most of all he wished to know about birds. Seeing that the boy liked
such things, his father took pains to get birds and flowers for him.

While he was yet a boy at school, he began to gather birds and other
animals for himself. He learned to skin and stuff them. But his
stuffed birds did not please him. Their feathers did not look bright,
like those of live birds. He wanted living birds to study.

His father told him that he could not keep so many birds alive. To
please the boy he got him a book with pictures in it. Looking at these
pictures made John James wish to draw. He thought that he could make
pictures that would look like the live birds.

But when he tried to paint a picture of a bird, it looked worse than
his stuffed birds. The birds he drew were not much like real birds. He
called them a "family of cripples." As often as his birthday came
round, he made a bon-fire of his bad pictures. Then he would begin
over again.

All this time he was learning to draw birds. But he was not willing to
make pictures that were not just like the real birds. So when he grew
to be a man he went to a great French painter whose name was David.
David taught him to draw and paint things as they are.

Then he came back to this country, and lived awhile in Pennsylvania.
Here his chief study was the wild creatures of the woods.

He gathered many eggs of birds. He made pictures of these eggs. He did
not take birds' eggs to break up the nests. He was not cruel. He took
only what he needed to study.

He would make two little holes in each egg. Then he would shake the
egg, or stir it up with a little stick or straw, or a long pin. This
would break up the inside of the egg. Then he would blow into one of
the holes. That would blow the inside of the egg out through the
other hole.

These egg shells he strung together by running strings through the
holes. He hung these strings of egg shells all over the walls of his
room. On the man-tel-piece he put the stuffed skins of squirrels,
raccoons, o-pos-sums, and other small animals. On the shelves his
friends could see frogs, snakes, and other animals.

He married a young lady, and brought her to live in this mu-se-um with
his dead snakes, frogs, and strings of birds' eggs. She liked what he
did, and was sure that he would come to be a great man.

He made up his mind to write a great book about American birds. He
meant to tell all about the birds in one book. Then in another book he
wo