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FIELD AND STUDY BY JOHN BURROUGHS BOSTON AND KEWTOBK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY JOHN BURROUGHS ALL RIGHTS RESERVED I 35 8 i J f - CONTENTS I Part I AFIELD I. THE SPRING BIRD PEOCESSION .... 3 II. NATURE LORE 9ff III. THE FAMILIAR BIRDS 53 IV. Fuss AND FEATHERS 77 V. THE SONGS OF BIRDS .89 VI. ORCHARD SECRETS 102 VII. NATURE IN LITTLE . . . . . .112 VIII. THE INSECT MIND 129 IX. A CLEVER BEASTIE 140 X. PHASES OF ANIMAL LIFE 152 XI. EACH AFTER ITS KIND 158 XII. THE PLEASURES OF SCIENCE .... 174 XIII. NEW GLEANINGS IN OLD FIELDS . . . 193 I. LIVE NATURAL HISTORY, . . 193 IL THE BARN SWALLOW .... 198 III. INSECTS 201 IV. THE DOG 205 V. WOOD WAIFS 206 VI. AN INTERESTING PLANT . . . 210 VII. NATURE NEAR HOME .... 213 Part II STUDY NOTES I. LITERATURE 221 IL RELIGION 241 CONTENTS m. SCIENCE . SS IV. EVOLUTION 273 V. NATURE AND NATUBAL HISTOKY . . . 89 VI. MISCELLANEOUS NOTES S0 INDEX 331 FIELD AND STUDY Parti AFIELD FIELD AND STUDY Part I AFIELD I THE SPEING BIRD PROCESSION i ONE of the new pleasures of country life when one has made the acquaintance of the birds is to witness the northward bird procession as it passes or tarries with us in the spring a procession which, lasts from April till June and has some new feature daily. The migrating wild creatures, whether birds or beasts, always arrest the attention. They seem to link up animal life with the great currents of the globe. It is moving day on a continental scale. It is the call of the primal instinct to increase and multiply, suddenly setting in motion whole tribes and races. The first phoebe-bird, the first song sparrow, the first robin or bluebird in March or early April, is like the first ripple of the rising tideon the shore. In my boyhood the vast armies of the passenger pigeons were one of the most notable spring tokens. Often late in March, or early in April, the naked beechwoods would suddenly become blue with 3 FIELD AND STUDY them, and vocal with their soft, childlike calls or all day the sky would be streaked with the long lines or dense masses of the moving armies. The last great flight of them that I ever beheld was on the 10th of April, 1875, when, for the greater part of the day, one could not at any moment look skyward above the Hudson River Valley without seeing several flocks, great and small, of the migrating birds. But that spectacle was never repeated as it had been for generations before. The pigeons never came back. Death and destruction, in the shape of the greed and cupidity of man, were on their trail. The hosts were pursued from State to State by pro fessional pot-hunters and netters, and the numbers so reduced, and their flocking instinct so disorgan ized, that their vast migrating bands disappeared, and they were seen only in loosely scattered and diminishing flocks in different parts of the West during the remainder of the century. A friend of mine shot a few in Indiana in the early eighties, and scattered bands of them have occasionally been re ported, here and there, up to within a few years. The last time that my eyes beheld a passenger pigeon was in the fall of 1876 when I was out for grouse. I saw a solitary cock sitting in a tree. I killed it, little dreaming that, so far as I was concerned, I was killing the last pigeon. What man now in his old age who witnessed in youth that spring or fall festival and migration of 4 THE SPRING BIRD PROCESSION the passengerpigeons would not hail it as one of the gladdest hours of his life if he could be permitted to witness it once more It was such a spectacle of bounty, of joyous, copious animal life, of fertility in the air and in the wilderness, as to make the heart glad. I have seen the fields and woods fairly inun dated for a day or two with these fluttering, piping, blue-and-white hosts. The very air at times seemed suddenly to turn to pigeons...
| ISBN-13 | 9781406705164 |
|---|---|
| ISBN-10 | 1406705160 |
| Weight | 0.98 Pounds |
| Dimensions | 5.51 x 0.75 x 8.50 In |
| List Price | $30.45 |
| Format | - |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Pages | 348 pages |
| Publisher | Richardson Pr |
| Published On | 2007-03-01 |
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