WOODLAND, MOOR, AND STREAM 



HOW I BECAME A NATURALIST 



MY home as a boy was in a quaint old fishing village 

 close to the edge of the North Kent marshes. The 

 place had an odd, irregular look ; one would think 

 its inhabitants had begun building from the shore 

 up inland to a certain point, and then come back 

 and finished along the water's edge. The top rooms 

 of the houses generally projected over the pavement, 

 with queer gables which were ornamented with gro- 

 tesque figures. By the water stood old mills, ware- 

 houses, and shipyards, all having a decayed look. 

 That business of some kind had once been carried 

 on there the old wharves and fine houses showed, 

 but when that was no one about the place in my time 

 knew. It was entirely isolated from any other town 

 or village. Railroads and steamboats were things 

 known only by name to the general community. 



D 



