If you get: A Goldfinch, floss nest; A Phoebe, moss nest; A Robin, mud nest; A Vireo, good nest; A Kingbird, rag nest; An Oriole, bag nest; you have six different kinds of beautiful nests that are easily kept for the museum, and you do no harm in taking them. TALE 74 The Ox-eye Daisy or Marguerite [Illustration: The Ox-eye Daisy or Marguerite] Do you know that "Daisy" means "day's eye," because the old country Daisy opens its eyes when day comes, and shuts them every night. But our Daisy is different and much bigger, so we have got into the way of calling it "Ox-eye." Some of our young people call it "Love-me; love-me-not," because they think it can tell if one is loved. They pull out the white rays of the flower one by one, saying, "He loves me; he loves me not; he loves me; he loves me not." Then what they are saying as the last is pulled, settles the question. If the Daisy says "He loves me," they take a second Daisy and ask the next question, "Will he marry me?" Then, pulling the rays as before, "This year, next year, some time, never." And in this way they learn all that the Daisies know about these important matters. We call it "our Daisy," but it is not a true native of America. Its home is Europe. The settlers of New England, missing the flower of their homeland, brought it over and planted it in their gardens. It spread widely in the North; but it did not reach the South until the time of the Civil War, when it is said to have gone in with the hay for Sherman's Army, to become a troublesome weed in the fields. * * * * * This scrap of history is recorded in a popular ballad. There's a story told in Georgia 'Tis in everybody's mouth, That 'twas old Tecumseh Sherman Brought the Daisy to the South. Ne'er that little blossom stranger In our land was known to be, Till he marched his blue-coat army From Atlanta to the sea. [Illustration: The Monkeys in the Tree Tops] TALE 75 A Monkey-hunt We all love to go a-hunting; every one of us in some way; and it is only the dislike of cruelty and destruction that keeps most of us from hunting animals continually, as our forebears did. Some of my best days were spent in hunting. The Arabs say, "Allah reckons not against a man's allotted span the days he spends in the chase." I hope that I may help many of you to go a-hunting, and to get the good things of it, with the bad things left out. Come! Now it is the spring of the year, and just the right time for a Monkey-hunt. We are going prowling along the brookside where we are pretty sure of finding our game. "See, there is a Monkey tree and it is full of the big Monkeys!" "What! That pussy-willow?" Yes, you think they are only pussy-willows, but wait until you see. We shall take home a band of the Monkeys, tree and all, and you will learn that a pussy-willow is only a baby Monkey half done.