1. The importance of the practical study of natural science in the education of youth can hardly be too strongly urged. The love of nature when strengthened by a knowledge of nature gives occupation, amusement, mental and physical development of the best kind; it is an antidote to the morbid influences of fashion and dissipation; it hinders the premature development of function; it furnishes a basis of intellectual companionship between the sexes, and would prove invaluable to a mother in the education of her children. The power of habits formed in children by their parents are second only to the original type of constitution, and often overpower even the original tendencies; these habits are nevertheless formed by the silent working of influences, hour by hour and day by day, that are invisible and cannot be measured, that seem valueless, taking item by item in the long account, and yet in the aggregate they mould body and soul. A mother may instil the love of reading or the love of dress, she may form the habit of outdoor exercise or the habit of gossip, not by set precept or even formal regulations, but by her own tastes unavoidably moulding the tastes of her children, and flowing out naturally into those external arrangements that reflect the ruling spirit or affections of the individual. Did the mother possess a hearty interest in the wonders of field and forest, of sea and sky, what a treasury of delightful intercourse might be found in every country ramble! A mother’s love, joined to broad tastes and knowledge, would never weary of the ceaseless questioning of childhood; the older the child, the closer and more influential would be the companionship. The holiday by the sea-side or amongst the mountains, so often wasted in idleness or frivolity, might be a rich harvest-time of delightful knowledge drawn from the treasures of land and water.