Winter Part 15

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_smiles at you--grins:_ Read the account of this habit in the opening chapter of the author's "Wild Life Near Home."

CHAPTER X

TO THE TEACHER

This chapter and the next go together--this for the lover of wild life, the next for the lover of adventure. The spring freshet is one of the most interesting of the year of days for animal study--better even than the day after the first snowfall.

But more than this, let both chapters suggest to you how primitive and elemental the real world is after all; with what cataclysmal forces the seasons are changed. As summer often pa.s.ses into autumn with a silencing frost that rests like a hush of awe over the land; so winter often gives way to spring with a rush of wind and tidal powers that seem to shake the foundations of the world. To feel these forces, to be a part of all these moods, to share in all these feelings--this, too, is one of the ends of nature-study.

CHAPTER XII

TO THE TEACHER

I should like to repeat here the suggestions in "The Fall of the Year" for this corresponding chapter. I will repeat only: "that _you_ are the teacher, not the book. The book is but a suggestion. You begin where it leaves off; you fill out where it is lacking." For these are not all the sounds of winter; indeed they may not be the characteristic sounds in your neighborhood.

No matter: the lesson is not this or that sound, but that your pupils _learn to listen_ for sounds, for the voices of the season, whatever those voices may be in their own particular region. The trouble is that we have ears, and literally hear not, eyes and see not, souls and feel not. Teach your pupils to use their eyes, ears, yes and _hearts_, and all things else will be added unto them in the way of education.

FOR THE PUPIL

I

It is the stilling of the insects that makes for the first of these silences; the hushing of the winds the second; the magic touch of the cold the third.

II

The voice of the great spring storm should be added to these, and the shriek of the wind about the house.

III

You should not only _hear_, but you should also _feel_ this split--pa.s.sing with a thrilling shock beneath your feet.

V

How many other of the _small_ voices do you know? The chirp of the kinglets; the scratching of mice in a shock of corn; the---- but you write a story about them. So listen for yourself.

VI

Do all you can to preserve the quail. Don't shoot.

VIII

Along toward spring you should hear him "drumming" for a mate--a rapid motion of his wings much like the hollow sound of a distant drum.

CHAPTER XIII

TO THE TEACHER

Do all that you can to teach the signs of the zodiac, the days of the seasons, and all the doings of the astronomical year. All that old lore of the skies is in danger of being lost. Some readers will say: "The author is not consistent! He loves the winter and here he is impatient to be done with it!" Some explanation on your part may be necessary: that the call of the spring is the call of life, a call so loud and strong that all life--human and wild, animal and vegetable,--hears it and is impatient to obey. If possible take your scholars upon a walk at this raw edge of the season when they will feel the chill but also the stirring of life all about them.

FOR THE PUPIL

Get an almanac and study the old weather signs.

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"_When descends on the Atlantic_": from Longfellow's "Seaweed."

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_frog or hyla_: The hylas belong to the family _Hylidae_ and include our tree-toad, and our little tree-frog.

"_For, lo, the winter is past_,": from The Song of Songs, or The Song of Solomon, in the Bible.

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