My Boyhood , page 89 by John Burroughs
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life there at Riverby from a new angle, as one must often do, get a short distance away to get a clear perspective of a place. And it being my first time away from home Father wrote more frequently, and he dropped the formality of his earlier letters.
West Park, N. Y., Oct. 11. [1897.]
MY DEAR JULIAN,
Your letter was here Monday morning. I am sorry you did not send some message to your mother in it. You know how quick she is to take offence. Why not hereafter address your letters to us both--thus "Dear Father and Mother." But write to her alone next time. How about that course in Geology given by Shaler? I thought you were going to take that? I had rather you take that than any course in English Composition. Read Ruskin's "Modern Painters" when you get a chance. Read Emerson's "English Traits" and his "Representative Men."
Send me some of the pictures you took at Slabsides of the Suter girls and any others that would interest me.
I go to-day to the Harrimans at Arden for two or three days. On Saturday last I had 25 Vassar girls at SS and expect more this Saturday. Lown said Black Creek was full of ducks on Sunday--I see but few on the river. Give my love to the Suter girls.... Much fog here lately.
Your affectionate father, J. B.
Ducks in Black Creek--it was tantalizing to read that! It brought back the memories of the days Father and I hunted them there--I shall never forget how impressed he was by one duck, so impressed that he spoke of it at length in an article he wrote--"The Wit of a Duck." He was paddling me up the sun-lit reaches of the Shataca on Black Creek when suddenly two dusky mallards or black ducks tore out of the willow herb and dodder and came like the wind over our heads. I was using a high- powered duck gun, and brought down both ducks, one, however, with a broken wing. The duck came tumbling down and with a fine splash struck the water, where for a moment it shone and glistened in the sun. And that was all, the duck was gone instantly, w