HARTLAND VERMONT 
11 
that had as its keynote originality. It soon became evident that, 
to make our work comprehensive, we should establish depart¬ 
ments, each under the leadership of Editor and sub-editors, for 
the study of Astronomy, Animals, Birds, Insects, Plants, Miner¬ 
als, Microscopy, and that we should put out a yearly bulletin to 
record observations in these departments. 
The desire of the club to share its work with others led to 
the yearly banquet, at which members and friends not only pre¬ 
pared and provided the food, decorated the hall and put up the 
exhibits, but also gave outsiders the opportunity, under attrac¬ 
tive conditions, to hear speakers and the reading of the bulletin. 
The custom of holding banquets continued until 1915. It 
was then thought best to hold the annual meeting in August 
when weather conditions and many summer friends combined 
for its success, with a picnic dinner, a roll-call to which each 
member responded with a fitting observation, and an exhibit 
with a special speaker when possible. 
As the years went on the club spent more time in the open 
and felt the importance of knowing thoroughly the natural 
history of specific places and of studying one phase of a subject. 
For example, it studied, in 1921, “Bogs, with ecological observa¬ 
tions”. This type of work is broader and in some ways better 
than our former more casual method. It was adopted partly 
because members had, under war conditions, less leisure to do 
original work and to write papers. The war suspended the Club’s 
work entirely for one year and interfered with it seriously for 
three. Our experience has emphasized the fact that “country 
leisure” which includes long winter evenings with good books, 
plenty of specimens collected throughout the year, walks and 
talks with congenial friends and absence of pressing financial 
matters, are important factors in the success of a nature club. 
It has also been shown that a few good students, who look 
upon their investigations as a component part of a life-time’s 
work, are necessary to hold an organization of this kind together. 
The assignment of definite subjects for study has produced 
good results. Individuals have been given subjects such as 
plant families—ferns, grasses, orchids, violets, etc.; bird fam¬ 
ilies—sparrows, warblers, etc.; how to recognize common moths 
and butterflies; injurious insects, etc. In studying the last sub¬ 
ject we had the help of Phineas P. Whiting, who bred flies, 
wasps, and animals to prove certain laws of genetics. Special 
interests of members are, of course, consulted. For instance, 
