March 5, 1886.1 



SCIENCE. 



209 



for the sake of third parties or of the general 

 public. A contract between two parties may 

 have an important effect on the rights and inter- 

 ests of persons who are noway concerned with 

 the making of it, and in such cases it has long 

 been the custom for the state to interfere for the 

 protection of those persons. Such cases often 

 arise in relation to common carriers. For in- 

 stance : if a railway company charges one shipper 

 a higher price for carrying freight than it charges 

 another for the very same service, it does injus- 

 tice to the party against whom the discrimination 

 is made ; hence recent decisions of the federal 

 courts have declared such discrimination to be 

 unlawful. 



The meeting of the American economic asso- 

 ciation, held on Saturday last in this city, indi- 

 cated that the interests of the association are being 

 wisely provided for, and that the plans under 

 preparation are in the interest of true science. It 

 showed itself cautious, and gave no countenance 

 to the establishment of a newer creed with fresh 

 dogmatic utterances. In the deliberations the 

 prominent fact stood out that the purpose of the 

 society must be in method. Scientific method of 

 investigation is the great need of economics at the 

 present time, and it is to this department of work 

 that this new association can unfalteringly com- 

 mit itself. The patient collection and analysis of 

 facts is a necessity which requires no apology in 

 these days of confusing arguments drawn from 

 insufficient statistical and social data. The coun- 

 cil, however, assembled for practical work, and 

 took a step forward in the development of the 

 usefulness of .he society by admitting the Con- 

 necticut valley economic association into its mem- 

 bership. This force, of about seventy-five mem- 

 bers, is located chiefly at Springfield, Mass., and 

 is a local society recently founded, and modelled 

 after the constitution of the larger association. 

 It was also determined to publish at an earl}- date 

 one or two monographs, as well as the secretary "s 

 report, which will shortly be in print. 



GEOGRAPHY-TEACHING IN GERMANY. 



In the matter of geographical education, Ger- 

 many may be taken as the model which other 

 European countries are following, so far as their 

 special circumstances will permit. It is true that 

 teachers like Dr. Lehman and Professor Wagner 

 are not satisfied with the position yet attained in 



German schools. But to the eyes of Mr. Keltic, 

 accustomed as they were to the methods and appli- 

 ances of English schools, Germany seemed very 

 far ahead. He therefore devoted a considerable 

 portion of Ms 'report,' recently published by the 

 Royal geographical society, to a description of 

 what we may call the German system of geo- 

 graphical education. According to him, the ideal 

 aimed at, and indeed being rapidly carried out, is 

 to have one continuous course of geographical in- 

 struction from the first year in the primary school 

 up to the university. 



The preHminary stage, or what is known in 

 Germany as heimatskunde, combined with or pre- 

 ceded by actual observation, is met with in nearly 

 all the primary schools and in the preparatory 

 classes of the higher schools. There are no text- 

 books in this early stage, except for the teacher, 

 the pupil obtaining his ideas from actual observa- 

 tion or practice. The instruction begins with the 

 student's home surroundings, and proceeds out- 

 wards from the town to the district, then to the 

 province, Germany, Europe, and, finally, the world 

 in general. At the outset the pupils are given a 

 mastery of the cardinal points, the course of the 

 sun in the heavens, and similar elementary no- 

 tions. This is done, not by compelling him to 

 commit the compass-card to memory, but by get- 

 ting him to find the direction of his own house 

 from the schoolroom, and by encouraging him to 

 a PPly a f ew simple ideas in his daily walks and 

 games. The next step is to teach him how to 

 read a map. Here, again, his local knowledge is 

 utilized. A map of his own town is procured, 

 and he learns how to trace his own homeward 

 path, and to find out the direction of some well- 

 known buildings. Then he often visits, map in 

 hand, the surrounding country, and thus learns 

 the actual meaning of this or that geographical 

 symbol. Often these excursions are extended to 

 distant points of interest. Many teachers think 

 that students acquire this faculty of map-reading 

 best by learning how to use the geographical 

 symbols themselves, or, in other words, by prac- 

 tice in map-drawing ; but, wherever this method 

 is followed, it is insisted on that the drawing is 

 done, not to produce a work of art, but solely to 

 familiarize the pupil with contour lines, mountain- 

 shading, and other similar signs. In some schools 

 the pupils build up the relief of a country with 

 sand ; in others the contour lines are reproduced 

 in card-board, and the relief is built up with great 

 exactness. When the maps are well made, as most 

 modem German maps are, no better way to teach 

 the meaning of geographical symbols could be 

 devised. But the conditions must be favorable : 

 and, above all, maps with unusual symbols, such 



