126 The Nature-Study Idea 



in the gross. If he plants at all, he usually 

 plants things exotic or strange to the neigh- 

 borhood. The woman grows a geranium or 

 fuchsia in a tin can, and now and then makes 

 a flower-bed in the front yard; but the man is 

 likely to think such things beneath him. If a 

 man has flowers at all, he must have something 

 that will fill the eye. Sunflowers are satisfying. 

 But the second and third generations begin 

 to plant forests and to allow the roadsides to 

 grow wild at intervals. Persons come to be 

 satisfied with their common surroundings and 

 to derive less pleasure from objects merely 

 because they are unlike their surroundings. 

 Choice plants come into the yards here and 

 there, and the men of the household begin to 

 care for them. The birds and wild animals are 

 cherished. (I know a man who in his pioneer 

 days took no interest in crows except to get rid 

 of them, but who later in life wept when a 

 crow's nest in an apple tree was robbed.) Love 

 of books increases. All this marks the growth 

 of the intellectual and spiritual life. 



