science, all books should at first be eschewed 
and the child should be taught to make some simple experiments. Every child, 
out of curiosity almost from its babyhood, wants to experiment, even if it may 
only be to take its doll to pieces to see what is inside it, and this desire of 
experimenting, though not of destroying, should be fostered. The natural 
desire to know all about the things around one is preliminary to the desire to 
know why certain things are as we see them; that is, to a knowledge of causes 
and their effects, which is science. The scientific teaching of the present day in 
our elementary schools is generally the mere imparting of a knowledge of the 
names and properties of things, and does not develop the intellectual powers. 
It is only when properly taught that the reason lately given by Professor D. 
Fraser Harris why a knowledge of science is useful to the general community 
truly applies. He said, in an address to the Nova Scotian Institute of Science 
(printed in ‘ Nature’ of May 17): ‘Apart altogether from the way in which 
science makes for technical efficiency, it is a means second to none in the training 
of the intellectual powers. It trains us in accuracy of observation, in the power 
of drawing trustworthy conclusions, in habits of precise thinking generally; anJ 
these are not small things. Science, the true, is the patient, loving interpretz- 
tion of the world we live in; it is a striving to attain not merely to an undev- 
standing of the laws whereby the world is governed, but to the enjoyment of the 
beauty and order which are everywhere revealed.’ 
The Rev. Hilderic Friend, in reviewing the last report of the Rugby School 
Natural History Society (in the same number of ‘ Nature’), says, with special 
reference to the Society’s work in ornithology : ‘Such studies are of inestimable 
value to young people. They develop the powers of observation, teach patience, 
sympathy, endurante, and kindness, divert the mind from base pursuits, and 
open out a fairy realm of beauty and delight, which cannot fail to ennoble, as 
well as entertain, those who pursue them.’ This Society is doing excellent work, 
so also is the Marlborough College Natural History Society; the latter on our 
list of Affiliated Societies. The formation of such scholastic societies should be 
greatly encouraged. 
The subject of museums comes, I think, most appropriately under this 
Section, for they are of very great educational value. One of the most 
important committees of the Association was that appointed in 1886, by the 
co-operation of Sections C and D and the Conference of Delegates, for the 
purpose of preparing a report on the provincial museums of the United King- 
dom. The Committee was very expeditious, thanks to the energy of its 
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