FIRESIDE MEMORIES. 



J. H. MACK AY, M. D. 



I have just laid away the latest copy of 

 Recreation, and the stories I have been 

 reading in it have set my mind wandering 

 backward. As I sit here by my winter fire- 

 side, puffing my cigar and looking about the 

 room, my eyes light on a case of mounted 

 birds that I have collected in the marshes 

 and along the rivers hereabout. 



As the winter wind howls without ; as 

 the snow banks up on the lee side of the 

 house; as the little pellets of sleet patter 

 on the window panes, marring the fantas- 

 tic frost pictures that Jack had already 

 painted there, my imagination follows the 

 flight of many another bird I saw on the 

 marsh when collecting these, and that I did 

 not disturb, I wanted only certain species, 

 more especially game birds, with a few of 

 their neighbors. 



There were hundreds, yes thousands of 

 birds; and if I had been as eager to 

 shed blood and as thoughtless and reckless 



bird when the gun cracks ; to see the limp 

 and mangled body fall to the ground ; to 

 rush out, gather in the bird and chuckle 

 over its untimely taking off. 



Why can not all men and all boys realize 

 that a bird is only valuable while it lives; 

 that when dead its beauty fades and its in- 



THE BEAUTIFUL WOOD DUCK WITH PLUMAGE RIVALING THAT OF THE PEACOCK. 



in my love of slaughter as many men are, 

 I could have killed hundreds of them dur- 

 ing the hours I sat within my blind, or 

 tramped about the sloughs and along the 

 river. 



It is a strange quality of mind which so 

 many men and boys possess, inherited per- 

 haps, from our savage ancestors, and which 

 so many of us have not attempted to curb 

 or refine in any way. I might almost say 

 that the average man or the average boy 

 values a bird only when it is dead ; that 

 he considers it a misfortune that so many 

 birds or animals should escape the hails 

 of lead sent after them. Not that these 

 men or boys need these wild creatures. 

 That is a small part of the impulse to kill ; 

 but these thoughtless, reckless men think 

 it great fun to see the feathers fly from a 



terest to the world at large ceases? Why 

 do we not all learn to hunt with a camera 

 instead of a gun? Why do we not learn 

 to find satisfaction in the study of the 

 habits of the birds? To admire the grace, 

 the beauty, the swiftness of the bird in 

 flight? 



Birds rarely fly far at any one time if let 

 alone. If you flush one, or a dozen, or a 

 hundred of them, they are likely to circle 

 about you, perhaps to move away ioo, 200, 

 or 500 yards, and settle down again within 

 sight and within easy walking distance. 

 Why not observe their movements as they 

 go? Why not follow them, crawl in 

 behind a clump of willows or a sand hill, 

 a tree or a rock, and see what they do in 

 their new quarters ? 



If you will try a day of this kind 



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