24 THE FAIRY-LAND OF SCIENCE. 
taken out of ourselves and made to look at the won- 
ders of nature going on around us? Do you never feel 
tired and " out of sorts," and want to creep away from 
your companions, because they are merry and you 
are not? Then it is the time to read about the stars, 
and how quietly they keep their course from age to 
age ; or to visit some little flower, and ask what story 
it has to tell; or to watch the clouds, and try to im- 
agine how the winds drive them across the sky. No 
person is so independent as he who can find interest 
in a bare rock, a drop of water, the foam of the sea, 
the spider on the wall, the flower underfoot or the 
stars overhead. And these interests are open to every- 
one who enters the fairy-land of science. 
Moreover, we learn from this study to see that there 
is a law and purpose in everything in the Universe, 
and it makes us patient when we recognize the quiet 
noiseless working of nature all around us. Study 
light, and learn how all colour, beauty, and life depend 
on the sun's rays ; note the winds and currents of the 
air, regular even in their apparent irregularity, as they 
carry heat and moisture all over the world. Watch 
the water flowing in deep quiet streams, or forming 
the vast ocean ; and then reflect that every drop is 
guided by invisible forces working according to fixed 
laws. See plants springing up under the sunlight, 
learn the secrets of plant life, and how their scents 
and colours attract the insects. Read how insects 
cannot live without plants, nor plants without the flit- 
ting butterfly or the busy bee. Realize that all this 
is worked by fixed laws, and that out of it (even if 
sometimes in suffering and pain) springs the wonder- 
