224 FOOTING IT IN FRANCONIA 



But I am glad of the picture of tlie bird that 

 I have in my mind. 



Enthusiasm is a good painter ; it is not 

 afraid of high lights, and it deals in fast 

 colors. And to us old Franconians, enthu- 

 siasm seems to be one of the institutions, 

 one of the native growths, one of the special 

 delectabilities, if you please, of that delect- 

 able valley. The valley of cinnamon roses, 

 we have before now called it ; the vaUey of 

 strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries ; 

 the vaUey of bobolinks and swallows; but 

 best of aU, perhaps, it is the vaUey of hob- 

 byists. Its atmosphere is heady. We all 

 feel it. The world is far away. Worldly 

 successes, yea, dollars and cents themselves, 

 are nothing, and less than nothing, and van- 

 ity. A new flower, a new bird, the hundi'ed 

 and fiftieth spider, these are the things that 

 count. We are like members of a conven- 

 ticle, or like the logs on the hearth. Our 

 inward fires are mutually communicative and 

 sustaining. We laugh now and then, it may 

 be, at one another's peculiarities. Each of 

 us can see, at certam moments, that the 

 other is " a little off," to use a " Francony " 



