THE 
CANADIAN NATURALIST. 
I. 
JANUARY 1st. 
Pleasures of Natural History. — Plan of investigation.— Aerial Spiculae. 
— Expansive power of Frost in Trees. — Opacity of Snow — Blue Tint. 
— Hairy Woodpecker — Food, Manners, Services. — Other Species of 
Picus — their Conformation. — Black- timbered Land. — White Pine. — - 
Spruce. — Hairy Lichen. — Hemlock. — Balsam — its height. — Tamarack. 
— Strobiles. — White Cedar — Rails. — Variety in Forms of Trees — In- 
stances : Rock Maple — Beech — Bass wood — Elm — Ash — Butternut- — 
Birch — Cherry — Poplar — Balm of Gilead. — Variety in all created 
Objects. 
Father. — My son^ you have begun to taste the delights 
of the study of Nature^ and have found it a pleasant and 
a flowery path to pursue ; but as your time since the age 
of understanding has been spent in England^ your personal 
acquaintance with our natural history must of necessity be 
slight and limited. I mean your out-of-door researches ; 
which have been confined to the desultory observations 
you have made during the few months that have elapsed 
since your arrival in this country. An attentive eye^ it is 
true;, cannot fail to acquire information, ever new, among 
the countless objects of creation, at all times, and under all 
circumstances ; but the more fully to avail ourselves of our 
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