SHARP EYES. 55 



Nevertheless, the habit of observation is the habit 

 of clear and decisive gazing ; not by a first casual 

 glance, but by a steady deliberate aim of the eye 

 are the rare and characteristic things discovered. 

 You must look intently and hold your eye firmly to 

 the spot, to see more than do the rank and file of 

 mankind. The sharp-shooter picks out his man and 

 knows him with fatal certainty from a stump, or a 

 rock, or a cap on a pole. The phrenologists do 

 well to locate, not only form, color, weight, etc., in 

 the region of the eye, but a faculty which they call 

 individuality that which separates, discriminates, 

 and sees in every object its essential character. This 

 is just as necessary to the naturalist as to the artist 

 or the poet. The sharp eye notes specific points 

 and differences, it seizes upon and preserves the 

 individuality of the thing. 



Persons frequently describe to me some bird they 

 have seen or heard and ask me to name it, but in most 

 cases the bird might be any one of a do/en, or else 

 it is totally unlike any bird found on this continent. 

 They have either seen falsely or else vaguely. Not 

 so the farm youth who wrote me one winter day that 

 he had seen a single pair of strange birds, which he 

 describes as follows : " They were about the size of 

 the ' chippie/ the tops of their heads were red, and 

 the breast of the male was of the same color, while 

 that of the female was much lighter ; their rumps 

 were also faintly tinged with red. If I have described 

 them so that you would know them, please write me 



