Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 November 1898 — AN OLD CROWS TREASURES. [ARTICLE]

AN OLD CROWS TREASURES.

Like a Miser He Hoarded and Gloated Over Tliein. One day while watching I saw a crow crossing the Don valley with something white in his beak, writes Ernest Seton Thompson in Scribner’s. He flew to the mouth of the Bosedale brook, then took a short flight to the Beaver elm. There he dropped the white object, and, looking about, gave me a chance to recognize my old friend Silverspot. After a minute he picked up the w hite thing, a shell —and walked over past the spring, and here, among the docks and the skunk cabbages, he unearthed a pile of shells and other white, shiny things. Ha spread them out in the sun, turned them over, lifted them one by one, nestled on them as though they were eggs, toyed with them and gloated over them like a miser. This was his hobby, his weakness. He could hot have explained why he enjoyed them, any more than a boy can explain why he collects postage stamps, or a girl why she prefers pearls to rubies; but his pleasure in them was very real, and after half an hour he covered them all, including the new one, with earth and leaves, and flew off. I went at once to the spot and examined the hoard; there was about a hatful in all, chiefly white pebbles, clam shells and some bits of tin, but there wps also the handle of a china cup, which must have been the gem of the collection. 'That w r as the last time I saw them. Silverspot knew that I had found his treasures, and he removed them at once; where, I never knew*.