St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1889-11-28
Che Californian.
NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM.

1t is surprising, writes Augusta
Larned in the Christian Register,
how little the ordinary inhabitant OF
the country knows about the rocks
and soils, the birds, beasts, insects,
and plants of his own region. Vii
1age people who live surrounded by
fields and woods can seldom d1stin-
guish the native birds by their notes,
even those that nest in their own
orchard trees, and sing in neighbour
ing groves. They have only the
most trivial knowledge of the vast
kingdom of insect life, the butterflies,
moths, dragon-fiies, and all the hard
winged species. They know nothing
of these things because knowledge of
them is hidden in learned books, or
only to be found in city collections,
inaccessible to the resident of the
country. Aside from experienced,
practical farmers there are few coun-
try folks who can distinguish all the
varieties of forest trees, every species
of pine, spruce, cedar, hemlock, birch,
beech, maple, oak, ash, and elm, that
grow in the neighboring forests and
swamps. Fewer still have any
ties of plants, or of the noxious in
sects that prey on field crops and
garden vegetables
The lively curiosity of childhood
about beasts and birds, insects and
plants, close at home, is practically
thrown away, because parents are
often too ignorant to guide the child
in these studies; and the public school
does not teach the child what lies at
its own doOr,-the nature of things
that first awaken its love of knOwl-
edge, and call forth its most ardent
affections. The public school leads
the child's mind off to the centre of
Asia or Africa, or occupies it with the
minute analysis of language, or the
procession of the equinoxes 1t is
well the child should know about the
procession of the equinoxes, and the
obliquity of the elliptic; but it is not
well that he should not be taught to
know and recognize his neighbors,
the birds, fishes, animals, and plants
of the place where he lives.
What the public school does not
do for the inquiring, observing child,
the local natural history museum
ought to do Every town owes this
great object lesson to its children.
If the interest of the thoughtful boy
is stimulated, if his local pride is
awakened, he can and probably will
do much to enrich the museum of his
town. If it is made worth while to
study birds in their haunts there will
be no lack of students. The demand
always creates the supply collec-
e he. e t,a
ranged with nests and eggs, and as
far as possible with the very stones,
MOSES, grasses, wild flowers, and
plants of the natural habitat, would
be a delight to the sagacious coun-
try boy in helping him to verify his
observations. and to extend them.
As the free library has created its
public, its devoted lovers who could
not exist without it, so the natural
history collection would soon become
a necessity to the town, and an es-
pecial source of profit and delight to
the young
The farmer would be helped by it,
for he would learn the geology of his
district, the nature of its soils, the
proper grains and grasses they are
calculated to nOuriSh. He would
discover the birds and insects he
ought to protect and befriend, and
the varieties he should exterminate
The practical advantage is obvious,
and beyond this is the delight of dis
covering and mapping out some as
yet unknown parts of the kingdom
he inhabits, not alone for worldly
profit, but also for the growth of in
telIigence. The time is coming when
country folk will be ashamed of not
knowing more about the country.
The farmers daughter, let us hope,
Will give less time to the piano, the
fashion paper, and the novel, and
more time to the study of botany,
ornithology, and insect life.
The study of nature is a great
emancipation. 1t removes the curse
pronounced ages ago upon the serf of
the soil. 1t gives the seeing eye, the
hearing ear, the comprehensive mind.
1t leads to calm, to quiet, to inward
satisfaction, to love of the world free
from every gross or destructive appe-
tite, and savOring of the highest joys.
The local museum and the illustrated
lecture are admirably adapted to
teach people how to study, observe
anu COiICCI- HC lOCdl lCuI
Ologist, ornitholOgist or bOtanist is
generally solitary. He collects speci-
mems for his own instruction, and he
finds few at home to sympathize with
his pursuits. All the help he gets
comes from Il distance, from other
solitary observers, perhaps hundreds
of miles away, who find little or no
appreciation or assistance from their
neighbors. The amateur naturalist
collects birds and birds eggs, butter
flies and beetles, he gathers fossils,
and perhaps fills small binet with
minerals, native ores, or the rocks of
his neighborhood These things are
of small importance in themselves,
but they might form the nucleus of a
helpful and stimulating village col
lection, open to all whose interest
and curiosity lead them to study ma
ture at first hand
DAN REMEMBERED HIM.