18 THE ALERT EYE. 



have not been eye-witnesses of the facts. Having 

 gone stupidly through life with unrewarded vision, 

 they cannot believe that others have seen so many 

 interesting things that they themselves have failed 

 to see. And let me ask, en passant^ Is not that 

 the secret of a great deal of the skepticism of the 

 times ? 



In his delightful book, " Outings at Odd Times," 

 Charles C. Abbott tells us that an ornithologist 

 once wrote to him, " Some of your birds in New 

 Jersey have strange ways." Mr. Abbott rightly 

 resents the innuendo so evident in the sentence, 

 and replies with some vigor that " birds in New 

 Jersey," as elsewhere, are " wide-awake, cunning, 

 quick to scent danger, and wise enough to suit 

 themselves to their surroundings." I do not call 

 in question a single statement made by this alert 

 and careful observer of bird deportment, because 

 — I saj^ it modestly, I hope — I have myself seen 

 many quaint and unheard-of pranks in my study 

 of the '' feathered republic." 



I have also encountered the skeptic, as has every 

 chronicler of nature's doings. For example ; I was 

 once telling an acquaintance, with no small degree 

 of animation, about the cunning artifices of several 

 crested chickadees, as described to me by a relative 



