But the greatest book about birds--the wonder of the bird and his relations to the whole animal world--is very properly called "The Bird," by C. William Beebe, who is at the head of the bird department of the great New York Zoo. Among other things it tells: How Nature practised drawing--so to speak--for years before she could finally make a proper bird. (If you have ever tried to draw a bird from memory and realized what a bad job you made out of it, you will sympathize with her.) How they know that the earliest birds Nature made, as well as being very homely, weren't at all smart; not to be mentioned in the same breath with clever Jim Crow, for example. How "a bird's swaddling clothes and his first full-dress are cut from the same piece," the very words of the book. About certain birds that have one set of wings to play in and a new set for flying, like a child wearing jumpers to save his nice clothes! About the world of interesting things you can discover with the bones of a boiled chicken. And so on for nearly five hundred pages, and as many illustrations; the most striking collection of pictures explaining birds that I ever saw. [Illustration: THE END OF A BUSY SEASON "And there's the corn and the pumpkins and the carrots and the turnips and the potatoes in the root cellar and the jelly in the jelly-glasses--we helped make them all."] CHAPTER X (OCTOBER) It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the tip of a root acts like the brain of the lower animals. --_Darwin._ THE BUSY FINGERS OF THE ROOTS This has been a very busy season for Mr. Root and his family. It always is, and you can imagine they're all glad when Fall comes and they can lay by for the Winter. "There's your apple crop, I helped make that," Mr. Root might say. "And there's the corn and the wheat in the granary, and the rye and the oats and the barley; and the hay in the mow; and the pumpkins and the carrots, and the turnips, and the potatoes in the root cellar; and the jelly in the jelly-glasses, and the jam, and the preserves--we helped make them all. "And we've been working for you almost since the world began; almost, but not quite--for the earliest plants, the Lichens, for example--didn't have true roots. "Yes, and--well, I don't want to say anything--Mr. Lichen has been a good neighbor--but he never did amount to much; never could. No plant can amount to much without roots. But with roots and a good start a plant can do almost anything--raise flowers and fruit and nuts, and help grow trees so tall you can hardly see the tops of them. And, it isn't alone what we do for the plants we belong to, but for the soil, for other plants and roots that come after we're dead and gone. For them we even split up rocks, and so start these rocks on their way to becoming soil." I. ALL IN THE DAY'S WORK