golden green or burnished bronze, 

 with coal-black wings. These dainty 

 creatures remained but a few days. 

 Having deposited their eggs on the edges 

 of the brook and on the leaves of the 

 water plants, their work was finished, 

 and their bright, brief existence came to 

 an end. 



Etchings of Dragon-flies are found on 

 the rocks of Arizona. The Moki Indians 

 say that their ancestors held them in 

 great veneration, as they were powerful 

 friends to them, and in prolonged 

 drought had often led the rain clouds 

 toward their country. Seeing them 



hovering over the water gave rise to the 

 belief that they had power to open 

 springs. The Dacotahs also reverence 

 them for the same reason. 



The Japanese, ever fanciful and poetic, 

 have called their country Akitsusu — the 

 Land of the Dragon-fly — from the fan- 

 cied resembance of the shape of the main 

 island to a Dragon-fly. 



Mr. Hearn tells us that in an old castle 

 at Matsue, which is used as a sort of 

 war museum, there is a great ball repre- 

 senting the world, on which is perched 

 an enormous Dragon-fly with wings of 

 tinted gauze five feet long. 

 Margaret Wentworth Leighton. 



FOUR YOUNG HAWKS. 



One day in early April, as I walked 

 through a pine forest, the form of a 

 large hawk flitting about just over the 

 tree tops attracted my attention. Soon 

 another appeared, and I decided to make 

 an investigation and if possible to find 

 the cause of their boldness. 



It was soon very evident that my pres- 

 ence in that locality was far from agree- 

 able to them, for, upon my starting in 

 the direction in which I first saw the old 

 bird, they began their shrill screaming, 

 and to my surprise I soon found that all 

 this ado was caused by my being near 

 to their half-finished nest. On discov- 

 ering the nest in a state of construction, 

 I immediately moved on, not wishing to 

 have the birds desert it. Evidently they 

 expected no harm, for when I returned 

 on May loth, four blue eggs, that I at 

 once identified as those of Accipiter 

 coo peri, lay upon the rough bark floor 

 of the nest. Again I left them in peace, 

 but when I returned a few weeks later 

 and found four fuzzie white youngsters 

 in the nest, I was not so lenient, and 

 carried them home with me. 



They took to their new life remarkably 

 well and I soon noticed that their yel- 



lowish-white coat was rapidly changing 

 to one of brown. Even at this early 

 period their savage tempers seemed fully 

 developed, for if one approached them, 

 they would spread out their scraggly 

 wings and strike with vigor. Imagine 

 my surprise one day on finding that three 

 of the young rascals had turned upon 

 the fourth and killed him. Apparently 

 this was done, not for want of food, but 

 for the mere desire to kill. A second 

 soon shared the fate of his brother, and 

 it began to look as though I would be 

 unable to raise them on account of their 

 ugly dispositions, but the remaining pair 

 were equally matched and though they 

 fought several hard battles, each refused 

 to die, so in the end they ceased to fight 

 and lived a quiet life. 



When they were being fed they would 

 seize the meat with both feet, spread out 

 their wings and tail and raise the feath- 

 ers on their napes. Should any intruder 

 happen along at that time, they would at 

 once fly at him fiercely, whistling loudly. 

 They grew to be nearly as large as the 

 average wild bird and proved to be a 

 very interesting find. 



William F. Mowry. 



