xii XATVRE STUDY. 



person can teach nature study unless he himself is in 

 love with nature; unless he feels a cordial interest and 

 a true sympathy with what he is trying to teach. A 

 watchmaker cannot teach blacksmithing, nor a black- 

 smith teach watchmaking. The delicate touch of the 

 artist fails when he clutches the hammer and the tongs, 

 and the muscular strength of the smith is wasted when 

 he tries to adjust a hair-spring, or to pierce a ruby to 

 receive the pinion of the balance wheel. The watch- 

 maker feels something like scorn for the swashbuckling 

 swings and blows of the smith, much as he may appre- 

 ciate the results, and the blacksmith smiles behind his 

 great hand at the delicate touches of the pale man who 

 adjusts hiS; watch, much as he, too, may appreciate the 

 result, for each feels that what he can do is the only 

 thing worth doing. The feeling is a natural one to the 

 natural man, but in the educated ■ teacher of our schools 

 and academies, such a feeling is perhaps open to criti- 

 cism, as an evidence of narrow-mindedness and of a 

 greatly restricted horizon. Yet such feelings do exist 

 among teachers who, I am free to say, should be above 

 them and should assuredly know better. The mathe- 

 matician thinks that there is no study so valuable as 

 mathematics for expanding the mental faculties. The 

 chemist thinks and says, too, that his science is, if not 

 the most useful to mankind in general, at least — "Well 

 you are not a chemist, so you may not appreciate what 

 chemistry has done and is doing for the world, and I 

 can not now stop to teach you what I know ; but I should 

 advise you to take up the study." 



I suppose that every person, with even a restricted leisT 

 ure, has a hobby, and nothing can be more praiseworthy 

 and helpful than a hobby, provided you do not ride it 



