£74 NATURE SKETCHES IN TEMPERATE AMERICA 



Meadow Echoes 



FTER the night's shower, what a freshness 

 comes over the uncultivated meadow! It 

 is the time of year in early July when all 

 nature is putting forward her greatest 

 efforts. The grasses and other flowering plants 

 are of sufficient growth to afford protection to the 

 young locusts and the grasshoppers now so plentiful; 

 also allowing the small garter snakes to easily escape unob- 

 served. The rasping call note of the meadow lark, constantly 

 repeated, hints of bird nesting, while every now and then 

 moths fly up disturbed at our tramping footsteps. The 

 black-eyed susans are gathered in clusters, which, viewed at 

 a distance, appear as if the ground had been splashed here and 

 there with yellow amid the verdant green. 



If one comes cautiously upon the black-eyed susan, he may 

 see a little frequenter of its blossoms, but one has to be very quiet 

 in making its acquaintance. As soon as this small striped 

 beetle is aware of danger, it takes a headlong tumble into the 

 grasses below, in this way concealing itself from its enemies. 

 I have endeavored in the illustration of the black-eyed susaa 



