NEW GLEANINGS IN OLD FIELDS 



offsets and runners like the strawberry. This would, 

 of course, keep the two kinds in groups by them- 

 selves. 



VII. NATURE NEAR HOME 



After long experience I am convinced that the 

 best place to study nature is at one's own home, 

 — on the farm, in the mountains, on the plains, 

 by the sea, — no matter where that may be. One 

 has it all about him then. The seasons bring to his 

 door the great revolving cycle of wild life, floral 

 and faunal, and he need miss no part of the show. 



At home one should see and hear with more fond- 

 ness and sympathy. Nature should touch him a little 

 more closely there than anywhere else. He is better 

 attuned to it than to strange scenes. The birds 

 about his own door are his birds, the flowers in his 

 own fields and wood are his, the rainbow springs its 

 magic arch across his valley, even the everlasting 

 stars to which one lifts his eye, night after night, 

 and year after year, from his own doorstep, have 

 something private and personal about them. The 

 clouds and the sunsets one sees in strange lands 

 move one the more they are like the clouds and sun- 

 sets one has become familiar with at home. The 

 wild creatures about you become known to you as 

 they cannot be known to a passer-by. The traveler 

 sees little of Nature that is revealed to the home- 

 stayer. You will find she has made her home where 



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