Part 22

Among the other motions of plants, I might speak of that of some leaves, which curl or shrink if you touch them. But I have not space for that now.

Perhaps you think that these lessons have told you a great many things about flowers. If you go on with the study of plants, you will see how much there is to tell, and how very little has here been told.

These lessons are only meant to stir up your interest in plants, and show you what wonders are in the plant world. After that, you will be sure to learn more for yourselves.

LESSON XV.

THE SCHOOL CABINET.

One of the wise teachers who are all the time thinking what will help and interest children wrote me a letter. In it, he said, “If you wish to do our school children a real service, write something about cabinets in our schools. In each school-house there should be a collection of natural history objects, brought together by teachers and children. This would be of great use, and the children would take pleasure in collecting specimens.”

So, right here, in the middle of this Third Book, I want to say a word about cabinets of natural curiosities.

In the Second Book I told you here and there how you might catch and keep a specimen. I told you how to dry beetles, star-fish, and a few other little animals.

If you make a collection of this kind, you can look at the object when you read of it in the book. That will help you to understand it and will interest you.

In a cabinet you could keep safely for use many nice things, which might otherwise be wasted. Also, you might spend some of your pennies in buying specimens. I think pennies are much better spent so than for candy and cake.

If you are collecting a cabinet of curiosities, I think you might write letters to other schools, or far off friends to ask them to send you specimens.

You might offer to trade objects, of which you have several, for something which other people have, and you have not.

I think, too, you would be very happy out of doors, looking for specimens. And I believe you and your teachers would be greater friends than ever, if you were all helping each other to get a cabinet together.

If, at first, you cannot have a cabinet case with glass doors, have some shelves. Have some boxes to set on the shelves, and lay pieces of glass over the boxes for covers. Those little paper boxes--, which jewellers and druggists use, are very nice for small objects,--as seeds, little shells, and so on. Nearly all children have some of these boxes.

When you have specimens in these little boxes, the teacher will write the name of the object on the box.

I knew a boy, who made a very nice collection of many kinds of wood. He cut the wood into wedges, with a bit of the bark left on. One side of the wedge he polished with glass and sand paper. One side he left rough. He wrote on each piece of wood the name of the tree from which it came.

I once saw some lovely pictures of leaves. They were made by a little girl. How did she make them? Could she paint? No.

She had some small sheets of stiff paper. She got some printer’s ink in a cup. She made two little balls of woollen cloth. She would take a nice, fresh, perfect leaf, and with one ball she would put a little ink, very gently, over all the under surface of the leaf. Then the next thing was to lay the leaf, inked side down, on a sheet of stiff paper, and pat it gently all over with the other woollen ball.

When she lifted up the leaf she had a picture of its shape, and of all its veins and edges. It looked like a nice engraving. She put the same kinds of leaves on the same sheet,--as the leaves of the rose family on one, the leaves of maples on another, and so on. Under each leaf she wrote its name.

Such a collection of leaf-patterns is fine in a cabinet. So is a collection of dried flowers,--called an herbarium. Your mother or teacher could show you how to make one.

You will find on the way-side, or in field and garden, some of those wonderful nests, built by spiders, wasps and bees, of which you read in the First Book of Nature Readers. And at the sea-side, you can find crabs, shells, and bits of coral, sponge and sea-weed.

Did you ever think what a pretty sight a row of pieces of many kinds of stone makes? Have you thought that stones are just hard, homely, brown things?

Have you noticed that marble is sometimes snow white, sometimes black, or veined with many colors? The granite is gray; sandstone is red, or gray, or purplish. Slate is black, purple, or veined in many shades. Other stones are black, red, yellow, brown, green, in fact of nearly all hues.

Each kind of stone has its own name. Some come from one place only, some from another. There is a reason why each kind has its color and grain. As you grow older, you may like to study about rocks and stones. Then how nice it will be to have on hand a collection of specimens.

A collection of birds’ nests is very fine. As we study in this book a little about birds, you will see how many kinds of nests there are. If you have a cabinet you can put into it one nest of each kind that you can find. Put into each nest one egg of the kind that belongs to the nest. Then put into the nest a little card, with the name of the bird, and the number of eggs commonly laid in each nest.

Be sure you do not break up the nest of a sitting bird. That is cruel. To keep the eggs you must blow them. Make a hole with a large pin in each end of the egg. Then blow hard, steadily in the pin-hole in the large end. All the inside of the egg will fly out at the hole at the other end.

Our next lesson will be about grasshoppers and their cousins. As the bodies of grasshoppers shrink when they dry, it is well to stuff them. How can you do that?

Put a little cotton wool on the end of a short thread, threaded in a long, coarse needle. The grasshopper should have been dead an hour or two, before you try to stuff it. Take it by the head and pass the needle through from the back end of the body, and bring it out under the breast. If you draw it gently, the cotton will go in with the thread.