and animals (especially birds and insects i. so that these may ho recognized in 
all stages of their development, and their economic relations determined. 
This will enable the pupils to decide whether a given species is mainly 
beneficial <>r harmful and will set them to thinking about means of per- 
petuating or exterminating the species. This last consideration is the one 
which mainly determines the attitude of the farmer toward his field crops, 
domestic animals, and fowls, as well as toward the weeds and other posts 
that annoy him. When the nature-study teacher and her pnpils have 
arrived at this point of view they will be in a position to pass over as 
unimportant such details as color of hair, length and number of teeth, 
number of leaves, length of petioles and internodes. and a hundred other 
peculiarities of plants and animals, except as these peculiarities have a direct 
hearing upon the perpetuation of the species or upon their usefulness or harm- 
fulness to man. Such a point of view and such an attitude toward the things 
studied will aid greatly in developing in the children the faculty of critical dis- 
cernment. This faculty, according to President Eliot, of Harvard, "ought to 
be carefully and incessantly cultivated by school, college, and the experience of 
life, for it is capable of contributing greatly to happiness as well as to material 
success." 
Such critical studies of plants, animals, soils, weather conditions, and other 
natural objects aud phenomena, in their relation to each other and to man, will 
give the pupils an excellent preparation to take up at the beginning of their 
sixth or seventh year in school the more formal study of the elements of 
agriculture. 
ELEMENTARY AGRICULTURE. 
The course in elementary agriculture may be given most appropriately during 
the last two years in the rural common school. The time to be devoted to this 
course will necessarily vary in different schools, but it is believed that on the 
average not less than one hour per week during two years will be required to 
make the course effective. A well-arranged and up-to-date text-book, with illus- 
trations and suggestions for practical exercises, should be adopted as a basis for 
this study. A few such books already exist, and an increased demand would 
undoubtedly lead to the production of others aud the still further improvement 
of books of this class. The text-book will in most cases be necessary as a more 
or less definite guide for the teacher, who will in all probability be without 
special training in agriculture. It will also be helpful to the pupils in giving 
a systematic view and in fixing definite knowledge of the subject, and to the 
parents in showing them what such instruction really involves and in creating 
an interest in the subject-matter of the books. 
The instruction in the class room should be supplemented by simple experi- 
ments with soils, plants, and animals both at school and at home. Every effort 
should be made to connect the instruction with the home life of the pupils. As 
an aid to the accomplishment of this aim the pupils should be taken on occa- 
sional Saturday excursions to neighboring farms to see improved live stock, 
examine plans of buildiugs. and take notes on methods of cropping and cultivat- 
ing. Visits to county fairs, where arrangements could be made to allow the 
older pupils to judge some of the live stock, fruits, and grain, and compare their 
scores with the work of the judges, would be fine training for the classes in 
agriculture. This scheme has been tried with older students of agriculture and 
has met with thorough approval. The officers of the fairs could probably be 
induced to offer prizes for products grown by the pupils and for other agricul- 
tural work done by them: or special exhibits of their work could be made at 
farmers' institutes or other meetings attended by their parents. All these 
things would tend to create an interest in farm life, and would encourage parents 
to make the farm more attractive to the children. 
The schoolrooms should be provided with illustrative material consisting of 
charts, pictures, collections of specimens (largely made by the pupils), and 
boxes, cans, plates, and other inexpensive material which can be used in making 
apparatus for conducting experiments. There should also be a school library 
containing at least a few standard reference books on the different divisions of 
agriculture and the publications of the State experiment stations and the United 
States Department of Agriculture. 
The text-book of agriculture should give an orderly and progressive treatment 
of the elements of plant production, animal production, and dairying, together 
with brief and very elementary discussions of a few topics in rural engineering 
