THE NATURE PHOTOGRAPHERS 



4'3 



not show the cat or the dog in an action 

 natural to cat or dog". Nature means 

 nothing- to any one until that person sees 

 himself throughout the realms of nature. 

 Therein is just the trouble why mure peo- 

 ple do not appreciate nature. They look 

 upon it as something apart from them- 

 selves. The moment one can see nature 

 with spiritual uplift, see in it improve- 

 ment of mind and heart, there is the art 

 of making nature real and valuable. 

 A photograph of a cat or a dog on a 



world or even in your town, yet you send 

 a picture of your pet to a magazine 

 and wonder why the editor is not enrap- 

 tured, and why lie is so calm when he 

 looks at the picture that means so much 

 to you. The explanation is that you have 

 put no story in your work. It contains 

 no human interest. If you had been 

 seated at the dinner table, and the cat 

 were standing with one paw on your 

 knee, while she looked in your face with 

 her head thrown back, and a paw held up 



ENJOYMENT. 



doorstep will excite no exhilarating 

 thought in any one except perhaps in the 

 owner of the pet, who may have an affec- 

 tion for the animal. It will connote no 

 such feeling in the breast of any one 

 else. It says nothing. It means nothing". 

 It is only a strange cat on a strange door- 

 step. It is not my cat. It is not the step 

 before my door. It is nothing but ink 

 and paper. It may mean something to 

 the photographer. But a picture that is 

 replete with suggestions and pleasing 

 recollections to him may be absolutely 

 meaningless to every one else. Your cat or 

 your dog is not loved by everybody in the 



toward you, and you looked down toward 

 her with your napkin in your hand, then, 

 maybe — but you have given us only a cat 

 on a stone. You photograph a road near 

 your home or near a schoolhouse where 

 you were a pupil years ago and that pho- 

 tograph seems to you the most marvelous 

 picture in all the world because it is full 

 of yourself. You send it to the editor 

 and he sees nothing in it. It is just an 

 ordinary road. It is not the editor's 

 schoolhouse. But the schoolhouse could 

 be made interesting. You could have 

 told a schoolhouse story that would have 

 brought tears to the eyes of the editor. 



