22 A SHARP LOOKOUT. 



that a viper will lie stock still if touched by a 

 beechen leaf ; that a wild bull grows tame if bound 

 with the twigs of a fig-tree ; that a hen purifies her- 

 self with straw after she has laid an egg ; that the 

 deer buries his cast-off horns ; that a goat stops the 

 whole herd by holding a branch of the sea-holly in 

 his mouth, etc. They sought to account for such 

 things without stopping to ask, Are they true ? Na- 

 ture was too novel, or else too fearful to them to 

 be deliberately pursued and hunted down. Their 

 youthful joy in her, or their dread and awe in her 

 presence, may be better than our scientific satisfac- 

 tion, or cool wonder, or our vague, mysterious sense 

 of " something far more deeply interfused/' yet we 

 cannot change with them if we would, and I, for one, 

 would not if I could. Science does not mar nature. 

 The railroad, Thoreau -found, after all, to be about 

 the wildest road he knew of, and the telegraph wires 

 the best seolian harp out of doors. Study of nature 

 deepens the mystery and the charm because it re- 

 moves the horizon farther off. We cease to fear, 

 perhaps, but how can one cease to marvel and to 

 love ? 



The fields and woods and waters about one are a ; 

 book from which he may draw exhaustless entertain-' 

 ment, if he would. One must not only learn the writ- 

 ing, he must translate the language, the signs, and 

 the hieroglyphics. It is a very quaint and elliptical 

 writing, and much must be supplied by the wit of the 

 translator. At any rate, the lesson is to be well 



