LEAF AND TENDRIL 



11 



To see accurately and completely is a power 

 given to few ; hence the observations of the majority 

 of people are of no scientific value whatever. One 

 spring I was interested in the question as to how 

 the crow picks up a dead fish or other food from the 

 surface of the water — with its feet or its bill. One 

 would naturally say with its bill, of course, as all 

 except the rapacious birds hold and carry things in 

 their beaks. But one of our younger nature writers 

 made the crow carry food for its young in its claws, 

 and a teacher of zoology in a Western academy 

 wrote that he had seen a crow pick up a dead fish 

 from a pond and carry it ashore with its feet. I 

 wrote and cross-questioned the teacher a little; 

 among other things,! asked him if he had the point 

 in question in mind when he saw the crow pick 

 up the fish. As I never received an answer, I con- 

 cluded that this witness broke down on the cross- 

 examination. 



I put the question to fishermen on the river : Had 

 they ever seen a crow pick up anything from the 

 surface of the water? Oh, yes, lots of times. Did 

 he seize the object with his feet or his beak ? They 

 would pause and think, and then some would reply, 

 "Indeed, I can't say; I did not notice." One man 

 said emphatically, "With his feet;" another was 

 quite as sure it was done with the bill. 

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