Excerpt from Animal Life in Field and Garden N these talks that we shall have together, said Uncle Paul, as he sat with his nephews one eve ning in May under the big elder tree in the garden, I propose to designate as 'friends' those forms of animal life that, though not domesticated or cared for by us, nevertheless come to our aid by waging war on insects and various other devouring creatures which would in the end, unless their excessive multi plication were kept in restraint by others besides ourselves, eat up all our crops and lay waste our fields; and it is these ravagers Of the farmer's care fully tilled acres that I shall speak of as 'foes.' What can man's efforts avail against those voracious hordes, multiplying as they do every year to an extent beyond calculation? Will he have the patience, the Skill, the keenness of vision necessary for waging successful warfare on the tiniest Species, Often the most formidable, when the J une-bug, despite its far greater Size, baffles all his endeavors? About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.