Eye Spy: Afield With Nature Among Flowers And Animate Things - free ebook by W. Hamilton (William Hamilton) Gibson

EYE SPY

AFIELD WITH NATURE AMONG FLOWERS AND ANIMATE THINGS BY WILLIAM HAMILTON GIBSON ILLUSTRATED BY THE AUTHOR NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER &amp; BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 1899 Copyright, 1897, by Harper &amp; Brothers . All rights reserved....

1 minute read

Read Chapter

A Naturalist's Boyhood

I AM enjoying a book, a picture, a statue, or, say, a piece of music. I know these to be the finished works of the man or the woman, but I invariably hark back to the boy or the girl. What I want to discover is the precise time, in the lives of certain boys and girls, when the steel first struck the flint, the spark flew, and out streamed that jet of fire which never afterwards was extinguished. I was reading an article entitled "Professor Wriggler," written by Mr. William Hamilton Gibson, which

8 minute read

Read Chapter

The Story of The Floundering Beetle

A MONG my somewhat numerous correspondence from young people, I recall several wondering inquiries about a certain fat, floundering "beetle," as "blue as indigo"; and when we consider how many other observing youngsters, including youngsters of larger growth, have looked upon this uncouth shape in the path, lawn, or pasture, will speculate as to its life history, it is perhaps well to make this floundering blue beetle better acquainted with his unappreciative neighbors. What are the lazy blue in

9 minute read

Read Chapter

Fox-fire

T HE most recent experience of my own with the mysterious fox-fire occurred a short time ago in a homeward drive with a companion from a botanizing expedition about twelve miles distant. It was near ten o'clock. The sky was overcast, only a stray star of the first magnitude now and then peeping out from between the rifts of hazy floating clouds. The new moon, "wi' th' auld moon i' her arm," had sunk below the western hills, and so dark had it become that the road ahead, at best but a faint sugge

12 minute read

Read Chapter

A Homely Weed with Interesting Flowers

T HE recent article from my pen on the "Riddle of the Bluets," and which showed the important significance of its two forms of blossoms, suggests that a few more similar expositions of the beautiful mysteries of the common flowers which we meet every day in our walks, and which we claim to "know" so well, may serve to add something to the interest of our strolls afield. It is scarcely fair to assert that familiarity can breed contempt in our relations to so lovely an object as a flower, but cert

7 minute read

Read Chapter

Two Fairy Sponges

T HE pretty works of my fairy and his companions in mischief are seen on every hand from spring until winter, but few of us have ever seen the fay, for Puck is no myth nor Ariel a creature of the poet's fancy. Their prototype existed in entomological entity and demoralizing mischievousness ages before the traditional fay, in diminutive human form, had been dreamed of. The quaint, bow-legged little "brownies," which have brought our entire land beneath the witching spell of their drollery, can sc

8 minute read

Read Chapter

Green Pansies

T HE casual observer may perhaps have noticed that interesting law of nature which governs the coloring of flowers, and which confines the hues of a given flower, or perhaps a botanical group of flowers, to two colors and the combination of these colors. The three primary colors—red, yellow, and blue—are rarely to be seen in the blossoms of the same botanical group. Thus we observe roses, hollyhocks, chrysanthemums, and tulips in all shades of white, yellow, pink, red, and crimson, even almost a

7 minute read

Read Chapter

Mr. and Mrs. Tumble-bug

O F all the insects which occasionally claim our attention in our country rambles, there is probably no example more entitled to our distinguished consideration than the plebeian, commonly despised, but admittedly amusing beetle known the country over as the funny "tumble-bug." As we see him now, so he has always been—the same in appearance, the same in habits; yet how has he fallen from grace! how humbled in the eyes of man from that original high estate when, in ancient Egypt, he enjoyed the p

12 minute read

Read Chapter

Those Horse-hair Snakes

So they are called; and if the almost unanimous rustic opinion, with its ancient tradition and reliable witness, is to be credited, such they are in very truth. Indeed, there would seem to be few better attested facts in the whole range of natural history than the pedigree of this white or brown thread-like creature which is found in summer shallows and pools. Go where you will in the rural districts and it is the same old story. "They come from horse-hairs," and in some sections they are destin

7 minute read

Read Chapter

"Professor Wiggler"

H OW potent and abiding are the reminiscences of early youth! It is now some thirty years since I discovered "Professor Wiggler," and noted his peculiar eccentricities. And simply because I chanced first to disclose his wiggling identity on a lilac-bush, how irresistibly must his comical presence assert itself with my slightest thought of lilac, with the shape of its leaf, the faintest whiff of its fragrance, or even a distant glimpse of its spray! Yonder, for instance, an old ruin of a home clo

8 minute read

Read Chapter

"Cow-spit, Snake-spit, and Frog-spit"

I F I have been asked once I have been asked fifty times to explain the secret of that frothy, bubbly mass which clings to the stems of grasses and weeds in the summer meadows. Surely no one of our readers who has spent a June or July in the country can have failed to observe it. Even as I write, having just returned to my studio by a short cut across a meadow near by, my nether garments plainly show that I must have come in contact with five hundred of them during these few rods. In the height

14 minute read

Read Chapter

The Paper Wasp & His Doings

F EW of our common insects enjoy a wider intimate acquaintance with or a more respectful recognition from humanity than the wasps and hornets. Their acquaintance, with that of their yellow-jacket bee and bumble-bee relatives, is forced upon most of us at a tender and impressionable age, and leaves a lasting reminiscence. Having once been interviewed by a hornet, do we not remember him for life for his pains? The bee has perhaps given us equally pointed excuse for respectful, or rather disrespect

10 minute read

Read Chapter

The Spider's Span

O BSERVERS who witnessed from day to day the construction of the great Brooklyn Bridge were often heard to remark, as they looked up with awe from the ferry-boats beneath at the workmen suspended everywhere among the net-work of cables, "Those men look just like spiders in a web." The comparison seemed irresistible, and the writer heard it expressed many times. But how few who gave utterance to the sentiment realized the full significance of the "spider" allusion, or for a moment reflected that

6 minute read

Read Chapter

Ballooning Spiders

T HE country boy, or I might say even country baby, who does not know a spider-web when he sees it would be considered a curiosity nowadays. The morning gossamer spread in the grass or hung among the weeds and glistening in the dew—who has not seen it, and thought of the agile, long-legged proprietor somewhere lurking near by? And yet for ages, and until a comparatively recent date, this cobweb, either trailing lightly in the breeze or spread in the grass, was a mystery as to its source, and was

11 minute read

Read Chapter

The Lace-wing Fly

L ACE indeed! Was ever lace even of fairy queen fashioned so daintily as are the wings of this diaphanous pale green sylph, that flutters in its filmy halo above the grass tips? Yonder it alights upon the clover. Let us steal closely upon its haunt. Here we find it hid under the upper leaf, its eyes of fiery gold gleaming in the shadow, its slender body now caged within the canopy of its four steep, sloping wings, their glassy meshes lit with iridescent hues of opal—the lace-wing fly, a delight

6 minute read

Read Chapter

The Perfumed Beetle

SURPRISES await us at every turn in wood and field if our senses are sufficiently alert and responsive. I well remember the singular revelation which rewarded my curiosity upon a certain occasion in my boyhood, an incident which now seems trivial enough, but which marked a rare day in my youthful entomological education, and which, as it relates to an insect of exceptional peculiarity, I may here recall. I was returning homeward after a successful day of hide-and-seek with the caterpillars and b

4 minute read

Read Chapter

Mushroom Spore-prints

THE dusty puff-ball, floating its faint trail of smoke in the breeze from the ragged flue at its dome-shaped roof as from an elfin tepee, or perhaps enveloping our feet in its dense purple cloud as we chance to step upon it in the path, is familiar to every one—always enthusiastically welcomed by the small boy, to whom it is always a challenge for a kick, and a consequent demonstration of smoke worthy of a Fourth-of-July celebration. A week ago this glistening gray bag, so free with its dust-puf

6 minute read

Read Chapter

Some Curious Cocoons

T HE title of this article will doubtless recall to readers of "Harper's Young People" [1] a paper upon a similar subject which appeared in my calendar series two years ago. With the title the resemblance ends, for the cocoons which I am about to describe are of a sort that has never been mentioned in any previous article. These curious cocoons had been familiar to me since my boyhood, having long excited my wonder before finally revealing their mystery. They have recently been brought freshly t

6 minute read

Read Chapter

Nettle-Leaf Tent-builders

V ERY few of our readers will need an introduction to the nettle. It is, perhaps, the one plant which may claim the largest number of intimate acquaintances. It was Dr. Culpepper, the old-time herbalist, I believe, who claimed, moreover, that it was one of the easiest of plants to distinguish, in proof of which he affirmed that "it could be found even on the darkest night by simply feeling for it." Even those most ignorant of botany, after having once "scraped acquaintance," as it were, with the

7 minute read

Read Chapter

The Evening Primrose

T HE summer which is allowed to pass without a visit to the twilight haunt of the evening primrose, perhaps at your very door, is an opportunity missed. Night after night for weeks it breathes its fragrant invitation as its luminous blooms flash out one by one from the clusters of buds in the gloom, as though in eager response to the touch of some wandering sprite, until the darkness is lit up with their luminous galaxy—that beautiful episode of blossom-consciousness and hope so picturesquely de

7 minute read

Read Chapter

The Dandelion Burglar

Y OUNG PEOPLE readers will perhaps recall my previous reference to the whims and preferences of the birds in their selection of building material. The unravelling of deserted nests will often prove an instructive as well as humorously entertaining pastime, revealing in the same fabric evidences of great sagacity and what would appear perfectly nonsensical prejudices, with an occasional piece of positive frivolity. Thus we can readily see the wisdom in the selection of these strong strips of milk

6 minute read

Read Chapter

The Troubles of the House-fly

Q UITE contrary to my original intention, my specimen of Musca domestica , which I had captured at random to serve as my model in the present chapter, has suggested that I begin with a Q, and after some expressive criticism on the matter I have at last consented to humor him, especially as he proved otherwise a most unique and accommodating individual. Being in need of a good, healthy, toe-twisting, neck-twirling specimen to sit for his portrait in an illustration for a forthcoming article on th

6 minute read

Read Chapter

Tendrils

C ARELESS observation of Nature is responsible for some curious misrepresentations of her most simple facts. Even those of us who stand somewhat in the relation of nature teachers—namely, artists, both draughtsmen and painters, and from whom we have a right to expect absolute fidelity—are not free from our shortcomings as truthful chroniclers. Thus how often we see otherwise beautiful landscapes marred by features which rebel against all laws of natural philosophy—of a storm sky above a sunlit s

7 minute read

Read Chapter

A Strange Story of a Grasshopper

A FEW days ago, while returning from a walk, I chanced to observe a dead grasshopper upon the dirt at the side of the road. Now this incident would not have been of special importance had I not discovered, upon careful post-mortem examination, the very remarkable manner of the insect's death, which recalled a similar surprising episode of several years ago which I had almost forgotten. Upon referring to my note-book of that period, however, I found considerable space devoted to the incident, whi

5 minute read

Read Chapter

Riddles in Flowers

INDEED , are they not all riddles? Where is the flower which even to the most devoted of us has yet confided all its mysteries? In comparison with the insight of the earlier botanists, we have surely come much closer to the flowers, and they have imparted many of their secrets to us. Through the inspired vision of Sprengel, Darwin, and their followers we have learned something of their meaning, in addition to the knowledge of their structure, which comprised the end and aim of the study of those

8 minute read

Read Chapter

Luck in Clovers

U NDER one guise or another the fickle goddess Fortuna would seem to have established her infallible interpreters or mediators. The lovelorn maiden with the daisy, its petals falling beneath her questioning finger-tips to the alternate refrain, "He loves me. He loves me not," is a sacrificial episode in the life of the daisy wherever it grows. The still younger maiden with her dandelion ball, whose feathered parachutes must be dislodged upon the breeze with three puffs from her little puckered m

6 minute read

Read Chapter

Barberry Manners

O NE who is unfamiliar with the remarkable doings of blossoms in association with their insect honey-sippers might consider it somewhat surprising to attribute "manners" to a flower. But who that has seen the sage-blossom clap its bee visitor on the back as she ushers him in at the threshold of her purple door, marking him for her own with her dab of yellow pollen as she almost pushes him into the nectar feast within; who that has witnessed the almost roguish demonstration which the tiny androme

6 minute read

Read Chapter

A Woolly Flock

H ARDLY a season passes without my being in receipt of one or more inquiries, personal or by letter, concerning this snowy brood which haunts the alders in the swamp or along the road-side, and which envelops the smaller branches in its dense, feathery fringe. It is often one of the most frequent and conspicuous incidents in a country walk during its season, and its season ranges from its height in early summer until the frost. And yet how few there are, even of those, perhaps, who pass it every

7 minute read

Read Chapter

"What Ails Him"

O N a certain afternoon last August, having just completed a particularly laborious work upon which I had long been engaged, and with my mind naturally inclined towards relaxation in my plans for the morrow's labors, my eye instinctively sought a certain note-book upon my table. It was a note-book containing memoranda on a wide variety of Nature topics, but presented in a particular place a choice, selected list of topics under the title of "Young People." A large number of these memoranda were

7 minute read

Read Chapter

The Cicada's Last Song

U NDER the popular name of "locust," our cicada, or harvest-fly, has long enjoyed the reputation as our chief insect musician, vying with the katydid in the volume of its song. We all know its long, whizzing crescendo in the sultry summer days. But let us call things by their right names. This buzzing musician is not a locust ; it is a cicada . The true locust is what we ordinarily call a grasshopper, that "high-elbowed grig" of the meadows, so generous with his "molasses," and with such a vigor

10 minute read

Read Chapter