xxviii NATURE-STUDY. 



called. It may not be given to you or td me to lay hold 

 upon great things, or to subdue to our will any great 

 external force, but it is given to you and to me to make 

 the most of our present opportunities. 



A World of Discovery. 



We all like to discover and to tell of some new thing. 

 Natural history is preeminently the field in which we can 

 exercise this faculty. What can a child discover in 

 mathematics, or in literary studies ? It is chiefly his duty 

 to follow in the steps of others, to do the task that is as- 

 signed. But in nature study his spirit is free. He may 

 be an original explorer; he may perhaps see something 

 that no one else has ever seen. And, then the boundless 

 pleasure of such scenes and the telling. His spirit breaks 

 forth exultingly as out of a prison house. He is the 

 individual in full exercise of his powers. The child 

 recognizes, and rejoices in the recognition, that his abil- 

 ity to discover depends not on years nor on long training, 

 but upon his own sharp eyes, and a loving, active mind 

 back of them. He joyously bounds over time, and years 

 of study, and stands an equal with his teacher, the only 

 phase of school work in which teacher and pupil can be 

 real companions. How affectionately close they come ; 

 this is the real camaraderie; it wins the right kind of 

 friendship. It develops both teacher and pupil. 



And as the child and teacher never really know the 

 field and forest till they have entered therein, so the 

 teacher never knows the child till she has entered into 

 this real companionship. In the presence of Mother 

 Nature we are all children, loving her and loving each 

 other. As we all must go into nature's domain to make 



