THE AMERICAN NATURAL HISTORY. 



G. 0. SHIELDS. 



No country in the world is more gener- 

 ously blessed with native wild life than 

 North America ; and yet for a hundred 

 years past Americans have been blindly 

 wondering what are the names of even our 

 common mammals, birds, fishes, amphib- 

 ians and reptiles. Of late years, however, 

 we have been deluged with pictures of 



tion of the public, and thousands of people 

 daily visit them. They see there living or 

 mounted specimens of thousands of native 

 creatures, and in most cases these are la- 

 beled with names which, even though print- 

 ed in English, are as Greek to the average 

 visitor. A man, a woman or a child may 

 spend a whole day in a great museum of 



THE GLACIER BEAR, URSUS EMMONSI. 



COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY W. T. HOflNADAY, 



This small but well denned species inhabits the Western slopes and glaciers of the Mt. St. Elias 

 Alps. Only one specimen is to be found in a museum, and not one has ever been taken alive. The 

 specimen here shown is in the United States National Museum. 



wild animals and birds. Scores of books 

 have been published giving facts or fairy 

 stories about our wild creatures, yet no 

 single work has been placed before us giv- 

 ing concise and accurate information as to 

 the classification of our living animals, and 

 showing in common sense ways their rela- 

 tive places in the great system of nature. 

 Zoological parks and museums have been 

 provided for the entertainment and instruc- 



natural history, and then carry away only 

 a jumbled, confused mass of information, 

 which it is impossible to systematize or to 

 remember. The next time the same person 

 sees any one of these tame animals or birds, 

 he wonders which it is. If there be at 

 hand a naturalist, he inquires ; yet he can 

 not remember the name or the family or 

 the species to which it belongs. 



I have in my office mounted heads of 



205 



