Excerpt from Life in Ponds and Streams
To a lover of Nature, all forms of life are interesting. But so numerous and varied are those forms that few students are able to give much time to the pursuit of more than one or two branches of Natural History. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that most young naturalists devote their energies to the study of the more conspicuous and attractive creatures of Earth. Thus it comes to pass that a certain few of the orders of Insects have quite an army of enthusiastic students, that the beautifully marked and exquisitely formed shells of our marine Molluscs are eagerly sought after, and that our feathered friends and their eggs are well known and prized by many lovers of wild country life while the study of the varied living forms inhabiting ponds and streams, most of which are not to be obtained without more or less careful searching for them in their haunts, has but comparatively few devotees.
But there is no reason whatever why the study of fresh water life should not be quite as fascinating and instructive to even the youngest naturalist as that of the more popular branches we have specified above, and the chief reason why the weedy pond and the winding stream are so generally neglected is probably that our young naturalists have not had their attention sufficiently directed to the world of interest that awaits them if they will pursue their investiga tions of aquatic life with the same ardour that the collecting of butterflies or birds' eggs generally excites.
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