12 THE ALERT EYE. 



gambols of the birds, at that moment my thoughts 

 were engrossed in fixing the mental attitude of my 

 friend toward nature. 



What had he been doing with his eyes all the 

 while? He was what we are pleased to call an 

 educated man ; that is, he had a diploma from the 

 college whose grounds we were then approaching, 

 and had, after completing the classical course, 

 spent three more years in taking a special course of 

 professional training. During all these years the 

 red-headed woodpeckers had been drumming their 

 resonant tattoos on the trees of the campus, utter- 

 ing their rollicksome cries, playing their odd 

 pranks of tilting and poising in the air, and rear- 

 ing their crimson-pated families ; and yet my com- 

 panion had never observed them — at least, not 

 sufficiently to learn even their common name ! 

 Verily here was a case of a man who, having eyes, 

 saw not, and having ears, heaid not. It is not the 

 blind eye only that does not see. Many a man 

 who prides himself on his acute oi'gans of vision, 

 is practically blind as far as many of the interest- 

 ing facts of nature are concerned. To me it is 

 simply marvelous that any man should be able to 

 study so many books, some of them brimming over 

 with pastoral poetry and delicate appreciations of 



