OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLUMN.

Otago Witness, Issue 2892, 11 August 1909, Page 86

OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLUMN.

FOR SENIORS AND JUNIORS. (Conducted by *Magisteb, to whom all com- , munications pmst be addressed.) BOOKS FOR SCHOOL LIBRARIES. Some time ago I promised to give addftional lists of books to add to school libraries, but pressure on my space has crushed out a good deal I s&ould have liked to' find room for. I shall try, however, in iuture to give * paragraph or two every fortnight upon new books I think might be put with advantage upon the library shelves of schools, or of teachers. As I writ© I have by me two or three volumes of three series issued by_T. C. and E. C. Jack. They are called "Told to the Children Series," "The Children's Heroes Series," and " Storiea From History Series," and the ticks of some of the books are "Stories From Greek History,'' "Stories of Robin Hood," "The Story of Columbus," "Uncle Tom's Cabin," "The Story of Nelson,"' "Stories of King Arthur's Knighta," "The Story of Stanley," " Stories From Roman History,"* " Story of Shakespeare," " Story of Captain Cook,'* "Stories of William Tell," " Robinson Crusoe," " Storiea From Chaucer," and so on. Each has eight appropriate coloured illustrations, and the language used can be well grasped by childnxsn of the Third and Fourth Standards, while older pupils will find them interesting also. Mr Clement K. Shorter, a leading literary critic and an author, says of the volumes: "The best series of books for very little children that I have seen, for a long time." The binding is in limp cloth, and the price, 8d net. They aro delightful reading, and I have reed through, two or tnree myself. Another children's book ; .s6ued by the came firm is " The Children's Fairy Book " ; this is published at 6d, and has coloured illustrations too. Some Supplementary Readers issued by this firm are: "The Children's Scott," "Tho Children's Pickwick," " Lamb's Tales " (two series). "Rab and His Friends" (a beautiful story), and "Rip Van Winkle." I sometimes wish I were born a generation or two later, for such delightful books were not in existence at anything like the prico when I was a boy, any good books, well illustrated, being prohibitive in price. In country schools a good deai can bo done to foster a taste- for reading — town schools, too, for that matter — by having books on hem-d- for pupils to help themselves to occasionally. A series that will be found interesting- for the purpose la "Jack's Concentric Histories," the num<bers of which are- named, " Simple Stories Simply Told," "British History Simply Told," "British History as Cause and Effect," " Britain in the Making," and "Europe in the Making." The type is a. little heavier than usual and v*ry easy to read; the paper is not calendered except when necessary to carry process pictures, and cansequ-en-tlv there is an absence of that gloss seen in most books. The pictures am out of the usual run, and every one has an historic*! value. Indeed, I should like to have a series of the pictures, as the nucleus of a little picture gallery illustrating history in its many phases. The maps, too, are more numerous than usual. The same firm publishes a periodic series for those who prefer to take events in regular •equer.ee. And while I am on history let me recommend two other series. Tike first, a unique set in its way, published by Blackwcod and Sons, and is called- "Tbe Story of the World Series." The first, "Qn> the Shores of the Great Sea," refers, of course, to great deeds and events happening in the ancient kingdoms opening upon the Mediterranean, some of the 54 chapters being entitled: "King Solomon's Fleet," "The Story of the Argonauts," " The Fall of Tyre," "That Battle of Marathon," "Tho Death of Socrates," "Alexander th© Great," "The Rise of Carthage," ana "The End of Carthage"; the second, "The Discovery of New Worlds" explains itself; the third, "The Awakening of Europe," is a natural outcome of the second. The fourth, "The Struggle for Sea Power," is especially interesting at the present time, bat stops with Napoleon's exile to St. Helena; and the fifth. "The Growth of the British Empire," is as interesting as the fourth. Btsidee the comprehensive plan tho series is worked out upon, it has other charac•terist.JC3 of its own. Each volume has on the insid-e cover a map illustrating the history treated, consequently we have a jr.-a.dual unfolding from,, the Mediterranean Sea and the countries bordering it to the complete map; and the last of the series contains a map showing in red the British Empire. Each volume concludes with a. bibliograohy from wJiich. readers can extend th«ir ioa<lin^, and a blank map to bo filled in according to the bent of the tencheir or student. Then there is an index in addition to the. table of contents. As fa.r as I know the series stands alone in school books. There is iust one defect, however. Tho illustrations are not numerous enough, though they have one l&erit—they are original : but in them days, it. appears to n», that, book makers should ui?o cv«ry opportunity to <?ive the best illustration* possible, and from the best pictures extant. ROOSEVELT AS A HUNTER. A gentleman who regularly reads these columns ©suds me an article headed as above, and taken from The Lone Hand, October, 1907. In the covering note ho writes, " I was profoundly touched when I read it," and h© passes it on to me thinking I might use it. I shall, and for several reasons. Ex-President Roosevelt snoke dis-pora-ngingly of such writera as Long, and Thomson-Seton, because they idealised animal life- and made animals appear human and more than human in their intelligence. The article — it i* largely mode 1 up of what was presumably an answer written by Mr WHliam J. Long— «how« . that Mr Roosevelt has been a wc*f caQojujgH hunter, and that taose he has advereel^^i epoken of are immeasurably above hiu, in their love for liaira&la. It is an erticl*

fts cradling as it is temperate and reasoned. This is one reason why I am reproducing it. Another is that "Dinornis," "Ornithologist," "Alpha," all men of scientific attainments, and many other regular correspondents — Mr Shore last week, for instance, and " A. Boyd " this — have recently expressed their abhorrence of needless slaughter simply to satisfy a co-called sporting instinct, and the article thus comes in opportunely. And one more. These columns are being made increasing use of in schools, and articles such as this one will act as a leaven which may produce results, the good of which cannot be measured : — " President Roosevelt, in addition to his other troubles, has just now a row on with the ' Nature-writers ' — the authors who make a specialty of animal stories. They, the audacious President declares, are mostly ' fakens.' One of them, Mx William J. Long, answers back in the American papere. In this way are the- tabl€6 turned in the oontroverey which now presents the aggrieved author in the attitude of demanding retraction and an apology from the head of the nation. The President is a hunter, he declares. 'He knows little or nothing concerning the beasts he hunts except how they try to escape death.' What else Mr Long thinks that the President knows he sets forth herewith: — ,"He knows the outside of the animal; he collects their heads and hides and measures tibeir exterior proportions. Who is he to write : ' I don't believe for a minute that some of tfiese Nature-writers know the heart of the wild tilings'? As to that, I find, after carefully reading two of his big books, that every time Mar Roosevelt gets near the heart of a wild thing he invariably puts a bullet through i*. From his own records I have reckoned a full thousand hearts •which he has know thus intimately- In one eb*piwr aJone I find that he violently gained knowledge of eleven noble elk hearts in a few days, and he teMa us that tliis was 'a type of many such huoEs ' ; in others he says he has been much more successful and often far excelled these figures (' Elk Hunt at Two Ocean Poes'). Mr Roosevelt certainly knows the hearts of the wild things. One Nature-writer whom he condemns has watched and followed animals for years, | thinking that he could understand these ■wild hearts better if he left them beating ' warmly under their own soft skins; and- ■ he still perversely clings to his delusion. " Mr- Roosevelt never gets near enough to animals of the forest to know anything j about them. "£ou stop two hundred yards away to shoot a deer. I watch my friends from a point perhaps twenty or thirty yards away. I have been so close to wild animals that I could lie and watch their eyelids lift and falL „He has his horees and his doge. What fehance has he of getting near them in tJieir native unoonsciounees? I go alone into the woods and steal silently after the animate, never killing except in need of food, and then with a heartache. Thus I spend months of each year in the solitudes. I have had the good fortune- to learn many things about the animals that had not been reported before. I couldn't help learning many things. I have discovered the individuality of animais and observed traits that had not been recognised be-fore. I am only one c;l many men wlio will soon be doing tb« same tHing — goia? out and getting acquainted with wild nature and learning how closely it is connected with human nature. "We axe still barbarians in our attitude toward the animals." asserts Mr Long. "Mr Roosevelt is like a man of the Stone Age who sallied forth with his olub tc brain some beast and drag it home to dieplay before hi« wives. But our hunting ig not even the savage's exousa of the need j of food. "Which," he asks, "is the more pleasing picture, that of the hairy man ■with his club, slaughtering \for food, or the gentleman whom we see in Mr Roosevelt's autobiography?" Mr Long gives these citations from the President's book: — "He bore his antlers aloft; the snow lay thick on his ma-ce; he snuffed the air as he walked. \ As I direw a bead his j bearing of self-confidence changed to one j of alarm. My bullet smote through k-s shoulder-blades, and he plunged wildly forward and fell full length on the bloodstained snow. "I jumped off my horse, knelt and covered the fawn; as I pulled the trigger, down went the deer, the bullet having gone into the back of its heed. I felt much pleased with it. " My nerves mere thrilling and my heart beating with eager, fierce excitement. . . . Drawing a fine bead I pressed the trigger. He did^not reel, but I knew hs was mine, for the blood sprang from both his nostrils, and he fell dying on his side before ho had gone 30 rods. "My aim was true, and the huge beast crashed down hill, pulling himself on his forelegs for 20 rods, his hindquarters trailing. Racing forward, I broke his neck. Two moose birds followed the -wounded bull, as he dragged his great carcase down the hill, and pounced with ghoulish hloodtihirstiness on the gouts of blood that sprinkled the green herbage." " A nature-writer," comments Mr Long, " would say here that the hungry birds were finding new food, and eating it thankfully, like two children picking up red apples; and that the bloodthirstincs3 lay in the heart of the man who killed thi* elk, when, according to his own record, he had already seven elk heads in camp, and the meat was of no possible use, being too strong for food at this eeason. No true sportsman," he continues, " butchers the deer that oomes tp }:is camp," and adds: "It is an unwritten law of the camp ■ that you may go after game when you need it, but must spare the anjmal that cornea confidingly to your own door. But Mr Roosevelt makes his own laws. " Sitting on his verandah, a deer comes to drink at the river in front of him. The great mmisisan" records: " ' Slipping stealthily into the house I picked up my rifle. ... I held trus, and as the smoke cleared away the deer lay straggling- on the sands.' "Too bad that deer did not know the heart of humanity as well as Mr Roosevelt knows the heart of the wild things! "He writes of two antelope: 'They stood side by side facing me, motionless, •unheeding- tie cracks of the rifle.' He killed one, after four shots, and then took several vain shots at the mate as it ran away. *This deer did not seem satisfied,' he says, ' but kept hanging round in the distance, looking at us.' A Nature-writer . would say here that the deer was looking for his iost mate; but that, of course,

would be a lie- He was merely ashamed of not letting himself be killed by so great a hunter " There was one last elk left in the country wherein Mr fioosevelt had his ranch in the West. One day the lonely old fellow, the last of a noble race, wandered upon the ranch. He belongs to a gregarious tribe, and he probably felt that he might find a sort of companionship among the cattle. •Of course,' writes Mr Roosevelt, 'such a chance was not to bs neglected.' He grabbed His rifle and rushed out: " ' My bullet struck too far back, but made a deadly wound. The elk disappeared in a wild plunging gallop. We followed the bloody traii and found him dead in a thicket. . . . No sportsman can ever feel keener pleasure and self-satis-faction than when he walks up to a grand elk lying- dead in the cool shade of the evergreen.' " To this last sentiment Mr Long utters a distinct denial, addressed directly to his j opponent in the oontroveasy : j " You are mistaken, Mr Roosevelt, profoundly, absolutely, hopelessly r^atftken. : There was a better chance that you neglected when that lonely old elk, the last j of his race, wandered to your ranch, seeing your cattle unmolested, and thinking, it may even be, in his dim, brute way, that here was a place where he might be gafs from his enemies. And there is a keener pleasure, than -to walk up to a noble an-inaal ' dead in the cool shade of the evergreen, his glad life gone, his symmetry distorted j in the death-struggle, his beautiful brown coat all clotted and blocd-etained, and has soft eyes glazing rapidly as if to hide the reproach fcbat is in them. There is a greater (pleasure and wisdom than all j this ; but you will never know what they j are. The bloody endings over which you gloai bring- lfttle 'self-satisfaction * to g. thoughtful man who has seen the last look | in tihe eyes of a stricken deer, and who j remembers that even this small life has , ita mystery, like our own. You are not a sportsman, thougph you have slain yo.ir ■thousands; you are not a natuiralist, though you have measured hides and horns; you do not and cannot understand * tie hearts of the wild things,' though you have made ! a grievous quantity of them bleed. Jt i needs no eye-witness nor any affidavit ij support fchis statement. You have your self furnished all the proof." CORRESPONDENCE NOTES. " Education Student's " letter, all being well, appears to-day, and I shall like to have criticisms upon it. Mr Hicks in his note opens up a new field. Will observers give their experiences and observations ? ETas there been any interbreeding between escapees and our native birds, or between the escapees themselves-? In their tamed stats, did they become so helpless as not to be able to hold their own when free? Have they all gone under? I am sorry to have to hold some letters overhand also to delay identifications. • " Ornithologist " sends his promised note for "Pond Lily." The owls lately imported seem to be -very much in evidence. I hear they are around Dunedin. Is that co? If so, where? Who hag seen squirrels abroad near Dunedin? lam told i they can be seen in two localities. Wax- : eyes are apparently very plentiful. Is it, as "Ornithologist" suggests it might be the case, because we are becoming more observant? It has been suggested to me that the owls may be responsible for some of the infloeking. The morepork is on the Belt, isn't it? Reverting to the owl, I hops that readers will watch this bird from the beginning and make records. Many previous impor' ; tations have had rather doubtful resorts, and it has been prophesied that the owl will be an enemy of our native birds. " Ornithologist " doesn't think so. The Waipahi observations show that it is acting on the- lines it was imported for. But may it no£ develop other tastes? CORRESPONDENCE. Dear " Magister,"— For the last two or three years I hare been " fossicking " for a satisfactory way of taking Nature study in school, and forward you herewith an outline of a method which, I feel confident, is sound and which I hope may be found useful to some inexperienced teachers like myself. I s«t out to find some w*y of attaining in the children a habit of intelligent observation and i record. At the outset I decided that one lesson <a week was useless, missing the goal — Habit ; hence daily observation was necessary. Then the " intelligent " factor became the problem. For this I tried self-correction — i.e., each one corrected not his own but his neighbour's observation. But here was another difficulty: When and why was an observation poor, fair, good, or cxoellent? I This was overcome by preparing a chart of I the factors which make an observation poor, I fair, etc. For example: — Simple fact .. ..Fair. Fact and explanation Good. ' Two or more related facts compared • Good. Ftu-ts compared and explanation Very gocd. 1 Same fact noted at different times Good, etc. This gave life to this work — intelligence. Lastly was introduced suggestion. The pupil correcting makes some suggestion for j improving the observation. ' Now for the procedure. First item each day pupils write observation aneK exchange j papers. Those correcting vrriie their opinion and reason for their opinion. Then j each critic writes suggestion. Lastly, but j by no means least, esch critic reads the ; observation, opinion, and suggestion. I shall ' not dilate on the op-portu-nities this pives for elocution, composition, alertness: the re?t of the class are on the gui vive for errors ■ of *11 kinds and for further suggestion i Now I imagine some of your readers will ] lay, " All -wry well, but who has time for , all this?" Let me say in reply that there is ' no claes in New Zealand or elsewhere too large for this : I find that it takes an average of 15 minutes for 19 pupils: oe« houi fifteen minutes a week. In a large class all the impils can got as far as the written observation and written criticism and suggestion in the same time as one pupil. It remains to take only, say, 20 pupils for oral expression to cover only 15 minutes. Different portions of the class could be taken on different days. For the 'nabit of recording the pupils have note-books in which to note, with drawing, sundry observations anywhere and at any time. These are examined once a week by the teacher — I am. etc.. Education Studext. Dear " Megister,"— The havoc isT-uKht by linnets and sparrows upon setd3 and crops, combined with the depredations of^ stoats and weesels on our native Sora and domestic poultry, fully attests the vigorous \itality

f -which aocompanied these vermin on their ■ change of environment. Fortunately, there are limitations, and as a few of the latter have come under my own notice I now pass them on to your many renders for confirmation ot otherwise. At one time during my boyhood days I had a collection of birds — about 50 altogether. In one large cage I had six beautiful Australian love-birds and a pair of goldfinches. They were the pride of my heart, and their habits and capers were an unending source of delight, but on returning home one fine summer day I found the eag« empty The love-birds hoverd around the house far several oVys, chattering incessantly by way of thanksgiving for their freedom. Their flight reminded me of our native parsakeets, but was much more rapid — alternately flying and darting like feathered streaks in the shimmering sunlight, but in lessi than a, week they disappeared. Being summer, I had hopes that they would nest and breed in some of the lovely wooded glens along the North Taieri bills, but, so f*r "as I could ever learn, my hopes were not realised. I can also recall at least half a dozen magpies and quite double that number of sulphur crested and rose breasted cockatoos -which escaped from captivity from time to time, to say nothing of escaped oanaxies, and as these came directly under my own notice within a radius of a dozen miles from Dunedin. it is feir to assume thai; there would be a similar proportion of feathered escapees at all the other chief centres. Spread this over 50 years and multiply by — what? Four, or forty? . What you please, but anyhow you can easily see that quite a large number of Australian birds; have escaped from captivity in New Zealand during the past 50 years, and yet I have never once heard of magpies, lovebirds, or cockatoos being known to breed in a wild* stats in our woods. Our huias, saddle-back crows, pairakeets, and kakas are closely allied to their Australian cousins, and I am "Surprised that our woods are not congenial to th« latter. Tlhey all thrive in captivity, and I am art; a loss to understand how they become so quickly effaced from the landscape when allowed iheir freedom in this country. I remember two cockatoos that lived for months at laxge on the Taieri, visiting several grain stacks in turn. One was shot by a cockney sportsman, and the other left the district. Several others visited the neighbourhood, but whether they sucoumbeS. to the allurements of the ** Lost and Found" column, the shotgun, or hunger. I have never been able to determine satisfactorily. I have several vague ideas on this point, but I would like to have yours, also the opinions and experience of others further afield, and I am sure there are many birdlovers who -will welcome a solution. — Yours truly, Bavensbourne. Geo. H. Hicks. I Dear " Maerister," — The little grey owl seen by " Pond Lily " is no doubt on© of thoce turned out by the" Otego Acclimatisation Society hist year, and which seem to be surviving the change and making themselves a terror to the sparrows. As I said before, I am not much afraid of iheir destroying many of our little birds, which are not in sufficient numbers and seldom roost in flocks .or aire to be got at in the way Bporrows are; besides this, most of oe&r birds are extremely wary, and would fight shy of & big stranger. Moreporks generally stick to native bush, but in places where -there is only patchy introduced stuff like macrocarpa and pinus tosignis. they may take shelter and remain, especially if near stacks and stubble paddocks, where mice, rats, and lizards can be obtained. They no doubt occasionally "go for " other birds, as is evidenced by accounts of their killing caged birds; but they would have to be mighty clever to catch and kill a redheaded parakeet in the daytime, if the latter bird were free. The grey owl (Athene noctua), like our native owl, makes no nest, but lays its eggs in holes in trees on rotten wood fibre, and a few feathers. When they, will lay in this country remains to be seen. They have to become acclimatised, and perhaps alter their breeding time by several months. Is this possible except after a lapse of a considerable number of years? And if the birds lay in the months they do at Home, which is here the depth of winter, lack of food and cold may wipe all the little ones out. However, it is marvellous what Nature can do. If .there are no big hollow trees, they will lay in big, disused nestß of other birds, boxes, or in or under thatch of stables, barns, etc. — I am, etc.. j Ornithologist.