Birds and All Nature, Vol. 6, No. 5, December 1899: Illustrated by Color PhotographyVarious
History
Birds and All Nature, Vol. 6, No. 5, December 1899: Illustrated by Color Photography
Various
Birds -- Periodicals; Natural history -- Periodicals
For ordinary purposes there should be little effort given to the
naming of the shades. If the colors are talked about by name, enough
is done in the line of language. But classes become readily interested
in comparing reds, and blues, or greens to say which is the deeper or
the purer. The location of a patch of color often changes its apparent
intensity. Contrast with surroundings may deceive the eye. Whistler
has used Naples yellow so the observer declares it pure white.
A good exercise in color recognition is given in choosing masses of
color on the picture and telling what primary colors are in them; also
in comparing two masses and saying which appears to have the more red
or yellow in it.
Where the class have water colors excellent practice may be had in
selecting and mixing colors to correspond with a given one. The mixing
should be first tried without placing the mixed mass beside the copy.
Very young children often make surprisingly accurate judgments of
color, and no game pleases them more than a mixing contest, having
the game decided in each instance by placing the best work beside the
original.
No pictures have inspired so many young people with a desire to copy
as have the color photographs. Their perfection of detail has not
discouraged such attempts. The more easily copied lithograph has no
such fascination. This shows that the nearer we approach nature in any
presentation the more strongly we appeal to human nature and draw out
its latent powers.
THE PILEATED WOODPECKER.
BELLE P. DRURY.
This noble bird may be found in wooded districts of Illinois, but I
made its acquaintance in the Indian Territory, where it is quite common.
In size and beauty of color it is second only to the ivory-billed.
The Choctaw Indians told me it was the "Good God" bird. I asked what
they meant by that designation. The reply was "Only listen and you will
know."
For days I spent much time watching several pairs as they flew about
among the trees on the Shawnee Hills, but the only sound I heard was
the hammering of their strong stone-colored bills on the sides of the
trees, a noise that might easily be heard a quarter of a mile away.
They did not descend to fallen logs for their prey but made the chips
and bark fly from the upright trees.
Naturalists say the pileated will occasionally leave the insect-laden
trees in search of fruit and grain, a thing the ivory-billed never does.
My beautiful, noisy companions eyed me and my opera glass suspiciously,
trying always to keep on the other side of the tree from me, and, for a
time, gave me no hint of the reason for their Indian name.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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