LEAF AND TENDRIL 



how destructive these birds are in the vineyard, 

 and we are on the lookout for them; our eyes 

 and ears are ready for them." 



If we think birds, we shall see birds wherever we 

 go; if we think arrowheads, as Thoreau did, we 

 shall pick up arrowheads in every field. Some 

 people have an eye for four-leaved clovers; they 

 see them as they walk hastily over the turf, for they 

 already have them in their eyes. I once took a 

 walk with the late Professor Eaton of Yale. He 

 was just then specially interested in the mosses, 

 and he found them, all kinds, everywhere. I can 

 see him yet, every few minutes upon his knees, 

 adjusting his eye-glasses before some rare specimen. 

 The beauty he found in them, and pointed out to 

 me, kindled my enthusiasm also. I once spent a 

 summer day at the mountain home of a well-known 

 literary woman and editor. She lamented the ab- 

 sence of birds about her house. I named a half- 

 dozen or more I had heard or seen in her trees 

 within an hour — the indigo-bird, the purple 

 finch, the yellowbird, the veery thrush, the red- 

 eyed vireo, the song sparrow. 



"Do you mean to say you have seen or heard 

 all these birds while sitting here on my porch?" 

 she inquired. 



"I really have," I said. 



"I do not see them or hear them," she replied, 

 " and yet I want to very much." 

 22 



