Madam How and Lady Why [67]
them yet. However, there is another question, which Madam How seems inclined to answer just now, which is almost as deep and mysterious.
What?
HOW all these different kinds of things became different.
Oh, do tell me!
Not I. You must begin at the beginning, before you can end at the end, or even make one step towards the end.
What do you mean?
You must learn the differences between things, before you can find out how those differences came about. You must learn Madam How's alphabet before you can read her book. And Madam How's alphabet of animals and plants is, Species, Kinds of things. You must see which are like, and which unlike; what they are like in, and what they are unlike in. You are beginning to do that with your collection of butterflies. You like to arrange them, and those that are most like nearest to each other, and to compare them. You must do that with thousands of different kinds of things before you can read one page of Madam How's Natural History Book rightly.
But it will take so much time and so much trouble.
God grant that you may not spend more time on worse matters, and take more trouble over things which will profit you far less. But so it must be, willy-nilly. You must learn the alphabet if you mean to read. And you must learn the value of the figures before you can do a sum. Why, what would you think of any one who sat down to play at cards--for money too (which I hope and trust you never will do)--before he knew the names of the cards, and which counted highest, and took the other?
Of course he would be very foolish.
Just as foolish are those who make up "theories" (as they call them) about this world, and how it was made, before they have found out what the world is made of. You might as well try to find out how this hay-field was made, without finding out first what the hay is made of.
How the hay-field was made? Was it not always a hay-field?
Ah, yes; the old story, my child: Was not the earth always just what it is now? Let us see for ourselves whether this was always a hay-field.
How?
Just pick out all the different kinds of plants and flowers you can find round us here. How many do you think there are?
Oh--there seem to be four or five.
Just as there were three or four kinds of flies in the air. Pick them, child, and count. Let us have facts.
How many? What! a dozen already?
Yes--and here is another, and another. Why, I have got I don't know how many.
Why not? Bring them here, and let us see. Nine kinds of grasses, and a rush. Six kinds of clovers and vetches; and besides, dandelion, and rattle, and oxeye, and sorrel, and plantain, and buttercup, and a little stitchwort, and pignut, and mouse-ear hawkweed, too, which nobody wants.
Why?
Because they are a sign that I am not a good farmer enough, and have not quite turned my Wild into Field.
What do you mean?
Look outside the boundary fence, at the moors and woods; they are forest, Wild--"Wald," as the Germans would call it. Inside the fence is Field--"Feld," as the Germans would call it. Guess why?
Is it because the trees inside have been felled?
Well, some say so, who know more than I. But now go over the fence, and see how many of these plants you can find on the moor.
Oh, I think I know. I am so often on the moor.
I think you would find more kinds outside than you fancy. But what do you know?
That beside some short fine grass about the cattle-paths, there are hardly any grasses on the moor save deer's hair and glade- grass; and all the rest is heath, and moss, and furze, and fern.
Softly--not all; you have forgotten the bog plants; and there are (as I said) many more plants beside on the moor than you fancy. But we will look into that another time. At all events, the plants outside are on the whole quite different from the hay- field.
Of course: that is what makes the field look green and the moor brown.
Not a doubt. They are so different, that they look like bits of two different continents. Scrambling over the fence
What?
HOW all these different kinds of things became different.
Oh, do tell me!
Not I. You must begin at the beginning, before you can end at the end, or even make one step towards the end.
What do you mean?
You must learn the differences between things, before you can find out how those differences came about. You must learn Madam How's alphabet before you can read her book. And Madam How's alphabet of animals and plants is, Species, Kinds of things. You must see which are like, and which unlike; what they are like in, and what they are unlike in. You are beginning to do that with your collection of butterflies. You like to arrange them, and those that are most like nearest to each other, and to compare them. You must do that with thousands of different kinds of things before you can read one page of Madam How's Natural History Book rightly.
But it will take so much time and so much trouble.
God grant that you may not spend more time on worse matters, and take more trouble over things which will profit you far less. But so it must be, willy-nilly. You must learn the alphabet if you mean to read. And you must learn the value of the figures before you can do a sum. Why, what would you think of any one who sat down to play at cards--for money too (which I hope and trust you never will do)--before he knew the names of the cards, and which counted highest, and took the other?
Of course he would be very foolish.
Just as foolish are those who make up "theories" (as they call them) about this world, and how it was made, before they have found out what the world is made of. You might as well try to find out how this hay-field was made, without finding out first what the hay is made of.
How the hay-field was made? Was it not always a hay-field?
Ah, yes; the old story, my child: Was not the earth always just what it is now? Let us see for ourselves whether this was always a hay-field.
How?
Just pick out all the different kinds of plants and flowers you can find round us here. How many do you think there are?
Oh--there seem to be four or five.
Just as there were three or four kinds of flies in the air. Pick them, child, and count. Let us have facts.
How many? What! a dozen already?
Yes--and here is another, and another. Why, I have got I don't know how many.
Why not? Bring them here, and let us see. Nine kinds of grasses, and a rush. Six kinds of clovers and vetches; and besides, dandelion, and rattle, and oxeye, and sorrel, and plantain, and buttercup, and a little stitchwort, and pignut, and mouse-ear hawkweed, too, which nobody wants.
Why?
Because they are a sign that I am not a good farmer enough, and have not quite turned my Wild into Field.
What do you mean?
Look outside the boundary fence, at the moors and woods; they are forest, Wild--"Wald," as the Germans would call it. Inside the fence is Field--"Feld," as the Germans would call it. Guess why?
Is it because the trees inside have been felled?
Well, some say so, who know more than I. But now go over the fence, and see how many of these plants you can find on the moor.
Oh, I think I know. I am so often on the moor.
I think you would find more kinds outside than you fancy. But what do you know?
That beside some short fine grass about the cattle-paths, there are hardly any grasses on the moor save deer's hair and glade- grass; and all the rest is heath, and moss, and furze, and fern.
Softly--not all; you have forgotten the bog plants; and there are (as I said) many more plants beside on the moor than you fancy. But we will look into that another time. At all events, the plants outside are on the whole quite different from the hay- field.
Of course: that is what makes the field look green and the moor brown.
Not a doubt. They are so different, that they look like bits of two different continents. Scrambling over the fence