4 



The Scottish Naturalist. 



of Natural Science. I have no desire to rhapsodize, and I have 

 no need ; for we are, from the point of view of Educationists, face 

 to face with two sad facts, (i). That owing to the drifting of our 

 population, from economic conditions into large centres, children 

 are deprived of the physical, moral and intellectual advantages 

 that result from direct contact with nature. (2). The drift of our 

 Public School instruction is too much in the direction of merely 

 putting pupils in possession of such educational tools as may fit 

 them for carrying out their own education in after life, and too 

 little in the direction of -securing for every child a sound physique, 

 a healthy brain, and a ready appetite for the moral lessons taught 

 by stream and lake, mountain and sea. There is a tendency to 

 teach children everything except what they should know best of 

 all — their own immediate surroundings. We are the creatures of 

 circumstances, the result of the influences brought to bear upon 

 us ; and in our educational systems the tremendous forces of 

 nature occupy at present almost no place whatever. I have no 

 desire to minimise the importance of the teaching of Grammar or 

 Arithmetic, or of imparting a knowledge of the manufactures and 

 cities of our own and of foreign lands. But the educative influence 

 as we know of the teaching of such subjects is small in comparison 

 with the forms and moods and methods of expression of nature 

 herself. 



Children, even in country districts, leave school unable to dis- 

 tinguish between an oak and an elm. They leave it, having little 

 sympathy with animals, for such sympathy can be based only on 

 intelligence. And yet children love nature. They are born with 

 a love of it. They will learn to stuff birds, make collections of 

 the stones in the district, and, as I know well, will classify, press, 

 and mount every plant in their neighbourhood. 



My time is limited and I am anxious to restrain any strong 

 expression of feeling, but I venture to express the conviction that 

 our combined societies have a duty in this matter. They have, 

 first of all, a duty to themselves. It is a matter of regret that 

 many of our societies are not advancing in numbers. How can 

 we expect them to do so when nothing is done to inoculate the 

 youth of our several districts with a love for Natural Science ? I 

 have always held that when any scientific body ceases to be 

 aggressive, its meridian is past. Children have hobbies as well as 

 men. Many of them have scientific hobbies ; but these are 



