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A Popular Record of Scientific Experiments, Inventions and Progress 
Copyright Secured, 1877. 
Vol. I. NEW YORK, JULY, 1878. No. 7. 
put under the special care of Hal, by whom 
he was regarded quite paternally. The 
children were full of interest for their new 
study, and in their eagerness would some- 
times speak together, so that I was obliged 
to remind them that I could neither hear 
nor answer all at once. 
Hal walked with me, and the little 
procession followed, sometimes walking 
quietly, like grown people, and then one, 
espying some flower, would dash off, and' 
the others after him. When they had again, 
assumed a quiet demeanor, after one of 
these sorties, I called their attention to the 
trees which surrounded us, and bade them 
notice their different shapes. Approaching 
an elm, they first noticed its plume-like ap- 
pearance, and on a nearer approach, ob- 
served that the boughs, which, springing 
from nearly the same point on the trunk,, 
sometimes near the ground, diverged grad- 
ually and equally till the normal height of 
the tree was attained, and, becoming slen- 
der, bent downwards in graceful curves, 
and the branches and branchlets followed 
this arched arrangement. They passed a 
group of oaks, and, singling out an indi- 
vidual tree, contrasted its crooked. Ion 
1 
How to Begin the Study of Botany. 
N a pleasajit day in 
Spring, I gathered 
my pupils together; 
dressed to defy any 
possible dampness, 
our feet protected 
with india-rubbers, 
that no marshy land 
might deter us from 
examining its plants, 
and laden with our 
botanical boxes, we 
started for a ramble 
in the fields. One enviable boy exhibited 
a pair of rubber boots, the penalty for 
which was commissions from his compan- 
ions to get for them any flowers which 
might grow in water beyond their reach, all 
of which he very pleasantly accepted. 
Let me describe my class; it numbered 
six pupils. Hal, the eldest, a bright boy of 
fourteen, and the owner of the boots; then 
Lucy, Amy, Ned, Mary and Charlie, who, 
being our youngest, eight years old, was 
