98 



NATURE STUDY AND LIFE 



plants, the making of two blades of grass grow where 

 one grew before, the lesson of improvement by culture, 

 applicable not only to plants but to everything else that 

 has life and grows. It represents the momentous step of 

 the race from barbarism to civilization. In this simple,' 

 easy, and natural way we permit the child to throw him- 

 self into the great current of human effort, that has done 



Fig. 41. Prize Plants 

 Grades IV-VII, Upsala Street School. June, 1900. (Photograph by the author) 



more than anything else to uplift human life, and let him 

 play and learn to swim in it ; and we may be sure that 

 no child who has once thrown his whole heart and soul 

 into this effort can ever develop into quite the ruffian 

 or savage he might otherwise have become. Unless we 

 do introduce this element, the work may fall to the level 

 of meaningless drudgery. With it the lesson epitomizes 



