20 SHARP EYES. 
Some friends of mine who lived in the country tried 
to describe to me a bird that built a nest in a tree 
within a few feet of the house. As it was a brown 
bird, I should have taken it for a wood-thrush, had 
not the nest been described as so thin and loose that 
from beneath the eggs could be distinctly seen. The 
most pronounced feature in the description was the 
barred appearance of the under side of the bird’s tail. 
I was quite at sea, until one day, when we were driv- 
ing out, a cuckoo flew across the road in front of us, 
when my friends exclaimed, “There is our bird!” I 
had never known a cuckoo to build near a house, and 
I had never noted the appearance the tail presents 
when viewed from beneath ; but it the bird had been 
described in its most obvious features, as slender, with 
a long tail, cinnamon brown above and white beneath, 
with a curved bill, any one who knew the bird would 
have recognized the portrait. 
We think we have looked at a thing sharply until 
we are asked for its specific features. I thought I 
knew exactly the form of the leaf of the tulip-tree, 
until one day a lady asked me to draw the outline of 
one. <A good observer is quick to take a hint and to 
follow it up. Most of the facts of nature, especially 
in the life of the birds and animals, are well screened. 
We do not see the play because we do not look in- 
tently enough. The other day I was sitting with a 
friend upon a high rock in the woods, near a small 
stream, when we saw a water-snake swimming across 
a pool toward the opposite bank. Any eye would 
have noted it, perhaps nothing more. A little closer 
and sharper gaze revealed the fact that the snake bore 
something in its mouth, which, as we went down to 
investigate, proved to be a small cat-fish, three or 

