Factories.
In recent years experimental research has become a regular occupation in connection with large manufacturing establishments. In some factories along the Rhine upward of sixty men are employed in chemical experiments for the purpose of finding what use can be made of waste products. In this way over two hundred useful products from petroleum have been discovered, and a large increase in profits has been the result. The great electrical works spend time and money upon experiments, and jealously censor every article written by their employees for scientific journals lest their valuable secrets should be given away. A company engaged in the manufacture of cash registers offers a yearly premium for the most helpful suggestion from the men and women in its employ. In one year the firm received over eleven hundred suggestions, of which at least eight hundred were utilized in improvements of various kinds.
Universities.
Where observation is needed.
The weather.
These instances are only samples of many that could be cited to show how systematic observation and experiment lend a helping hand to our national prosperity. Manufacturers carry them on for the sake of gain, the universities for the sake of widening the field of knowledge. To aid in such research large endowments have been established, and many of the common people willingly pay tax in support of State universities. Treatises on inductive logic and on the physical sciences have been prepared by Herschel, J. S. Mill, Jevons, and others for the purpose of showing the correct methods of research by the use of instruments of precision, of standards of measurement, and of other apparatus; for the laws of thought must be obeyed in the interpretation of natural phenomena. Although as a matter of discipline the teacher in our public schools may well study these advanced treatises, yet the habits of observation which the elementary school should aim to beget and to foster are simpler in detail, more easily acquired, and, it may be added, of inestimable value in the subsequent life of the pupils. Habits of observation are needed not only by authors, inventors, and scientists, but also by all other people for the interpretation of the books they may read and for the discharge of the daily duties devolving upon them. The engineer, the fireman, the conductor, the tradesman, the mechanic, the detective, the scout, the warrior, must be able to see things as they are or face partial failure. Too many of them have eyes and see not; they have ears and hear not. The study of nature is valuable as a preparation for life either in the country or in the city. Our rural population have not learned to see and appreciate the marvels in nature which are transpiring on every side. The way in which the almanac is consulted for signs to guide in sowing and planting, for prognostications of the weather, show how little the average man can make observations. The printers have found it necessary to retain these absolutely unreliable weather predictions in their almanacs; the attempted omission has been an experiment involving the loss of thousands of dollars. The success of the quack is largely due to limited observation. One cure is made much of while multitudes of failures are always forgotten.
Country and city.
Our rural population would be far more contented if the boys and girls were taught at school how to observe and appreciate their surroundings. They have many advantages over city folks which they never realize as sources of enjoyment. The senses themselves, which have been styled the gate-ways of knowledge, may be improved by judicious exercise; and the power of the mind to interpret sense-impressions may be developed to a marvellous degree. The savages of our North American forests had developed keen eyes and ears; the more civilized backwoodsmen were soon more than a match for the wily Indian. To-day, when the latter watches the trained sharp-shooters hitting with unerring accuracy a mark more than half a mile distant, he shakes his head and walks away in silence.
The child.