HP 



INTEODUCTION 



HE father of the school of modem 

 I nature-study was Gilbert White of 

 ■^ Selbome. The classic volume which 

 he has left exerted a strong influence, either 

 direct or indirect, on the men who have inter- 

 preted nature for us in the last hundred 

 years, such men as Thoreau, Burroughs and 

 Muir. To write like Gilbert White one must 

 combine a keen scientific interest for detail 

 with a sensitive and loving eye for natural 

 phenomena. Happy the region which has for 

 its biographer a man who sees the familiar 

 fields with the curiosity of a scientist, the 

 sensitiveness of an artist, and the fidelity of 

 a lover. 



Thoreau travelled widely in Concord and 

 has left an imperishable record of a few 

 square miles. In themselves the woods about 

 Walden and the meadows along the Assabet 

 have no unusual charm, but, in Thoreau 's 

 pages, they have become to his readers more 

 familiar and more dear than many of the 

 great wonders of the world. 



