ENTOMOLOGY AS A SUBJECT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCHOOLS. 329 



DiPTERA. 



N. i., 99. -" The mouth of a fly is a little truuk or tube lihr the tnnih 

 of a tiny elcji/iant." ..." These worms (fly larvii;) oat a great deal and 

 then tjo to deep.'" . . , "Flies feed on dirt of all kinds.''' 



One book has a full-page illustration with the legend " Bees at 

 Howers." The puzzle is to find the " bees " for the insects figured are 

 all Diptera. 



Now, Sir, I would appeal to you to use your great influence to help 

 us, who work in these schools, to dispel these dense clouds of ignorance 

 from the training-grounds of future l^jUgland ; and I would also 

 appeal to all those who are anxious to see the youth of our country 

 grow up intelligent and well-informed men and women, especially 

 those who are in positions to influence the work done in our schools, 

 to take an active part in seeing that the money spent on science instruc- 

 tion is worthily spent, and that natural science shall take the honoured 

 place that Huxley long ago gave it as one of the most powerful 

 educational instruments for the training of the human intellect. 



Entomology as a subject of instruction in schools. 



With the advance of scientific education, the natural history sub- 

 jects have become a general feature, in some form or other, in the 

 curricula of many schools. They are taught in our elementary schools 

 as Mr. Hepden has pointed out in the preceding article under various 

 titles, and, as " Object Lessons " and " Elementary Science," claim a 

 fair share of attention. In fact, as Object Lessons, natural history is 

 taught in almost all our schools, and large sums of money in the form 

 of grants are paid for the instruction thus given. 



We are continually receiving cuttings from papers from entomolo- 

 gists, usually headed " Newspaper Entomology," and setting forth in 

 no measured terms the contempt of the sender for the writer, but this 

 must continue so long as the publishers of school books are careless as 

 to the contents of what are launched on the educational world as 

 " Object Lesson Eeaders," "Elementary Science Readers," and so on. 

 Errors absorbed by a youngster are exceedingly tenacious and are rarely 

 thoroughly eradicated. The Education department, we believe, takes 

 no practical means to check the circulation of these books that are one 

 mass of errors, even in the most elementary principles and facts of 

 science, and H.M. Inspectors appear to be ignorant of, or too busy to 

 attend to, the matter, which must be daily under their observation. 

 The managers of schools (who are personally responsible for the selec- 

 tion of the books used) seem to take no interest in the accuracy of the 

 books selected, and the teacher himself usually selects the easiest, and 

 not the most accurate, readers for use in his school. 



Mr. Hepden's article shows that this carelessness (or ignorance) of 

 the authorities has become little less than a public scandal, and he asks 

 whether entomologists cannot help him, and others like him. to bring 

 pressure to bear on the authorities who are responsible. J3ad as are 

 the errors in nuitters entomological found in these books, mostly paid 

 for out of public monies, they are as nothing to those in some other 

 branches of science. Our readers \\ould say that it was impossible 



