Nature Books

CHAPTER I THE LITTLE FURRY ONES THAT SLIDE DOWN HILL In the brown, balsam-smelling log cabin on the shores of Silverwater, loveliest and loneliest of wilderness lakes, the Babe's great thirst for information seemed in a fair way to be satisfied. Young as he was, and city-born, the lure of the wild had nevertheless already caught him, and the information that he thirsted for so insatiably was all... more...

Introduction.—The occasion for publishing this catalogue of Philippine earthquakes which were of violent and destructive character has been furnished by a request from Prof. John Milne for a list of such phenomena, to be included in the General Earthquake Catalogue which this eminent seismologist is preparing under the auspices of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. The said... more...

INTRODUCTION. A considerable portion of the contents of the present volume formed the zoological section of a much more comprehensive work recently published, on the history and present condition of Ceylon. But its inclusion there was a matter of difficulty; for to have altogether omitted the chapters on Natural History would have impaired the completeness of the plan on which I had attempted to... more...

SQUIRRELS Walking through the early October woods one day, I came upon a place where the ground was thickly strewn with very large unopened chestnut burrs. On examination I found that every burr had been cut square off with about an inch of the stem adhering, and not one had been left on the tree. It was not accident, then, but design. Whose design? A squirrel’s. The fruit was the finest I had ever... more...

Preface. I have been called upon to write illustrative sketches to a series of engravings, designed by an eminent artist. In performing my part of the work I have thrown the Mammalia into twenty-four groups—corresponding more or less to the picture designs—and have dwelt chiefly on the geographical distribution of the animals. The Cetaceae and Vespertilionidae are properly omitted. In the groups... more...

A Story of Some Maples This is not a botanical disquisition; it is not a complete account of all the members of the important tree family of maples. I am not a botanist, nor a true scientific observer, but only a plain tree-lover, and I have been watching some trees bloom and bud and grow and fruit for a few years, using a camera now and then to record what I see—and much more than I see, usually! In... more...

INTRODUCTION. I Evelyn & his literary contemporaries Isaac Walton & Samuel Pepys. Among the prose writers of the second half of the seventeenth century John Evelyn holds a very distinguished position. The age of the Restoration and the Revolution is indeed rich in many names that have won for themselves an enduring place in the history of English literature. South, Tillotson, and Barrow among... more...

BABY BIRDS. "Ears have they, but they hear not," may be said of all the world. Tragedies and comedies go on continually before us which we neither see nor hear; cries of distress and prattle of infants, songs of love and screams of war, alike fall upon deaf ears, while we calmly discuss the last book or the news from Borriboo-lah-Gha, as completely oblivious as if all this stirring life did not... more...

In the academic year of 1947-48 Montague studied the geographic variation in Thomomys talpoides of Wyoming. His study was based upon materials then in the University of Kansas Museum of Natural History. Publication of the results was purposely delayed until previously reported specimens from certain adjacent areas, especially in Colorado, could be examined. In the autumn of 1950 one of us, Hall, was... more...

WILD FLOWERS WATER-PLANTAIN FAMILY (Alismaceae) Broad-leaved Arrow-head Sagittaria latifolia (S. variabilis) Flowers—White, 1 to 1-1/2 in. wide, in 3-bracted whorls of 3, borne near the summit of a leafless scape 4 in. to 4 ft. tall. Calyx of 3 sepals; corolla of 3 rounded, spreading petals. Stamens and pistils numerous, the former yellow in upper flowers; usually absent or imperfect in lower... more...