10 INTRODUCTION TO ZOOLOGY. 



You should keep in a notebook a faithful record 

 of all your observations. Each observation should 

 be written out in full, in ink, at the time it is made, in 

 order that it shall be as complete as possible. "Writ- 

 ing makes an exact man." Do not try to make crude 

 notes on a scratch-book and copy the notes afterward. 

 Your book may thus become a copy-book, but it will 

 not be a notebook. Sometimes an erroneous obser- 

 vation will be recorded. In such a case, the correction 

 should be recorded in the notebook just when it is 

 discovered, with the statement that an erroneous 

 obsei'vation has been recorded on a certain preceding 

 page. Nothing should be copied into the notebook 

 from another book. It should contain only the record 

 of your personal observations. 



The drawings should be the best that you are 

 capable of making. It will be found the most satis- 

 factory to make the drawings with India ink, on good 

 smooth paper, using a fine-pointed pen. The draw- 

 ings should be line drawings, and every line should 

 represent something on the object, and not be put in 

 merely for looks. Drawing is a method of study, and 

 everything that is studied should be drawn. The 

 drawings, like the notes, should be made while the 

 object is before you. Do not copy pictures from 

 books. Copied pictures are worse than useless for 

 purposes of this study. 



There are two kinds of questions that you will be 

 disposed to ask. One is a proper kind and one is an 

 improper kind. For example, on the grasshopper 

 you may be disposed to ask, "Where is the labial 

 palpus?" This is an improper question. It means 

 that you have somehow got hold of a name, and now 

 are asking some one to show you the thing that fits 

 it. The proper reply to your question is to say, "Ask 

 the grasshopper." The other kind of question is a 

 proper one. You say, "I have found something 



