56 HOW NATURE STUDY SHOULD BE TAUGHT 



wanted was not there. In sadness I laid them 

 aside. 



Next I picked up an unattractive letter written 

 on the leaves of a pocket note-book. The drawing 

 that accompanied it was crude and the paper was 

 soiled by finger marks. With difficulty I read it, 

 but was fascinated as I deciphered the story of a 

 boy's seaside investigation of the fiddler crab. He 

 wanted to know how they lived underground ; 

 what they did ; what food they ate ; what kind of 

 quarters they occupied. He made inquiries of the 

 fishermen. No one knew. He said, " I'll find 

 out if it takes a week." He borrowed pick, shovel, 

 and crowbar. He went to work and he found out. 

 Then he wrote the story, as he sat beside the 

 hole that he had dug after several hours' hard 

 work. He made the drawing after careful watching 

 of the living object. He wrote the article on the 

 field of battle, where the weapon was a spade, 

 the enemy a crab. I was sorry that I had not a 

 basketful of prizes to give that boy, because he 

 wrote his letter for the love of it, and not for a 

 reward, of which he knew nothing. 



The story of a little girl's watching the sexton 

 beetles burying a dead snake u hour after hour, 

 with her little rocking-chair and parasol, in the 



