PREFACE. 



TN order to give more unity to these pages, it was 

 ■*• decided, after some hesitation, to introduce one 

 or two fictitious personages and an element of human 

 interest. Whatever Nature may be from the strictly 

 scientific point of view, it is interesting to the artist 

 (whether literary or pictorial) mainly as it is related, 

 in ways more or less mysterious, to the world of feeling 

 which lies hidden within our own breasts. Therefore, 

 although a man of science might have written about the 

 forest without reference to human sorrows or satisfac- 

 tions, an artist could not do so except at the risk of 

 sacrificing his most effective forces, those which have 

 influence by means of sympathy and association. The 

 principal personage of the narrative was in some degree 

 suggested by the ' Obermann ' of De Senancour, a crea- 

 tion which has been, if not precisely popular, certainly 

 very influential amongst the more sensitive and studious 

 minds of Continental Europe during the earlier part of 



