458 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 
they would embroidery. Pupils were never allowed to see how experiments 
were prepared. When Agassiz came over there was a great change, as indicated 
by such schools of science as the Sheffield school, at Yale, and the Chandler 
school, at Harvard. The lecturer gave some recent personal observations of 
science teaching in the East. He spoke of science literature. Harpers’ science 
department was read and relished as much as any other department of the magazine. 
The leading journals now are called upon to furnish scientific literature, edited 
by men trained in this department. The teaching in our public schools has 
changed very much in twenty five years and science is gaining ground. 
The lecturer then considered how science is taught in our schools. The 
methods are very much improved, still there is too much of books and too little 
of nature. There is a lack of originality. The grades have been an obstruction. 
Public schools have too much of statistics and too little of apparatus. The 
laboratory of public schools is often a rubbish room. Specimens have been 
considered as mere curiosities. Teachers need to be trained to scientific methods. 
The laboratory should be a place of work and investigation. T:wo things have 
worked against the study of science. Experiments cost something and science 
requires hard study. There are many means of scientific illustration in every 
day life in manufactories. Professors in our schools have often been on the 
best terms with the superintendents of manufactories, realizing that they often 
furnish the best illustrations of scientific processes. The lecture concluded with 
valuable suggestions in reference to the improvement of our schools in teaching 
science. The votaries, however, in looking over results, can thank God and 
take courage. 
Col. Theo. S. Case was then introduced and delivered his lecture on the 
ancient city of Pecos, New Mexico. This lecture was recently delivered in 
Kansas City where, as well as at Topeka, it was well received. 
The Academy met in the Senate chamber on Saturday morning, the abun- 
dance of material furnished in the programme, overflowing the limit of two days. 
Mr. B. B. Smyth, of Great Bend, read a paper on The Plants of Central and 
Southwestern Kansas. The paper was illustrated with a beautiful herbarium of 
the plants described. The author said he had traced the roots of the Amorpha 
canescens twenty-six feet deep in the ground, where they were uncovered in dig- 
ging a well. The paper showed original work. 
Professor Sadler, of Emporia, was called upon to explain a pinch-cock, with 
a tangent screw, which he had invented to aid in chemical manipulation. With 
this ingenious device half a drop can be obtained in a given time, a supply very 
satisfactory in laboratory processes. 
Mr. D. C. Tillotson, of North Topeka, read an interesting paper on 
‘‘Fragments of Pottery on the Upper Solomon.”’ Some of the pottery was 
found in a mound partly washed away, and was attributed to the Mound-builders, 
and some of the pottery to the Indians. 
Mr. J. C, Cooper gave, by invitation of the president, a narrative of his 
