Part 1

THE CHILDREN’S LIBRARY

NATURAL WONDERS

THE CHILDREN’S LIBRARY

NATURAL WONDERS

EDWIN TENNEY BREWSTER

Garden City — New York

DOUBLEDAY, DORAN & COMPANY, INC.

1928

COPYRIGHT, 1912 BY DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES AT

THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y.

PREFACE

No small part of our fundamental knowledge concerning the world of nature has been put into shape for comprehension by children, time out of mind. “The Swiss Family Robinson” is half natural history, even if not always of an especially convincing kind; and science of all sorts, good and bad together, makes up no small portion of Jules Verne’s uncounted tales. “Cousin Cramchild’s Conversations,” if there had been such a book, would have embodied the Victorian idea of what every child should know about his universe; while of actual books, we elders recall at once Abbott’s “Science for the Young,” and the half dozen contributions to juvenile knowledge of John Trowbridge and “Arabella Buckley.” Even the great Ostwald, within the decade, has made a child’s book on chemistry after the old conversational form.

In school, moreover, between his geography and his nature study, the modern child becomes acquainted with not a little modern science, while in most of our states a detailed acquaintance, by no means always scientific, with his own physiology is required by law of every public school pupil. One thing with another, today’s child of eight or ten is supposed to know a little of physics and of biology, together with a good deal in a general way of earth science and the elements of human physiology.

Naturally, there are excellent texts and reading books in all these fields. So far as I am aware, however, the present work is the first attempt to set before young readers some knowledge of certain loosely related but very modern topics, commonly grouped together under the name, General Physiology. It is, in short, an attempt to lead children of eight or ten, first to ask and then to answer, the question: What have I in common with other living things, and how do I differ from them? Incidentally, in addition, I have attempted to provide a foundation on which a perplexed but serious-minded parent can himself base an answer to several puzzling questions which all children ask—most especially to that most difficult of them all: By what process of becoming did I myself finally appear in this world?

How far I have succeeded with either task, I leave to the mothers who shall read this book aloud.

E. T. B.

Andover, Massachusetts

NATURAL WONDERS

CONTENTS

Chap. I — How The Chicken Gets Inside The Egg Chap. II — Some Other Sorts of Eggs Chap. III — Little Fishes in The Brook Chap. IV — Of Plants’ Eggs Chap. V — What Little Boys And Girls Are Made Of Chap. VI — More About Living Bricks Chap. VII — How Much Of Us Is Alive Chap. VIII — How We Grow Chap. IX — How We Grow Up Chap. X — How We Grow Old Chap. XI — Why We Grow At All Chap. XII — Things That Do Not Have To Be Learned Chap. XIII — Why We Like Certain Things Chap. XIV — Animals’ Games Chap. XV — Some Instincts Of Chicks And Kittens Chap. XVI — Certain Stupidities Of Animals Chap. XVII — How We Differ From The Animals Chap. XVIII — Something More About Speech And Thinking Chap. XIX — Why Most Of Us Are Right-Handed Chap. XX — Where We Do Our Thinking Chap. XXI — Where Some Of The Animals Do Their Thinking Chap. XXII — What Plants Know Chap. XXIII — What Plants Can Do Chap. XXIV — Some Plant-Like Doings Of Animals Chap. XXV — The Five Senses And The Other Five Chap. XXVI — Eyes Chap. XXVII — Seeing And Believing Chap. XXVIII — Some Other Senses Chap. XXIX — The Sight And Hearing Of Ants Chap. XXX — Ants’ Noses Chap. XXXI — Some Other Eyes And Ears Chap. XXXII — Having Senses And Using Them Chap. XXXIII — Seeing In The Mind’s Eye Chap. XXXIV — Ear Minds And Others Chap. XXXV — Living Automobiles Chap. XXXVI — Air And Fuel Chap. XXXVII — Men In Glass Boxes Chap. XXXVIII — Of Sugar And Other Poisons Chap. XXXIX — Snake Venoms And Others Chap. XL — Of Measles And Rusty Nails Chap. XLI — The Great War Chap. XLII — More About The Great War Chap. XLIII — Living Apothecary Shops Chap. XLIV — What Becomes Of The Tadpoles Chap. XLV — Nature’s Repair Shop Chap. XLVI — Little Monsters Chap. XLVII — How The Animals Keep Their Tools Sharp Chap. XLVIII — Why The Blood Is Salt Chap. XLIX — Horses’ Fingers Chap. L — How The Elephant Got His Trunk Chap. LI — Something Nobody Understands

ILLUSTRATIONS

Frontispiece

The Robin Moth

Full Page Illustrations

How the Chicken Gets Inside the Egg

Seeds That Have Plumes and Wings