iscovering features in it which might
escape the unobservant. Whenever such features are discovered the
children try to account for them. In these attempts they display much
ingenuity and intelligence, and are led on by Egeria in the direction
of the true explanation of each phenomenon, and the relation of this
to what they know of the object as a whole, and of its meaning and
function. The eagerness of the children to volunteer explanations of
the facts that they observe is only equalled by the intelligence with
which they grasp the general bearing of the problems that confront
them, and the resourcefulness and quickness of wit with which they
make repeated attempts to solve them.

And these are not the only qualities to which the Nature lesson gives
free play. It is interesting to note that as on the one hand the
inquisitive instinct is obviously near of kin to the communicative,
so on the other hand it is ever tending to link itself to the
artistic. The closeness of observation which is the basis of success
in Nature-study, and by means of which the inquisitive instinct is
fed and strengthened, is also the basis of success in drawing; and
in each case it leads beyond itself into a region in which it has to
be supplemented by, and even transfigured into, imagination, the
faculty by means of which we observe what is at once impalpable and
real.[19] And in that region the distinction between truth and beauty
is ever tending to efface itself. The master sculptor is always an
accomplished anatomist; and the genuine naturalist is a lover and
admirer, as well as a student, of Nature. It has been well said that
"to see things in their beauty is to see them in their truth"; and it
is perhaps equally, though more remotely, true that to see things in
their truth is to see them in their beauty. That being so, we need
not wonder that among the Utopian children the love of what is
beautiful in Nature has grown continuously with the growth of their
interest in Nature-study, and that the inquisitive instinct is ever
Reinforcing and being reinforced by the artistic.

(6) _The Constructive Instinct_.

Active, intelligent, resourceful, self-helpful, the Utopian child
takes to handwork of various kinds as readily and almost as
spontaneously as the birds in spring-time take to the work of
nest-building. It must indeed be admitted that the systematic
instruction in Gardening, Cookery, and Woodwork which warrants the
payment of speci