50 THE STORY OF A BIRD LOVER 



bers of the club always found some medium for 

 their contributions. Forest and Stream and other 

 journals were available for such publications. 

 The readers of this book are referred to the second 

 volume of the Bulletin of the Nuttall Club for a 

 more detailed account of the society. 



Now began my last year as an undergraduate 

 student at Cambridge. My study was much out- 

 side of books. It was not conventional. Many 

 of us still concur in the belief that all knowledge 

 is to be gained through print. Perhaps this was 

 the point of view of my mother. At any rate, so 

 far as I can remember, the only real anxiety I 

 caused her was as a student. A student outside 

 of books was an anomaly, and there are many yet 

 who fail to read the simplest stories that are told 

 out of doors, and not printed in the orthodox way. 

 Throughout the entire year my mother feared I 

 would not get a degree, because in order to do 

 so I had naturally to pass a difficult examination, 

 and also to prepare a thesis. That instead of 

 applying myself in the conventional way, every 

 moment I could snatch from what was absolutely 

 necessary to be done inside was spent in the fields, 

 was to her a source of worry. Thus it went on 

 until within a few days of graduation. When I 

 came home the morning after my final examina- 

 tion, knowing the result, and told her that I not 

 only would graduate, but with some degree of 



