Category: Biographies
I. A BOYHOOD IN SCOTLAND Earliest Recollections—The “Dandy Doctor” Terror—Deeds of Daring—The Savagery of Boys—School and Fighting—Birds’-nesting. II. A NEW WORLD Stories of America—Glorious News—Crossing the Atlantic—The New Home—A Baptism in Nature—New Birds—The Adventures o...
After the sawmill was proved and discharged from my mind, I happened to think it would be a fine thing to make a timekeeper which would tell the day of the week and the day of t...
5. Chapter 5Coming direct from school in Scotland while we were still hopefully ignorant and far from tame,—notwithstanding the unnatural profusion of teaching and thrashing lavished upon u...
4. Chapter 4We greatly admired the plucky kingbird. In Scotland our great ambition was to be good fighters, and we admired this quality in the handsome little chattering flycatcher that whi...
9. Chapter 9Foxes, though not uncommon, we boys held steadily to work seldom saw, and as they found plenty of prairie chickens for themselves and families, they did not often come near the...
8. Chapter 8It was a great memorable day when the first flock of passenger pigeons came to our farm, calling to mind the story we had read about them when we were at school in Scotland. Of...
6. Chapter 6The beautiful meadow lying warm in the spring sunshine, outspread between our lily-rimmed lake and the hill-slope that our shanty stood on, sent forth thirsty swarms of the litt...
11. Chapter 11The growth of these grubs was interesting to me. When an acorn or hickory-nut had sent up its first season’s sprout, a few inches long, it was burned off in the autumn grass fir...
2. Chapter 2The roof of our house, as well as the crags and walls of the old castle, offered fine mountaineering exercise. Our bedroom was lighted by a dormer window. One night I opened it...
10. Chapter 10Nature has many ways of thinning and pruning and trimming her forests,—lightning-strokes, heavy snow, and storm-winds to shatter and blow down whole trees here and there or brea...
3. Chapter 3Our amusements on Saturday afternoons and vacations depended mostly on getting away from home into the country, especially in the spring when the birds were calling loudest. Fat...
1. Chapter 1I. A BOYHOOD IN SCOTLAND Earliest Recollections—The “Dandy Doctor” Terror—Deeds of Daring—The Savagery of Boys—School and Fighting—Birds’-nesting. II. A NEW WORLD Stories of Ame...
7. Chapter 7The Wisconsin oak openings were a summer paradise for song birds, and a fine place to get acquainted with them; for the trees stood wide apart, allowing one to see the happy hom...
13. Chapter 13During the four years that I was in the University, I earned enough in the harvest-fields during the long summer vacations to carry me through the balance of each year, working...