There are times when I wish that I had a proper scientific education. For instance, I would like to know just now whether turkey gobblers ever suffer from speaker's sore throat. None of the bulletins I have on hand throws any light on the matter. It would cheer me considerably to learn that gobblers occasionally suffer from aphonia or speechlessness. It sometimes seems to me that our bubblyjock is getting hoarse, though he is still able to gobble with vigour and authority. But unless he loses his voice before long I shall have to wring his neck—no easy job—or do without my usual amount of sleep. The trouble is all due to the fact that when the turkey hen tried to hide her nest she selected a bunch of long grass at the foot of a tree not far from the house. As she had been put off the cluck a couple of times to make her lay the proper amount of eggs it was decided to let her keep this nest. When she finally got broody she was given seventeen eggs and allowed to settle down to the task of incubating Christmas dinners. As far as she was concerned this was all right, for she is a modest, quiet bird, whose presence would never be noticed. But this is not the case with her lordly spouse. Every morning at about a quarter to four he comes down from his perch on the ridge-pole of the stable and struts down to see if his lady has passed a comfortable night. As the grass is long and wet with dew he comes to the lawn and sends her his morning greetings, and I can tell you that a forty-pound gobbler can let out a very considerable amount of noise. He gets right under my window and explodes into assorted sounds. Once a minute, or oftener, he lets out a gobble, until I get up and throw a shoe or a hairbrush at him. Then I go back to bed and try to sleep until it is time to get up. If there is any way of treating his vocal cords so as to stop this morning charivari I wish some scientist would write and tell me about it. And, by the way, I can give him a little interesting information in return. After she was given her eggs the turkey hen evidently became dissatisfied with her nest and moved to a new location about four feet away. In order to do this she had to move her eggs through the long grass, but she didn't leave one behind. How did she manage it?

There is an interesting fact about turkeys that I think I have referred to before, but as it has a political application at the present time I am going to refer to it again. When the wilderness was conquered by the pioneers the turkeys were the only important wild creatures that were conquered with it. Apparently they believed in "peace at any price." While the timid deer fled to more remote districts, and the wolves "died in silence, biting hard," the turkeys allowed themselves to be deported to the farmyards, and proceeded to eat from the hands of their conquerors. But their spineless policy did them no good. Although they are fed and pampered they have lost their wild freedom and every year they are fattened for the tables of their masters. Those who believe in peace at any price would do well to meditate on this. The peace that is won at the price of submission is not worth having. Even though we may hate war and regard it as a criminal folly, the only way to end it and to secure a peace worth while is to fight heroically to put an end to war. Before dismissing this analogy it is worth noting that the turkeys are not the only wild creatures that survived the conquest of the wilderness. The vermin, the skunks, and weasels also survived, but they are not respected. There is probably a moral attached to this also, for those who will take the trouble to study it out.