HIDE AND SEEK IN THE LIBRARY
As I said, most people not only think that they're smarter than their fellow animals, but when you point out to them how clever some of these other animals are, they say: "Oh, that's just instinct!" As if animals don't think and learn by experience, and all, just as we do! You look up "instinct" in the encyclopædia, and you'll see. Then read Long's "Wood Folk at School."
There's really a lot more fun in shooting animals with a camera than with a shotgun or a rifle. Did you ever try it? "Hunting with a Camera" in "The Scientific American Boy at School," by Bond, will tell you how to get the best results. Other good pointers on animal photography will be found in Verrill's "Boy Collector's Hand Book" ("Photographing Wild Things") and in "[On the Trail]," by A. B. and Lina Beard.
And if you ever feel like killing a bird "just for fun," read in the diary of "Opal" about the farmer boy who shot the little girl's pet crow; it was "only a crow," he said, and he wanted to see if he could hit it. That will cure you, I think. The diary of "Opal" reads like a fairy-tale, but it's all true, and although it was written—every word of it—by a little girl of seven, it is one of the most remarkable books that anybody ever wrote. The crow's name, by the way, was "Lars Porsina of Clusium." The little girl used to give her pets names like that.
Don't forget what the great naturalist, Agassiz, said about the pencil being "the best eye"; that is to say, you can get a more accurate knowledge of things and come nearer to seeing them as they really are, by drawing them. Drawing, in the best schools, is a part of Nature Study, and when you get so that you can draw fairly well—as everybody can with practice—you will find there is even more of a thrill in thus creating forms—out of nothing, as you might say—than there is in taking photographs. The pencil is a magician's wand! As an example and inspiration for taking your pencil and sketch-book into the fields, get "Eye Spy," by Gibson, and, of course, Seton's animal books. I do believe Seton drew his pictures with those simple, expressive outlines so that young folks could redraw them. The difference between redrawing a drawing and simply looking at it, is a lot like the difference between reading a book and merely glancing at the print.
You are sure to be interested in Sir John Lubbock's book on "Ants, Bees and Wasps," and you will find a world of interesting things about the earlier animal days of man in his "Origin of Civilization" and "Pre-Historic Times."
And who do you suppose had most to do with teaching men they were really brothers, and so bringing them up to the civilized life we know to-day? Mother! (See Drummond's "Ascent of Man," or Chapter XII of "The Strange Adventures of a Pebble," where the whole marvellous story of evolution is told in simple form.)
If Nature Study proves half as delightful and profitable to you as I am sure it will, the following list of books will be very useful in building up your library on the subject, and in selecting books from the public library:
"[Among the Farmyard People]," by Clara D. Pierson, deals with various things you probably never noticed about chickens and pigs, and other domestic animals. "[Among the Meadow People]," by the same author, tells about birds and insects. You can see what her "[Among the Pond People]" tells about—tadpoles, frogs, and so on. Really, it's a perfect fairy-land, an old pond is! "Among the Moths and Butterflies," by Julia P. Ballard, is about fairies, too, as the title shows.
For children of the seventh to eighth grades, and up, Hornaday's "American Natural History" will be a delight, and it has loads of pictures which, as in all well-illustrated scientific books, are as valuable as the text. You know who Hornaday is, don't you? He is the man at the head of the great Zoo in New York City.
Margaret W. Morley's "The Bee People" is worthy of its subject, and that's about the highest praise you could give to a book about bees, I think. Then don't forget, when you are in the library, to look up her "Grasshopper Land." The grasshopper book also treats of the grasshopper's cousins, which include the crickets and the katydids; yes, and the "walking sticks"; and the "praying mantis." (Did you know that whether you spell this weird little creature's first name, "praying," with an "e" or an "a" you'd be correct?)
Every boy and girl, of course, is supposed to know about Ernest Thompson Seton's books, but for fear some of them don't, I'll mention a few that it simply wouldn't do to miss. "[Animal Heroes]" gives the history of a cat, a dog, a pigeon, a lynx, two wolves and a reindeer; "Krag and Johnny Bear" is made up from his larger book, "Lives of the Hunted"; "Lobo, Rag and Vixen" is from his "[Wild Animals I Have Known]," and "[The Trail of the Sandhill Stag]."
John Burroughs is very different from Seton and Long, but the older you get the better you will like him. His is one of the great names in the study of Nature's pages at first hand and, as literature, ranks with the work of Thoreau. Get his "[Birds, Bees and Other Papers]," "[Squirrels and Other Fur-bearers]."
Darwin, one of the greatest men in the whole history of science—the man whose name is most prominently identified with the greatest discovery in science, the principle of evolution—how do you suppose he started out? Just by looking around! Read about it in "What Mr. Darwin Saw in His Voyage around the World."
INDEX
(For numerous practical suggestions as to the use of an index the reader is referred to the preface to the index in the author's "Strange Adventures of a Pebble.")
Africa, one country where the Hornbills live, [169]
Ants, their interesting habits in relation to the history of the soil, [94];
ants that thresh and store, [205], [213];
how they clean up after the day's work, [208]
Aphids, how they supply the ants with honey, [99]
Armadillo, a four-footed farmer who wears armor;
how fast he can dig, [120];
the funny gimlet nose that helps him travel so fast under the ground, [121]