75 
NATURE-KNOWLEDGE. 
LOVE of Nature which is worthy of the name will 
inevitably lead to a desire for a fuller and deeper know- 
ledge of Nature, so that I have not been at all surprised 
at receiving various letters urging the insertion of more 
directly instructive articles in Nature Notes. I hope in the 
immediate future to respond to these suggestions in what I 
believe to be the best way, by giving complete life-histories, by 
various writers, of various types of plant and animal life. Mean- 
while, however, so many of our members are interested in the 
work of our primary schools that no apology is, I think, needed 
from me for quoting at length from his presidential address on 
“ The Training in the Elementary School, with especial reference 
to the Over-crowding of the Time Table,” which I have received 
by the kindness of Mr. W. Johnson, of the West Lambeth 
Teachers’ Association. 
“ Nowadays,” he says, “ we have before us some capital schemes of ele- 
mentary physics and chemistry. Probably most teachers would choose to take 
one of these. But in country schools, at least, I should much prefer to see 
adopted a department, or a combination of studies from several departments, of 
what may be called from want of any other name, ‘ Nature-knowledge.’ Such a 
course might embrace the observation and explanation of familiar physical pheno- 
mena, of plant life and the operations of the fields, of the neighbouring rocks, 
soil, springs, &c., together with easy lessons on the common trees, birds, insects 
and flowers, or the face of the sky by day and night, on the laws of health as 
concerned with the cottage, and so forth. 
4 ‘ Some of you will say, ‘ Well, this is distinctly good ; you started by com- 
plaining of the multiplication of subjects, and now you propose to teach geology, 
botany, astronomy, and who knows what else ? ’ I would answer that the topics 
suggested should be allowed to comprehend object lessons and class and specific 
subjects under one scheme. Again, the course would be spread over several 
years. Nor need the teacher try to take all the subjects alluded to, certainly not 
the respective sciences as such, unless indeed one only were taken. I claim that 
the course has practical as well as educational merit. Some of the pioneers of 
education — the Gills, the Robinses, and the Webbs — proved what could be done 
in this field. The fact not to be lost sight of, if you will pardon the well-worn 
sermon, is that the child has familiar surroundings which to him are all in all. It 
is through these homely matters that we can cultivate the habit of swift, correct, 
and comprehensive observation. Then, by utilising the composition lesson, we 
can teach him to express in correct English what he sees and infers. To give 
him the open ear, ‘ the seeing eye and the understanding heart ’ is surely better 
than to make him acquainted with some science only remotely connected with his 
daily experience. Please do not conclude that I place trust in a mere bundle of 
facts. Probably we already teach too many. There is sober truth in the maxim 
put into the mouth of Sherlock Holmes that there comes a time when for every 
fact driven into the memory an old one is knocked out. Hence we must make 
the load light at first. ‘ Education,’ says Mr. Frederic Harrison, ‘ can open to 
the learner the door into the vestibule of the World’s Wisdom, but it cannot cram 
its contents into his brain.’ Be the child’s memory as retentive as you will, in the 
after-time much will be lost. Consequently, particulars should be so carefully 
selected that simply by the daily, monthly, or yearly recurrence of the phenomena, 
the youth is compelled to use that surest aid to the memory, the continual revolv- 
ing in the mind of known facts, and the constant re-testing, revising, and 
extending of those facts. 
“ I feel very hopeful on the teaching of ‘ Nature-knowledge,’ for is it not 
true that some of the most intelligent country people one has ever known, are 
those who have learnt to take the closest interest in Nature and her ways ? 
