AN EGOTISTICAL CHAPTER 15 



and only what I feel. If I had run after the birds 

 only to write about them, I never should have writ- 

 ten anything that any one would have cared to read. 

 I must write from sympathy and love, or not at 

 all: I have in no sort of measure the gift of the 

 ready writer who can turn his pen to all sorts of 

 themes ; or the dramatic, creative gift of the great 

 poets, which enables them to get out of themselves 

 and to present vividly and powerfully things entirely 

 beyond the circle of their own lives and experiences. 

 I go to the woods to enjoy myself, and not to report 

 them ; and if I succeed, the expedition may by 

 and by bear fruit at my pen. When a writer of 

 my limited range begins to " make believe," or to 

 go outside of his experience, he betrays himself at 

 once. My success, such as it is, has been in put- 

 ting my own personal feelings and attractions into 

 subjects of universal interest. I have loved Nature 

 no more than thousands upon thousands of others 

 have, but my aim has been not to tell that love to 

 my reader, but to tell it to the trees and the birds 

 and to let them tell him. I think we all like this 

 indirect way the best. It will not do in literature 

 to compliment Nature and make love to her by 

 open profession and declaration : you must show 

 your love by your deeds or your spirit, and by the 

 sincerity of your service to her. 



For my part, I never can interview Nature in the 

 reporter fashion : I must camp and tramp with her 



