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DHE AUDUBON < BU TT Berea 
animals were compared; and if the bird’s temperature was talked abéut, 
even though the child’s questions were incompletely answered, it seems 
reasonable to suppose that the child or children would have a continued 
interest. 
Why is a boy often cruel to birds? May it not be because birds have 
been accepted as part of the landscape—something that no more interest 
has been shown in than in a stone, or a stick or a fence by those about 
him, and he has had no feeling aroused in him for them. 
True stories about birds and their relation to man would awaken a 
real interest, stories about real people and real birds such as are told in 
the AUDUBON BULLETIN. 
Even little people like to think about such questions as these: 
Why do not a bird’s feathers wet easily in the rain? 
How and where do birds sleep at night? 
Why do they not fall off their perches when asleep? 
Does a robin see or hear a worm? 
Why do birds go South in autumn? 
What do birds eat in winter time? 
They love bird poems, especially where a refrain is repeated in imita- 
tion of a bird song, as “‘The Bluebird,” and ‘‘ Robert of Lincoln.” 
At first little people’s eyes will see strange and wonderful sights where 
birds are concerned. But day by day intelligent and sympathetic direc- 
tion will bring enthusiastic responses and one day the reward will be an 
independent and lasting interest. 
FE. CLAIRE KENNEDY, 
Elm Place School, Highland Park, Ill. 
Spring Notes at *‘Larchmound’”’ 
E are having a peculiar spring February, March and April were 
abnormally warm and April would have been the warmest on 
record had not the last two or three days been cold reducing the 
mean temperature to 61.8°. The cold has continued since then, and the 
last two nights there has been a light frost, but not enough to hurt any- 
thing. 
Notwithstanding the cool weather of the past eight or ten days the 
spring was early. Red and silver maples were in bloom February 22; the 
apricot on March 22; Magnolia Soulangeana, March 24; Bridal-wreath 
Spirea, March 25; pears (Kieffer), March 29; peach, April 1; cherry, 
April 4; apple orchards in fullest bloom April 12; flowering dogwood, 
April 14; the Chinese Shrub (Kolckwiczia amabilis) between the two 
Deutzia gracilis, which you photographed last spring, bloomed April 23 
and is still in magnificent bloom, the two Deutzias flowering at the same 
time. The first garden rose to open was the “baby rambler”’ “Tip-top,” 
