'June 190g. 



5^5 



Miscellaneous. 



Among other notable successes have been 

 hybrid walnuts — trees of extraordinarily 

 rapid growth and yielding valuable timber ; 

 the pineapple quince, so called from the novel 

 flavour ; and the thornless cactus for which a 

 great future is foretold from the point of 

 view of stock-feeding in desert regions, 

 Besides these a great number of garden 

 flowers might be alluded to such as Cannas, 

 Poppies, Amaryllis and the Shasta daisy. 



So far we have recorded the successes of a 

 remarkable natural genius in his own line 

 of work, and if we seem to have given them 

 a somewhat grudging recognition, it is 

 because we have sought in simple statement 

 an antidote to the rapturous phrases of the 

 work under review. In Mr. Burbank's mani- 

 fold new productions, in his notable success 

 as a gardener and plant breeder, we have 

 evidence of very marked bowers of patience 

 and industry and of other powers which oan 

 only be described as amounting to an instinct- 

 ive knowledge of plants, borne no doubt 

 principally of a vast experience. This equip- 

 ment does not however entitle Mr. Burbank to 

 deliver judgment on scientific problems. 

 In point of fact neither he nor his biographer 

 has any understanding at all of the meaning 

 of scientific work, and Mr. Harwood, at least, 

 shows himself quite incapable of stating a 

 simple scientific problem intelligibly. This is 

 a circumstance over which no one need dis- 

 tress himself were it not for the announce- 

 ment in the preface that " the statements in 

 this volume, both those which have a scienti- 

 fic, and those which have a practical bearing, 

 stand unreservedly vouched for by Mr. 

 Burbank." We find it difficult to believe 

 that Mr. Burbank is capable of the muddled 

 ideas with which his interpreter credits him, 

 and we earnestly recommend Mi'. Harwood 

 to omit the chapter entitled "Theories and 

 Conclusions " from future editions of a work 

 which, as a piece of purely rhapsodic writing, 

 has certain peculiar merits of its own. If 

 time had been available we should have liked 

 to estimate the number of times the words 

 miracle and miraculous are made use of by 

 our author. 



R. H. LOCK. 



SUGGESTIONS ON RURAL EDUCATION, 



With the object of assisting in some degree 

 the adoption of rural education to the condi- 

 tions of rural life, specimen courses of special 

 object lessons and of gardening were publish- 

 ed by the Board of Education, in 1901 and 

 1902. These pamphlets have long been out 

 of print, and the Board of Education have 

 now issued a phamphlet by Mr. T, S. 

 Dymond, entitled " Suggestions on Rural 

 Education," in which an attempt is made to set 

 out the educational needs of those who are to 

 follow rural pin-suits, to suggest the character 

 of the instruction that would supply the 



educational equipment required to meet those 

 needs, and to indicate the means by which 

 in course of time such instruction could more 

 generally and more adequately be supplied. 



Rural prosperity, Mr. Dymond observes, 

 primarily depends on the prosperity of rural 

 industry, and this, though principally deter- 

 mined by economic conditions, must also 

 depend upon the. intelligence, adaptability, 

 knowledge and skill of those engaged in it. 

 The prosperity also of rural workers depends 

 on the profitable use made of cottage gardens, 

 allotments and small holdings by the men, 

 and the domestic skill of the women. It 

 must also be remembered that, in the country, 

 people must depend for recreation on their 

 own mental and physical resources, so that 

 general culture has an important part to 

 play in making country life attractive; and 

 lastly, that the natural increase in the 

 population usually necessitates a steady 

 migration of young men and women from 

 the country to the town, and education must 

 be of such a kind as not to place these at a 

 disadvantage. 



Elementary Schools- — It is principally to 

 the development of intelligence and observa- 

 tion in connection with rural subjects that 

 the system of elementary education should 

 be directed. The influence of country 

 surroundings should be distinctly felt, and 

 the subjects should be taught more in 

 relation to the rural environment of the 

 school. Mr. Dymond lays great stress on 

 the value of nature study, gardening and 

 other manual work in elementary schools, 

 as well as the treatment of other subjects, 

 such as drawing, geography, arithmetic, 

 &c, in relation to rural life. 



Higher Elementary Schools.— Higher 

 elementary schools and upper classes are in- 

 tended to carry on the work of the element- 

 ary school and develop it in the direction of 

 the industries the scholars are likely to 

 follow. For this purposed Mr. Dymond 

 suggests that nature-study should give place 

 to the study of natural science and to theappli- 

 cation of science to agriculture, horticulture, 

 dairying, domestic economy and hygiene. 

 The subjects of manual instruction should be 

 developed in their industrial aspects ; thus 

 food culture would form an important subject 

 for practical work, and needlework would be 

 carried on to dressmaking. Arithmetic should 

 be developed in the direction of mensuration 

 and mechanics, and be correlated with book- 

 keeping and commercial correspondence. 

 The subject of general culture would include 

 a secondary course of English literature, 

 history and geography, together. with singing 

 and physical exercises. 



Rural Seconday Schools.— The function 

 of the rural secondary school is to instil that 

 general culture which gives [an outlook wid e 

 enough to encompass all rural activity and 

 that knowledge of science underlying rural 



