The Penn's Grove record., 1921-04-29
John Burroughs, Naturalist

Mrs. Albert f. NaylOr read an in
terestlng paper as tolIows on
John Burroughs, Naturalist
John Burroughs was born in RoX-
bury, Delaware county, New ork, on
Aprl 3, 1861. He was the dean OF ma
ture writer's in the United States.
Through a score OF books he shared
with countless readers, his lite long
intimacy with birds, bees, flowers, ana
I the whole outdoor lie. burroughs
learned 10 love nature when he drove
COWS at MS birthplace farm, among
the Catsklls, but anything like liter
ary composition was trial to him as
youth.
In 1863 he went to Washington with
a desire to enlist in the Union Army.
Instead he accepted a Government
position. 1t is related that with only
a IeW OF his poems as credentials he
walked into the Treasury Department
and asked Tor a Job. IL was agreed
that his several verses really smelled
OF the woods. They said he would be
a safe man to watch the Treasury
= vaults. He agreed to take the place.
At little desk, facing the high vault,
where he kept tabs on those who went
to handle the $50,00O,O00 stored there,
he began writing OF the birds to re-
ieve his home sickness. The results
was his first book, wake Robin.
Some years later, after work as a
Treasury clerk, and national bank
examiner had netted him some saw
ings, he bought a few acres at West
Fark on the Hudson. There among
the loaded trellises of a vineyard he
fDt1pT than the
closets with greenDacks.
There he renewed his emotional in
tercourse with nature, building real
house overlooking the Hudson river.
He said nature never discovered man
He said if man knows nature, he comes
close to knowing God. He also said to
know nature is wisdom.
Burroughs took life easy and wrote
when the spirit moved him of the Sc
crets Of mature. He never made much
of the discovery of new species and
nothing of cataloguing them, but de-
lighted in finding for himself and re-
vealing to others the charms of close
contact with the birds, bees and
flowers. 1t gave him great pleasure
to call by name countless numbers OF
the million species of birds and insects
on this old earth of ours.
He said nature is full of variety. He
was once asked to name the three
most precious resources of life. he
named book, friend and nature. He
said there are sermons in stones,
books and brooks and God in every
thing.
To know the laws of nature means
the prolongation of life.
The title of some of his books IN
clude "Winter Sunshine" "Locusts and
Wild Honey" "Fresh Fields" Birds
and Poets" Signs and Seasons" i" "Re-
Hgious Discussion from the Standpoint
of the Naturalists," and the "Waifs
of Nature"
Burrough said the best and most
hopeful feature in any people is un-
doubtedly the instinct that leads them
of the country, to take root there, and
not that which sends them to the cities
and it's distractions. The lighter the
snow, the more it drifts, and the more
frivolous the people, the more they
are blown by one wind OF another INTO
town and cities.
Speaking of birds, Burrough said, II
all birds were killed, insects would
flourish for a short time, or until they
had eaten up all vegetables. Mean
time the animals would have been
starving and would soon disappear.
Man with neither vegetables nor AMI
NAL food left would die.
Riverby and Slabsides, Burroughs
retreats on the Hudson, became the
shrines for his many admirers. He
died March 20, 1921, on passenger
train near Kingston, O., and was
buried April Sd, high in the Catsklll
Mountains at RoXbury, NY.
Some of His Sayings
Beautiful things do not just happen.
They are always productive of growth.
They are oftimes of struggle.
A face is beautiful only as it reflects
a beautiful heart.
A character is beautiful only as it
rises toward beautiful things.
On his seventy-fifth birthday he
said: Growing old is a kind of let
ting go. The morning has its delights
and its enticements. The noon has its
triumphs and satisfactions, but there
are charm and spiritual uplift about
the close of the day that belongs to
neither.
The paper read by Mrs. w. A. Sum
merrill was as follows on
Moths
The life cycle of most moths is one
year. The eggs are laid by the moths
in the splingtime, usually in May and
June, when there is plenty of green
leaves for food. From the eggs which
number from two to sixty the tiny
caterpillar matches out in about thir-
teen to fourteen days. Some species
take a little longer. The first thing
they eat is their eggshells, then they
begin upon the leaves of trees. The
cecropia prefer hickory and wild
cherry leaves. The heitheronia rega-
lis prefer1ing the leaves of the walnut
tree.
About the fifth day they shed their
skin and change color again. They
first appear yellow or black. After