The True Citizen, How To Become One | Page 5

most
favorable periods for the cultivation of this faculty. Not only is the
mind then more free from care, and, therefore, more at leisure to
observe, but it is also more easy to interest one's self in the common
things, which, while they lie nearest to us, make up by far the greater
portion of our lives. Experience also proves that a person is not a good
observer at the age of twenty, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred he
will never become one. "The student," says Hugh Miller, "should learn

to make a right use of his eyes; the commonest things are worth
looking at; even the stones and weeds, and the most familiar animals.
Then in early manhood he is prepared to study men and things in a way
to make success easy and sure."
Houdin, the magician, spent a month in cultivating the observing
powers of his son. Together they walked rapidly past the window of a
large toy store. Then each would write down the things that he had seen.
The boy soon became so expert that one glance at a show window
would enable him to write down the names of forty different objects.
The boy could easily outdo his father.
The power of observation in the American Indian would put many an
educated white man to shame. Returning home, an Indian discovered
that his venison, which had been hanging up to dry, had been stolen.
After careful observation he started to track the thief through the woods.
Meeting a man on the route, he asked him if he had seen a little, old,
white man, with a short gun, and with a small bob-tailed dog. The man
told him he had met such a man, but was surprised to find that the
Indian had not even seen the one he described. He asked the Indian
how he could give such a minute description of a man whom he had
never seen.
"I knew the thief was a little man," said the Indian, "because he rolled
up a stone to stand on in order to reach the venison; I knew he was an
old man by his short steps; I knew he was a white man by his turning
out his toes in walking, which an Indian never does; I knew he had a
short gun by the mark it left on the tree where he had stood it up; I
knew the dog was small by his tracks and short steps, and that he had a
bob-tail by the mark it left in the dust where he sat."
The poet Longfellow has also dwelt upon the power of observation in
the early training of Hiawatha. You will perhaps recall the lines:
"Then the little Hiawatha Learned of every bird its language, Learned
their names and all their secrets, How they built their nests in summer,
Where they hid themselves in winter, Talked with them whene'er he
met them, Called them 'Hiawatha's Chickens.'"

The most noted men of every land and age have acquired their fame by
carrying into effect ideas suggested by or obtained from observation.
The head of a large commercial firm was once asked why he employed
such an ignorant man for a buyer. He replied: "It is true that our buyer
cannot spell correctly; but when anything comes within the range of his
eyes, he sees all that there is to be seen. He buys over a million dollars'
worth a year for us, and I cannot recall any instance when he failed to
notice a defect in any line of goods or any feature that would be likely
to render them unsalable." This man's highly developed power of
observation was certainly of great value.
Careful observers become accurate thinkers. These are the men that are
needed everywhere and by everybody. By observation the scholar gets
more out of his books, the traveler more enjoyment from the beauties
of nature, and the young person who is quick to read human character
avoids companions that would be likely to lead him into the ways of
vice and folly, and perhaps cause his life to become a total wreck.
JOHN JAMES AUDUBON.
In 1828 a wonderful book, "The Birds of America," by John James
Audubon, was issued. It is a good illustration of what has been
accomplished by beginning in one's youth to use the powers of
observation. Audubon loved and studied birds. Even in his infancy,
lying under the orange trees on his father's plantation in Louisiana, he
listened to the mocking bird's song, watching and observing every
motion as it flitted from bough to bough. When he was older he began
to sketch every bird that he saw, and soon showed so much talent that
he was taken to France to be