Such a lesson might involve exposure to cold,
but we were hardy and no one was harmed either at the moment or
afterward by a little touch of temperature down toward the frost line.
Trees and plants were studied in the woods and fields. The botany class
made excursions, gathering specimens of the flora on the Farm and in the
neighborhood, with peripatetic lectures by the way. Instruction in
geology was given on the rocks, hammer in hand. Birds and the animal
life of the locality we became acquainted with at close quarters. They
were tame and friendly, being protected, cared for and never disturbed,
and we learned their ways habits and characteristics by intimate
association. Kindness to animals was taught and practiced first, last
and all the time, and every living creature from the ox at the plow to
the swallow building in the sandbank was gentle and not afraid.
The only cruel thing we ever did was to cut down through the middle of
an ant's nest in the pine woods. Our Natural History Club, of which both
old folk and young folk were members, made quite a thorough study of
ants, at one time, and, for the purpose of illustrating a lesson, John
Cheever drove a spade through the center of a nest and shoveled away,
one half of it.
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