244 



THE GUIDE TO NATURE 



to drive them out. There are a few 

 in this locality but an effort is being 

 made to get rid of them. We hope 

 that they will never get a hold in the 

 southern part of the state. 



Harriet Williams Myers. 



Nest of Burrowing Owl. 



Denver, Colorado. 

 To the Editor : 



The comical little burrowing owl se- 

 lects the deserted burrow of a prairie 

 dog in which he spends his life. This 



THE NEST OF THE BURROWING OWL. 



he carefully lines with dry, pulverized 

 manure, and far down in the earth on 

 this soft lining the female owl lays from 

 eight to twelve white eggs. 



Figure i shows a nest of this bird 

 from which the surrounding ground 

 has been removed. This little mother 

 incubated her eggs fully four feet be- 

 low the surface of the ground, and more 

 than five feet from the entrance of the 

 crooked burrow. 



It is an interesting fact that with 

 few exceptions, the eggs that are laid 

 in holes in the ground or in holes in 

 trees, where there is a little or no light, 

 are pure white. 



Robert B. Rockwell. 



A Boulder Monument. 

 A few years ago, while on a tramp 

 through the North Woods, I came out 

 through the forests of North Elba, to 

 the old "John Brown Farm". Here 

 John Brown lived for many years, and 

 here he tried to establish a colonv of 

 freed slaves in the pure air of the moun- 



tains. Here, too, his family remained 

 through the stirring times when he took 

 part in the bloody struggles that made 

 and kept Kansas free. 



The little old brown farmhouse stands 

 on the edge of the great woods, a few 

 miles to the north of the highest peaks 

 of the Adirondacks. There is nothing 

 unusual about the house. You will find 

 a dozen such in a few hours' walk 

 almost anywhere in the mountain parts 

 of New England or New York. It 

 stands on a little hill, "in a sightly 

 place," as they say in that region, with 

 no shelter of trees around it. 



At the foot of the hill in a broad 

 curve flows the River An Sable, small 

 and clear and cold, and full of trout. 

 It is not far above that the stream takes 

 its rise in the dark Indian Pass, the 

 only place in these mountains where the 

 ice of the winter lasts all summer long. 

 The same ice on the one side sends forth 

 the Au Sable, and on the other feeds the 

 fountain head of the infant Hudson 

 River. 



In the little dooryard in front of the 

 farmhouse is the historic spot where 

 Tohn Brown's body still lies mouldering. 

 There is not even a grave of his own. 

 His bones lie with those of his father, 

 and the short record of his life and 

 death is crowded on the foot of his 

 father s tombstone. Near by, in the 

 little yard, lies a huge, wandering boul- 

 der, torn off years ago by the glaciers 

 from the granite hills that hem the 

 Indian Pass. The boulder is ten feet 

 or more in diameter, large enough to 

 make the farmhouse behind it seem 

 small in comparison. On its upper sur- 

 face, in letters two feet long, which can 

 be read plainly for a mile away, is cut 

 the simple name JOHN BROWN. 



This is John Brown's grave, and the 

 place, the boulder, and the inscription 

 are alike fitting to the man he was. 



Dust to dust; ashes to ashes; 



granite to granite ; the last of the 

 Puritans ! — 



The Last of the Puritans, by Prcs. 

 David Starr Jordan. 



