52 Bird -Lore 



Androscoggin — Amasagunticook form = 'fishing place for ale wives,' or 'fish spearing.' 



Antigo — Indian form = 'evergreen.' 



Apopka — Indian form = 'catfish eating creek.' 



Aptakisic — Indian form = 'half day' or 'sun at meridian.' 



Aquaschicola — Indian form = 'where we fish with the bush net.' 



Areata — Indian form = 'sunny spot.' 



Aswaguscawadic — Indian form = 'place where one is compelled to drag his canoe 



through a stream.' 

 Attapulgus — Indian form = 'boring holes into wood to make a fire.' 

 Attitah — Indian form = 'blueberries.' 

 Aztec — name of a native Mexican tribe = 'place of the Heron,' 'shallow land where 



vapors arise,' 'land of the flamingoes.' 



From these few examples, it is easy to see how the Indian marked the places 

 to which it was useful for him to be able to find his way, or, which appealed 

 to his sense of beauty, or served as a landmark through newly trodden ways. 

 Many of these names will be unfamiliar to you, but they will all be found on 

 the map of the United States. It would make an interesting evening's game to 

 look up the locality of each place in a large atlas. 



The list of words might be indefinitely prolonged, if there were space. It 

 remains for you to find a deeper meaning in your study of geography than 

 merely learning to locate places on maps. Would it not be easier to remember, 

 for example, that Menominee is a city in Wisconsin, and also, in Michigan, if 

 you knew that this queer Indian word refers to the wild rice which once grew 

 abundantly about those places? Wild rice, in turn, suggests wild birds which 

 prefer that food and, by this clew, one might discover something of the abun- 

 dance of such species in earlier times. 



Summing up this rather novel method of study, we may find it of value in 

 three ways: first, to stimulate interest in routine study; second, to aid the 

 memory through the association of different ideas; and third, to awaken the 

 mind to the wealth of knowledge hidden in words, which is free to all who have 

 the will and the wit to claim it as their own. This New Year, let us make the 

 hours in school count for more, by getting the most we can out of what we have 

 to learn.— A. H. W. 



FOR AND FROM ADULT AND YOUNG 

 OBSERVERS 



"John Thoreau, Jr. (Henry Thoreau's eldest brother), one day put a Bluebird's box 

 on my barn, — fifteen years ago, it must be, — and there it still is, with every summer a 

 melodious family in it, adorning the place and singing his praises. There's a gift for 

 you which cost the giver no money, but nothing which he bought could have been so 

 good." Excerpt from Emerson's Diary. 



Note: "The Bluebird box has lasted until destroyed by a spring gale of the present 

 year" (1915). 



