Chapter II: Part 2

It is only in the breeding-plumage that this species wears the slaty plumbeous hood. In the winter the hood is wanting, though it may be suggested by a few dark spots, but there is a dusky spot over the ears always. It seems doubtful if the birds attain the dark hood until the second or third year, at which time they may be said to be fully adult.

It was formerly supposed that this gull nested entirely north of the United States, but later investigations have shown that it nests regularly in northern Minnesota and even as far south as the Saint Clair Flats near Detroit, Mich. It may then be said to nest from the northern United States northward to the limit of its range. It is rare along the Alaskan coast of Bering Sea, and there seems to be no record of it along the coast of the Arctic Ocean.

The nest is always placed in elevated situations, in bushes, trees, or on high stumps, and is composed of sticks, grasses, and lined with softer vegetable material. The eggs are three or four in number and have the grayish-brown to greenish-brown color, spotted and blotched with browns, which is characteristic of the gulls as a group.

While the gulls are fish-eaters and almost constantly hover above the fishers' nets, often catching over again the fish which the nets have trapped, we never hear of any warfare waged against them by the fishermen. On the contrary, the gulls are always on the most friendly terms with them, gladly accepting the fish found unworthy of the market. But let a bird of whatever kind visit the orchard or chicken-yard, for whatever purpose, and his life is not worth a moment's consideration. We need again to sit at the feet of fishermen as earnest inquirers.

EGG COLLECTING.

FRED MAY, School Taxidermist.

_To the Editor of Birds and All Nature:_

I am glad the magazine of birds is furnishing its readers so many points about the good qualities of our birds. And as they are being protected more every year by the state laws and by the lovers of birds, I think they are sure to increase. I have often been asked about the decrease in bird life. The blame is generally put on the taxidermist, collector, sportsman, and schoolboy, which I claim is all wrong. The taxidermist collector of to-day is a lover of bird-life, and only hunts specimens to mount for a scientific purpose. This gives our school children a better chance to study them. The schoolboy and girl of to-day are doing great good in the protection of bird-life, and your book of birds has a warm friend among them. The true sportsman always lives up to the laws and takes a fair chance with dog and gun. The plume and bird collector will soon be a thing of the past, as hats trimmed with choice ribbons and jets are fast taking the place of those covered with feathers and birds. Now the persons who hide behind all these, and who destroy more bird-life in a single season than all the hunters and collectors of skins, are never brought to the eyes of the press. These are the people who have a fad for egg-collecting. They not only rob the nest of its one setting, but will take the eggs as long as the bird will continue to lay, and, not satisfied with that, will take the eggs from every bird as long as they can find them. They will even take the eggs after incubation has begun, and often-times, after a hard climb for the eggs, will destroy the nest. There are thousands upon thousands of settings of eggs of every kind taken every year by these fad egg collectors and you will see in some of our magazines on ornithology offers of from fifty to five hundred settings for sale. Now, what is an egg to this egg collector? Nothing. But to the lover of birds there is a great deal in that shell. There is a life; the song of the woods and of the home. In that shell is the true and faithful worker who has saved our farmers and our city homes and parks from the plagues of insects that would have destroyed crops and the beauty of our homes. Shall the law allow these nest-robbers to go on summer after summer taking hundreds of thousands of settings? If it shall I am afraid the increase in our bird-life will be slow. With the help of our game wardens and sporting-clubs a great deal of this could be stopped, and a great saving could be made in game birds' eggs. Our country school children can protect our song birds' nests by driving these collectors, with their climbing irons and collecting cans, from their farms in the breeding-season. Yes, it often looks sad to see a song bird drop at the report of the gun of the skin collector. But when we think of the bird-egg collector sneaking like a thief in the night up a tree or through a hedge, taking a setting of eggs on every side while the frightened mother sits high in the tree above, and then down and off in search of more, only to come back in a short time to take her eggs again--what is bird-life to him? What would he care to be sitting in the shade by the lake or stream listening to the song of the robin, or after a hard day's work in the hot summer, be seated on his porch to hear the evening song of the warbler and the distant call of the whippoorwill? Let the lovers of bird-life commence with the spring song, with the building of the nest, and save each little life they can from the egg collector. Will this man, if he may be called a man, look into his long drawers filled with eggs, and his extra settings for sale and trade? Let him think of the life he has taken, the homes he has made unhappy. I should think he would go like Macbeth from his sleep to wash the blood from his hands.

THE BABOON.

Naturalists seem to be agreed that the baboons (_cynocephalus_), while one of the most remarkable groups of the monkey family, are the ugliest, rudest, coarsest, and most repulsive representatives of it. The animal stands in the lowest degree of development of the monkey tribe, and possesses none of the nobler shapes and qualities of mind of other species. Aristotle called the baboons dog-headed monkeys, on account of the shape of their heads, which have a resemblance to that of a rude, fierce dog.

The baboons are found throughout Africa, Arabia, and India. In the main they are mountain monkeys, but also live in forests and are excellent tree-climbers. In the mountains they go as high as nine thousand to thirteen thousand feet above the sea-level, but give preference to countries having an elevation of three thousand or four thousand feet. Old travelers assert that mountainous regions are their true home.

The food of the baboons consists chiefly of onions, tubers, grass, fruit, eggs, and insects of all kinds, but, as they have also a greedy appetite for animal food, they steal chickens and kill small antelopes. In plantations, and especially vineyards, they cause the greatest damage, and are even said to make their raids in an orderly, deliberate, and nearly military manner.

Brehm, who observed them closely, says that they resemble awkward dogs in their gait, and even when they do stand erect they like to lean on one hand. When not hurried their walk is slow and lumbering; as soon as they are pursued, they fall into a singular sort of gallop, which includes the most peculiar movements of the body.

The moral traits of the baboons are quite in accord with their external appearance. Scheitlin describes them as all more or less bad fellows, "always savage, fierce, impudent, and malicious; the muzzle is a coarse imitation of a dog's, the face a distortion of a dog's face. The look is cunning, the mind wicked. They are more open to instruction than the smaller monkeys and have more common sense. Their imitative nature seems such that they barely escape being human. They easily perceive traps and dangers, and defend themselves with courage and bravery. As bad as they may be, they still are capable of being tamed in youth, but when they become old their gentle nature disappears, and they become disobedient; they grin, scratch, and bite. Education does not go deep enough with them. It is said that in the wild state they are more clever; while in captivity they are gentler. Their family name is 'dog-headed monkeys.' If they only had the dog's soul along with his head!" Another traveler says that they have a few excellent qualities; they are very fond of each other and their children; they also become attached to their keeper and make themselves useful to him. "But these good qualities are in no way sufficient to counterbalance their bad habits and passions. Cunning and malice are common traits of all baboons, and a blind rage is their chief characteristic. A single word, a mocking smile, even a cross look, will sometimes throw the baboon into a rage, in which he loses all self-control." Therefore the animal is always dangerous and never to be trifled with.

The baboons shun man. Their chief enemy is the leopard, though it oftener attacks the little ones, as the old fellows are formidable in self-defense. Scorpions they do not fear, as they break off their poisonous tails with great skill, and they are said to enjoy eating these animals as much as they do insects or spiders. They avoid poisonous snakes with great caution.

This animal is said to be remarkable for its ability in discovering water. In South Africa, when the water begins to run short, and the known fountains have failed, it is deprived of water for a whole day, until it is furious with thirst. A long rope is then tied to its collar, and it is suffered to run about where it chooses. First it runs forward a little, then stops, gets on its hind feet, and sniffs the air, especially noting the wind and its direction. It will then, perhaps, change its course, and after running for some distance take another observation. Presently it will spy out a blade of grass, pluck it up, turn it on all sides, smell it, and then go forward again. Thus the animal proceeds until it leads the party to water. In this respect at least, baboons have their uses, and on occasions have been the benefactors of man.

The baboons have, in common with the natives, a great fondness for a kind of liquor manufactured from the grain of the _durra_ or _dohen_. They often become intoxicated and thus become easy of capture. They have been known to drink wine, but could not be induced to taste whisky. When they become completely drunk they make the most fearful faces, are boisterous and brutal, and present altogether a degrading caricature of some men.

As illustrating the characteristics of fear and curiosity in the baboon, we will quote the following from the personal experience of Dr. Brehm, the celebrated traveler. He had a great many pets, among others a tame lioness, who made the guenons rather nervous, but did not strike terror to the hearts of the courageous baboons. They used to flee at her approach, but when she really seemed to be about to attack one of them, they stood their ground fairly well. He often observed them as they acted in this way. His baboons turned to flee before the dogs, which he would set upon them, but if a dog chanced to grab a baboon, the latter would turn round and courageously rout the former. The monkey would bite, scratch, and slap the dog's face so energetically that the whipped brute would take to his heels with a howl. More ludicrous still seemed the terror of the baboons of everything creeping, and of frogs. The sight of an innocent lizard or a harmless little frog would bring them to despair, and they would climb as high as their ropes would permit, clinging to walls and posts in a regular fit of fright. At the same time their curiosity was such that they had to take a closer look at the objects of their alarm. Several times he brought them poisonous snakes in tin boxes. They knew perfectly well how dangerous the inmates of these boxes were, but could not resist the temptation of opening them, and then seemed fairly to revel in their own trepidation.

THE SUMMER POOL.

BUCHANAN.

There is a singing in the summer air,
The blue and brown moths flutter o'er the grass,
The stubble bird is creaking in the wheat,
And, perched upon the honeysuckle hedge,
Pipes the green linnet. Oh! the golden world--
The star of life on every blade of grass,
The motion and joy on every bough,
The glad feast everywhere, for things that love
The sunshine, and for things that love the shade.

THE FEATHER CRUSADE.

E. K. M.

Just as the Audubon societies and the appeals of humanitarians in general have had some effect in lessening the demand for the aigrette for millinery purposes, and their banishment, as officially announced, from the helmets of the British army, there springs up a new fashion which, if generally adopted, will prove very discouraging--especially to the birds.

"She made a decided sensation last evening at the opera," says Miss Vanity's fond mamma. "Those blackbirds with outspread wings at either side of her head were simply fetching. They drew every lorgnette and every eye in the house upon her. Not a woman of fashion, or otherwise, I venture to say, will appear at a public function here-after without a pair of stuffed birds in her hair."

A melancholy outlook truly, though as an onlooker expressed it, the effect of the spreading wings was vastly more grotesque than beautiful. The poor little blackbirds! Their destruction goes on without abatement.

"I like the hat," said a gentle-looking little lady in a fashionable millinery establishment the other day, "but," removing it from her head, "those blackbirds must be removed and flowers put in their place."

"A member of the Audubon Society, probably," queried the attendant, respectfully.

"No," was the answer, "but for years the birds have been welcome visitors at our country place, great flocks of blackbirds, especially, making their homes in our trees. This year, and indeed the last, but few appeared, and we have in consequence no love for the hunters and little respect for the women who, for vanity's sake, make their slaughter one of commercial necessity and greed."

'Tis said fashion is proof against the appeals of common sense or morality, and one must accept the statement as true when, in spite of all that has been said upon the subject, the Paris journals announce that "birds are to be worn more than ever and blouses made entirely of feathers are coming into fashion." The use of bird skins in Paris for one week represent the destruction of one million three hundred thousand birds; in London the daily importation ranges from three hundred to four hundred thousand. It is honestly asserted that, in the height of the season, fifty thousand bird skins are received in New York City daily.

At the annual meeting of the Audubon Society of New York state a letter was read from Governor Roosevelt in which he said that he fully sympathized with the purpose of the society and that he could not understand how any man or woman could fail to exert all influence in support of its object.

"When I hear of the destruction of a species," he added, "I feel just as if all the works of some great writer had perished; as if one had lost all instead of only a part of Polybius or Livy."

Rev. Dr. Henry Van Dyke sent a letter in which he said the sight of an aigrette filled him with a feeling of indignation, and that the skin of a dead songbird stuck on the head of a tuneless woman made him hate the barbarism which lingers in our so-called civilization. Mr. Frank M. Chapman, at the same meeting, stated that the wide-spread use of the quills of the brown pelican for hat trimming was fast bringing about the extinction of that species.

In front of my pew sits a maiden--
A little brown wing in her hat,
With its touches of tropical azure,
And the sheen of the sun upon that.

Through the bloom-colored pane shines a glory
By which the vast shadows are stirred,
But I pine for the spirit and splendor
That painted the wing of that bird.

The organ rolls down its great anthem,
With the soul of a song it is blent,
But for me, I am sick for the singing
Of one little song that is spent.

The voice of the curate is gentle:
"No sparrow shall fall to the ground;"
But the poor broken wing on the bonnet
Is mocking the merciful sound.

GOD'S SILENCE AND HIS VOICES ALSO.

DR. N. D. HILLIS.

Nature loves silence and mystery. Reticent, she keeps her own counsel. Unlike man, she never wears her heart upon her sleeve. The clouds that wrap the mountain about with mystery interpret nature's tendency to veil her face and hold off all intruders. By force and ingenuity alone does man part the veil or pull back the heavy curtains. The weight of honors heaped upon him who deciphers her secret writings on the rock or turns some poison into balm and medicine, or makes a copper thread to be a bridge for speech, proclaims how difficult it is to solve one of nature's simplest secrets. For ages man shivered with cold, but nature concealed the anthracite under thick layers of soil. For ages man burned with fever, but nature secreted the balm under the bark of the tree. For ages, unaided, man bore his heavy burdens, yet nature veiled the force of steam and concealed the fact that both wind and river were going man's way and might bear his burdens.

Though centuries have passed, nature is so reticent that man is still uncertain whether a diet of grain or a diet of flesh makes the ruddier countenance. Also it is a matter of doubt whether some young Lincoln can best be educated in the university of rail-splitting or in a modern college and library; whether poverty or wealth does the more to foster the poetic spirit of Burns or the philosophic temper of Bach. In the beautiful temple of Jerusalem there was an outer wall, an inner court, "a holy place," and afar-hidden within, "a place most holy." Thus nature conceals her secrets behind high walls and doors, and God also hath made thick the clouds that surround the divine throne.

CONCEALMENTS OF NATURE.

Marvelous, indeed, the skill with which nature conceals secrets numberless and great in caskets small and mean. She hides a habitable world in a swirling fire-mist. A magician, she hides a charter oak and acre-covering boughs within an acorn's shell. She takes a lump of mud to hold the outlines of a beauteous vase. Beneath the flesh-bands of a little babe she secretes the strength of a giant, the wisdom of a sage and seer. A glorious statue slumbers in every block of marble; divine eloquence sleeps in every pair of human lips; lustrous beauty is for every brush and canvas; unseen tools and forces are all about inventors, but they who wrest these secrets from nature must "work like slaves, fight like gladiators, die like martyrs."

For nature dwells behind adamantine walls, and the inventor must capture the fortress with naked fists. In the physical realm burglars laugh at bolts and bars behind which merchants hide their gold and gems. Yet it took Ptolemy and Newton 2,000 years to pick the lock of the casket in which was hidden the secret of the law of gravity. Four centuries ago, skirting the edge of this new continent, neither Columbus nor Cabot knew what vast stretches of valley, plain, and mountain lay beyond the horizon.

If once a continent was the terra incognita, now, under the microscope, a drop of water takes on the dimensions of a world, with horizons beyond which man's intellect may not pass. Exploring the raindrop with his magnifying-glass, the scientist marvels at the myriad beings moving through the watery world. For the teardrop on the cheek of the child, not less than the star riding through God's sky, is surrounded with mystery, and has its unexplored remainder. Expecting openness from nature, man finds clouds and concealment. He hears a whisper where he listens for the full thunder of God's voice to roll along the horizon of time.

THE OWLS' SANCTUARY.

PROF. HENRY C. MERCER.

Seven bluish-white, almost spherical eggs, resting on the plaster floor of the court-house garret, at Doylestown, Pennsylvania, caught the eye of the janitor, Mr. Bigell, as one day last August he had entered the dark region by way of a wooden wicket from the tower. Because the court-house pigeons, whose nestlings he then hunted, had made the garret a breeding-place for years, he fancied he had found another nest of his domestic birds. But the eggs were too large, and their excessive number puzzled him, until some weeks later, visiting the place again (probably on the morning of September 20), he found that all the eggs save one had hatched into owlets, not pigeons.

The curious hissing creatures, two of which seemed to have had a week's start in growth, while one almost feather-less appeared freshly hatched, sat huddled together where the eggs had lain, close against the north wall and by the side of one of the cornice loop-holes left by the architect for ventilating the garret. Round about the young birds were scattered a dozen or more carcasses of mice (possibly a mole or two), some of them freshly killed, and it was this fact that first suggested to Mr. Bigell the thought of the destruction of his pigeons by the parent owls, who had thus established themselves in the midst of the latter's colony. But no squab was ever missed from the neighboring nests, and no sign of the death of any of the other feathered tenants of the garret at any time rewarded a search.

As the janitor stood looking at the nestlings for the first time, a very large parent bird came in the loop-hole, fluttered near him and went out, to return and again fly away, leaving him to wonder at the staring, brown-eyed, monkey-faced creatures before him. Mr. Bigell had thus found the rare nest of the barn owl, _Strix pratincola_, a habitation which Alexander Wilson, the celebrated ornithologist, had never discovered, and which had eluded the search of the author of "Birds of Pennsylvania." One of the most interesting of American owls, and of all, perhaps, the farmer's best friend, had established its home and ventured to rear its young, this time not in some deserted barn of Nockamixon swamp, or ancient hollow tree of Haycock mountain, but in the garret of the most public building of Doylestown, in the midst of the county's capital itself. When the janitor had left the place and told the news to his friends, the dark garret soon became a resort for the curious, and two interesting facts in connection with the coming of the barn owls were manifest; first, that the birds, which by nature nest in March, were here nesting entirely out of season--strange to say, about five months behind time; from which it might be inferred that the owls' previous nests of the year had been destroyed, and their love-making broken up in the usual way; the way, for instance, illustrated by the act of any one of a dozen well remembered boys who, like the writer, had "collected eggs;" by the habitude of any one of a list of present friends whose interest in animals has not gone beyond the desire to possess them in perpetual captivity and watch their sad existence through the bars of a cage; or by the "science" of any one of several scientific colleagues who, hunting specimens for the sake of a show-case, "take" the female to investigate its stomach.

Beyond the extraordinary nesting date, it had been originally noticed that the mother of the owlets was not alone, four or five other barn owls having first come to the court-house with her. Driven by no one knew what fate, the strange band had appeared to appeal, as if in a body, to the protection of man. They had placed themselves at his mercy as a bobolink when storm driven far from shore lights upon a ship's mast.

But it seemed, in the case of the owls, no heart was touched. The human reception was that which I have known the snowy heron to receive, when, wandering from its southern home, it alights for awhile to cast its fair shadow upon the mirror of the Neshaminy, or such as that which, not many years ago, met the unfortunate deer which had escaped from a northern park to seek refuge in Bucks County woods. At first it trusted humanity; at last it fled in terror from the hue and cry of men in buggies and on horseback, of enemies with dogs and guns, who pursued it till strength failed and its blood dyed the grass.

So the guns of humanity were loaded for the owls. The birds were too strange, too interesting, too wonderful to live. The court house was no sanctuary. Late one August night one fell at a gun shot on the grass at the poplar trees. Then another on the pavement by the fountain. Another, driven from its fellows, pursued in mid air by two crows, perished of a shot wound by the steps of a farm-house, whose acres it could have rid of field mice.

The word went out in Doylestown that the owls were a nuisance. But we visited them and studied their ways, cries, and food, to find that they were not a nuisance in their town sanctuary.

In twenty of the undigested pellets, characteristic of owls, left by them around the young birds, we found only the remains, as identified by Mr. S. N. Rhoads of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, of the bones, skulls, and hair of the field mouse (_Microtus pennsylvanicus_) and star nose mole (_Condylura cristata_). "They killed the pigeons," said someone, speaking without authority, after the manner of a gossip who takes away the character of a neighbor without proof. But they had not killed the pigeons. About twelve pairs of the latter, dwelling continually with their squabs in the garret, though they had not moved out of the particular alcove appropriated by the owls, had not been disturbed. What better proof could be asked that THE BARN OWL IS NOT A POULTRY DESTROYER?

It was objected that the owls' cries kept citizens awake at night. But when, one night last week, we heard one of their low, rattling cries, scarcely louder than the note of a katydid, and learned that the janitor had never heard the birds hoot, and that the purring and hissing of the feeding birds in the garret begins about sundown and ceases in the course of an hour, we could not believe that the sleep of any citizen ever is or has been so disturbed.

When I saw the three little white creatures yesterday in the court-house garret, making their strange bows as the candle light dazzled them, hissing with a noise as of escaping steam, as their brown eyes glowed, seemingly through dark-rimmed, heart-shaped masks, and as they bravely darted towards me when I came too near, I learned that one of the young had disappeared and that but one of the parent birds is left, the mother, who will not desert her offspring.

On October 28 two young birds were taken from their relatives to live henceforth in captivity, and it may be that two members of the same persecuted band turned from the town and flew away to build the much-talked-of nest in a hollow apple tree at Mechanics' Valley. If so, there again the untaught boy, agent of the mother that never thought, the Sunday school that never taught, and the minister of the Gospel that never spoke, was the relentless enemy of the rare, beautiful, and harmless birds. If he failed to shoot the parents, he climbed the tree and caught the young.

If the hostility to the owls of the court house were to stop, if the caged birds were to be put back with their relatives, if the nocturnal gunners were to relent, would the remaining birds continue to add an interest to the public buildings by remaining there for the future as the guests of the town? Would the citizens of Doylestown, by degrees, become interested in the pathetic fact of the birds' presence, and grow proud of their remarkable choice of sanctuary, as Dutch towns are proud of their storks? To us, the answer to these questions, with its hope of enlightenment, seems to lie in the hands of the mothers, of the teachers of Sunday schools, and of the ministers.

THE WATER THRUSH.

C. C. MARBLE.

I never see a skylark fly
Straight upward, singing, to the sky,
Or hear the bobolink's glad note
Issue with frenzy from his throat,
As though his very heart would break
In bars of music, but straight
I think, brave, happy bridegrooms they,
And this must be their wedding-day.
_C. C. M._

The water thrush (_Seiurus noveboracensis_) has so many popular names that it will be recognized by most observers by one or more of them. It is called small-billed water-thrush, water wagtail, water kick-up, Besoy kick-up, and river pink (_Jamaica_), aquatic accentor, and New York aquatic thrush. It is found chiefly east of the Mississippi River, north to the Arctic coast, breeding from the north border of the United States northward. It winters in more southern United States, all of middle America, northern South America, and all of West Indies. It is accidental in Greenland. In Illinois this species is known as a migrant, passing slowly through in spring and fall, though in the extreme southern portion a few pass the winter, especially if the season be mild. It frequents swampy woods and open, wet places, nesting on the ground or in the roots of overturned trees at the borders of swamps. Mr. M. K. Barnum of Syracuse, New York, found a nest of this species in the roots of a tree at the edge of a swamp on the 30th of May. It was well concealed by the overhanging roots, and the cavity was nearly filled with moss, leaves, and fine rootlets. The nest at this date contained three young and one egg. Two sets were taken, one near Listowel, Ontario, from a nest under a stump in a swamp, on June 7, 1888; the other from New Canada, Nova Scotia, July 30, 1886. The nest was built in moss on the side of a fallen tree. The eggs are creamy-white, speckled and spotted, most heavily at the larger ends, with hazel and lilac and cinnamon-rufous.

As a singer this little wagtail is not easily matched, though as it is shy and careful to keep as far from danger as possible, the opportunity to hear it sing is not often afforded one. Though it makes its home near the water, it is sometimes seen at a considerable distance from it among the evergreen trees.

THE TARSIER.

Along with Tagals, Ygorottes, and other queer human beings Uncle Sam has annexed in the Philippine islands, says the Chronicle, is the tarsier, an animal which is now declared to be the grandfather of man.

They say the tarsier is the ancestor of the common monkey, which is the ancestor of the anthropoid ape, which some claim as the ancestor of man.

A real tarsier will soon make his appearance at the national zoological park. His arrival is awaited with intense interest.

Monsieur Tarsier is a very gifted animal. He derives his name from the enormous development of the tarsus, or ankle bones of his legs. His eyes are enormous, so that he can see in the dark. They even cause him to be called a ghost. His fingers and toes are provided with large pads, which enable him to hold on to almost anything.

Professor Hubrecht of the University of Utrecht has lately announced that Monsieur Tarsier is no less a personage than a "link" connecting Grandfather Monkey with his ancestors. Thus the scale of the evolution theorists would be changed by Professor Hubrecht to run: Man, ape, monkey, tarsier, and so on, tarsier appearing as the great-grandfather of mankind.

Tarsier may best be described as having a face like an owl and a body, limbs, and tail like those of a monkey. His sitting height is about that of a squirrel. As his enormous optics would lead one to suppose, he cuts capers in the night and sleeps in the daytime, concealed usually in abandoned clearings, where new growth has sprung up to a height of twenty feet or more. Very often he sleeps in a standing posture, grasping the lower stem of a small tree with his long and slender fingers and toes. During his nightly wanderings he utters a squeak like that of a monkey. During the day the pupils of his eyes contract to fine lines, but after dark expand until they fill most of the irises. From his habit of feeding only upon insects he has a strong, bat-like odor.

John Whitehead, who has spent the last three years studying the animals of the Philippines, foreshadows the probable behavior of the tarsier when he arrives at the national "zoo." The Philippine natives call the little creature "magou."

"In Samar," says Mr. Whitehead, in a report just received at the Smithsonian, "where at different times I kept several tarsiers alive, I found them very docile and easily managed during the day. They feed freely off grasshoppers, sitting on their haunches on my hand. When offered an insect the tarsier would stare for a short time with its most wonderful eyes, then slowly bend forward, and, with a sudden dash, would seize the insect with both hands and instantly carry it to its mouth, shutting its eyes and screwing up its tiny face in a most whimsical fashion. The grasshopper was then quickly passed through the sharp little teeth, the kicking legs being held with both hands.

"When the insect was beyond further mischief the large eyes of the tarsier would open and the legs and wings were then bitten off, while the rest of the body was thoroughly masticated. My captive would also drink fresh milk from a spoon. After the sun had set this little animal became most difficult to manage, escaping when possible and making tremendous jumps from chair to chair. When on the floor it bounded about like a miniature kangaroo, traveling about the room on its hind legs with the tail stretched out and curved upward, uttering peculiar, shrill, monkeylike squeaks and biting quite viciously when the opportunity offered."

THE TRAILING ARBUTUS.

WILLIAM K. HIGLEY.

Thou dainty firstling of the spring,
Homage due to thee, I bring.

The faintest blushes of the morn
Do tint thy petals and adorn,

And thy fine perfume, sweetly faint,
Is like the breathings of a saint.

Oh my sweet! how fair thou art;
How chaste and pure thy dewy heart!

Thou poem of perfumed grace,
Dear hope and truth beam from thy face.

I drink deep draughts of joyfulness,
And bow before thy loveliness.
--_Albert C. Pearson._

The great heath family (_Ericineæ_) are scattered over many parts of the world, and include a great variety of plants, many like the American laurel (_Kalmia_) being large shrubs or small trees. Others are much smaller, and among the smallest plants, there is none more beautiful and universally loved than the charming trailing arbutus (_Epigæa repens_).

Those who are fortunate enough to live in the localities where it is found have the rare pleasure of searching for the early blossoms, which prefer to nestle cosily at the foot of the evergreen trees, though they are sometimes found in the open.

The late snows may even cover the blooms, but when their delicate heads are peering through, we know that winter has fled, and that the snow mantle is only a cast-off garment which, too, will slip away, dissolved by the long rays of the early spring sunshine.

In New England the trailing arbutus is called May flower, and in other places is known as the ground laurel. Its scientific name (_Epigæa repens_) is from two Greek words, _epigæa_, meaning "upon the earth," and _repens_, "trailing, or creeping."

The word arbutus is from the Latin, meaning a tree, and is first applied to another tribe of the same family, and is pronounced with the accent on the first syllable--_ar_butus. This must not be confounded with the trailing arbutus, where usage allows the accent on the second syllable--ar_bu_tus (_Standard Dictionary_) and whose characteristics are very different.

The trailing arbutus is a native of the eastern portion of North America, but is found as far west as Wisconsin. It grows among the rocks, or in a sandy soil, as in Michigan, and it blossoms from March until May, though April is its chosen month.

The flowers are sometimes pure white though usually beautifully tinged with various shades of pink and red, and though really forming terminal clusters, they are apparently clustered in the axils of the evergreen and leathery leaves.

The leaves may be oval or orbicular, and the stems which are tough and hairy grow to the length of six to fifteen inches.

The fragrance of the flower is very strong and attractive, though its strength varies with its locality and with the character of the soil in which it grows, and it is especially fine when growing under evergreen trees.

The stamens of the flower are interesting to the botanist as they vary greatly, apparently to insure cross-fertilization.

A study of this species, as well as of plant-life in general, teaches us that nature abhors self-fertilization and, as a rule, so develops plants that two individuals of the same species are essential to the production of seed.

This species especially enjoys nature, and is not easily cultivated. A few florists have succeeded in producing mature plants with fair results, but it may be stated that even transplanting, with much soil attached to the roots, to a soil identical with the native, results in a weakened development.

The trailing arbutus is greatly loved by the poet and writer, and has received many tributes from gifted pens.

Donald G. Mitchell, in speaking of the desolation of earliest spring, tells us that "the faint blush of the arbutus, in the midst of the bleak March atmosphere will touch the heart like a hope of heaven, in a field of graves."

THE HAIRY-TAILED MOLE.

In the March number of BIRDS AND ALL NATURE the common American mole, which is the most common species in the eastern portion of the United States, is described, and the habits of moles, which are identical, were rather fully set forth. The hairy-tailed mole (_Scapanus breweri_) is found principally in the western part of the United States.

This little animal has so many enemies besides man, as polecats, owls, ravens, storks, and the like, who watch it as it throws up its hillocks, that it is a wonder it has not been exterminated. It betrays its home by its own handiwork, as it is obliged constantly to construct new hillocks in order to earn its living. These hillocks always indicate the direction and extent of its hunting-grounds. The little weasels pursue it in its conduits, where it also frequently falls a prey to the adder. Only foxes, weasels, hedgehogs, and the birds already mentioned, eat it.

"Take the mole out of its proper sphere," says Wood, "and it is awkward and clumsy, but replace it in the familiar earth, and it becomes a different being--full of life and energy, and actuated by a fiery activity which seems quite inconsistent with its dull aspect and seemingly inert form. The absence of any external indication of eyes communicates a peculiar dullness to the creature's look, and the formation of the fore-limbs gives an indescribable awkwardness to its gait. In the ground only is it happy, for there only can it develop its various capabilities. No one can witness the eagerness with which it flings itself upon its prey, and the evident enjoyment with which it consumes its hapless victim without perceiving that the creature is exultantly happy in its own peculiar way. His whole life is one of fury, and he eats like a starving tiger, tearing and rending his prey with claws and teeth. A mole has been seen to fling itself upon a small bird, tear its body open, and devour it while still palpitating with life. 'Nothing short of this fiery energy could sustain an animal in the life-long task of forcing itself through the solid earth.'"

The hidden habitation of the mole is described as a nearly spherical chamber, the roof of which is nearly on a level with the earth around the hill, and therefore situated at a considerable depth from the apex of the heap. Around this are driven two circular galleries--one just level with the ceiling, and the other at some height above. The upper circle is much smaller than the lower. Five short, descending passages connect the galleries with each other, but the only entrance into the inner apartment is from the upper gallery, out of which three passages lead into the ceiling. It will be seen, therefore, that when a mole enters the house from one of its tunnels, it has first to get into the lower gallery, to ascend thence to the upper gallery, and so descend into its chamber. There is another entrance from below, however, by a passage which dips downward from the center of the chamber, and then, taking a curve upward, opens into one of the larger tunnels.

The mole comes from the earth with unsoiled fur, which is due in part to the peculiar character of the hair, and partly to strong membraneous muscles beneath the skin, by means of which the animal gives itself a frequent and powerful shake.

TREES.

W. E. WATT.

Woodman, spare that tree!
Touch not a single bough!
In youth it sheltered me,
And I'll protect it now.
--_Morris._

The monarch oak, the patriarch of the trees,
Shoots rising up, and spreads by slow degrees;
Three centuries he grows, and three he stays
Supreme in state; and in three more decays.
--_Dryden._

Sunlight and moisture fall upon the earth and find it full of germs of life. At once growths begin each after its own kind. There is such a multitude of them that they have not yet been counted. Each locality has forms peculiar to itself. The places most abundantly watered have different forms from those less favored by rain and dew, and those receiving more heat and sun allow more luxuriant growths than others if the water supply is large.

The business of life and growth is mostly carried on by means of water set in motion and sustained by heat. Those forms of life which reach highest above the surface of the earth are called trees. They are always striving to see what heights they can attain. But the different forms of life have limits set them which they cannot pass. The structure of one tree is limited to carrying its top twenty feet from the ground, that of another is so favored that it can reach twice that height, and others tower high above us and stand for centuries.

But the same tree does not flourish with the same vigor in different places. The nourishment of the soil may favor it or poverty dwarf its growth. Moisture and heat must be supplied or the growth will be slight.

I have stood upon the thick tops of cedar trees on high places in the White mountains near the tree-line. Towards the summit the trees diminish in size until they become veritable dwarfs. They are stunted by the cold. They shrink aside or downward trying to find shelter from the angry winds that are so cutting. Diminutive tree trunks are found that have curled themselves into sheltering crannies of rock and grown into such distorted shapes that they are gathered as curiosities.

The last trees to give up the fight on Mount Adams are the cedars of which I speak. They hug the rock for the little warmth that may be lurking there in remembrance of the sun's kindly rays; they mat themselves together and interlock their branches so as to form a springy covering to the whole ground. One may lie down upon their tops as upon a piece of upholstery, and in the openings below are rabbits and woodchucks and sometimes bears safely hidden from the view of the hunter.

From these ground-hugging trees of the mountain-tops to the great redwoods of our western slopes the mind passes the entire range of tree life. No trees are so great as our redwoods, though in Australia the eucalyptus reaches higher with a comparatively slender trunk. Where the forests are thickest, and the growth of the trees consequently tallest, the eucalyptus towers sometimes four or five hundred feet towards the sky.

The shrinking of mountain trees where the rock affords some warmth and shelter is shown on a larger scale in the forms of trees that stand at the edge of a forest. Where a stream divides the forest we find the trees upon the bank reaching out their branches and spreading luxuriant foliage over the water, because the open air in that direction helps the growth of leaves and twigs. Shade trees by the road-side reach out towards the open space of the road and grow one-sided because the conditions of light and air are better over the road than against the buildings or other trees that are behind them.

The prevailing winds of any country bend the trees largely in one direction. In the vicinity of Chicago, where the return trade winds blow day after day from the southwest, we find the willows of the prairie all bending their heads gracefully to the northeast.

The relations between trees and the fertility of the country around them is a matter of deep interest to man. Portions of France have been productive and afterwards barren because of the abundance of the trees at first and their having afterwards been cut down to supply the wants of man, who desired their material and the ground on which they stood. The rivers of Michigan are not navigable now in some instances where once they were deep with water. The destruction of the forests to supply the lumber and furniture markets of the world has caused less rain to fall, and the snows of winter which formerly lay late in spring beneath the forests now melt at the return of the sun in the early months and are swept with the rush of high water away to the great lakes. Many of the barren wastes in Palestine and other countries, which in olden times blossomed as the rose, have lost their glory with the destruction of their trees.

Men have learned something of the value of the trees to a fertile country and the science of forestry has arisen, not only to determine the means of growing beautiful and useful trees, but also to court the winds of heaven to drop their fatness upon the soil. In the state of Nebraska 800,000,000 planted trees invite the rain and the state is blessed by the response.

Man used to worship the forest. The stillness and the solemn sounds of the deep woods are uplifting to the soul and healing to the mind. The great gray trunks bearing heavenward their wealth of foliage, the swaying of branches in the breeze, the golden shafts of sunlight that shoot down through the noonday twilight, all tend to rest the mind from the things of human life and lift the thoughts to things divine.

The highest form of architecture practiced on earth is the Gothic, which holy men devised from contemplation of the lofty archings of trees and perpetuated in the stone buildings erected to God in western Europe through the centuries clustering around the thirteenth.

Trees afford hiding and nesting places for many birds and animals. Their cooling shelter comforts the cattle; they furnish coursing-places among their branches for the sportive climbing-animals, and their tender twigs give restful delight to the little birds far out of reach of any foe.

Man has always used the trees for house building; his warmth is largely supplied from fires of wood and leaves; from the days when Adam and Eve did their first tailoring with fig leaves, the trees have been levied upon for articles of clothing till now the world is supplied with hats of wood, millions of buttons of the same material are worn, and the wooden shoes of the peasantry of Europe clump gratefully over the ground in acknowledgment of the debt of mankind to the woods.

Weapons of all sorts, in all ages, have been largely of wood. Houses, furniture, troughs, spoons, bowls, plows, and all sorts of implements for making a living have been fashioned by man from timber. Every sort of carriage man ever devised, whether for land or water travel, depended in its origin upon the willing material the trees have offered. Although we now have learned to plow the seas with prow of steel and ride the horseless carriage that has little or no wood about it, yet the very perfection of these has arisen from the employment of wood in countless experiments before the metal thing was invented.

Our daily paper is printed from the successors of Gutenberg's wooden type, upon what seems to be paper, but is in reality the ground-up and whitened pulp of our forest trees. Our food is largely of nuts and fruits presented us by the trees of all climes, which are yet brought to our doors in many instances by wooden sailing-vessels, whose sails are spread on spars from our northern forests.

The baskets of the white man and the red Indian are made from the materials of the forest. Ash strips are pounded skillfully and readily separate themselves in flat strips suitable for weaving into receptacles for carrying the berries of the forest shades or the products of the soil, whose richness came by reason of the long-standing forests which stood above it and fell into it for centuries.

Whoever has tried to stopper a bottle when no cork was at hand knows something of the value of one sort of trees. He who has lain upon a bed of fever without access to quinine knows more of the debt we owe the generous forests that invite us with their cooling branches and their carpeted, mossy floors. The uses of rubber to city people are almost enough to induce one to remove his hat in reverence to the rubber tree; the esteem we have for the products of the sugar maple and the various products of the pine in their common forms of tar, pitch, and turpentine, as well as in their subtler forms, which are so essential to the arts and sciences, contributing to our ease, comfort, and elegance, should cause us to cherish the lofty pine and the giant maple with warmest gratitude.

Perhaps the most refined of the pleasures of man is found in the playing of musical instruments. There is not one of the sweeter-toned of all the vast family of musical instruments that is not dependent on the sympathetic qualities of the various woods. The violin shows the soul of this material in its highest refinement. No other instrument has so effectually caught the tones of the glorious mountain and the peaceful valley as has the choicely selected and deftly fashioned shell of the fiddle. It awakens all the fancies of a lifetime in one short hour, it brings gladness to the heart and enlivens the whole frame, and when the master hand brings out from its delicate form the deeper secrets of its nature the violin brings tears to our eyes and inspires within us an earnestness of purpose which is a perpetual tribute of the soul of man to the heart of the forest.