JOHN BURROUGHS 145 



no saner, happier criticism anywhere than in his 

 "Literary Values." There are many other excellent 

 critics, however, many poets and religious writers, 

 many other excellent nature- writers, too; but is 

 there any other who has written so much upon 

 the ways of nature as they parallel and cross the 

 ways of men, upon so great a variety of nature's 

 forms and expressions, and done it with such 

 abiding love, with such truth and charm ? 



Yet such a comparison is beyond proof, ex- 

 cept in the least of the literary values mere 

 quantity; and it may be with literature as with 

 merchandise : the larger the cask the greater the 

 tare. Charm? Is not charm that which /chance 

 to like, or you chance to like ? Others have writ- 

 ten of nature with as much love and truth as has 

 Mr. Burroughs, and each with his own peculiar 

 charm : Audubon, with the spell of wild places 

 and the thrill of fresh wonder; Traherne, with 

 the ecstasy of the religious mystic; Gilbert White, 

 with the sweetness of the evening and the morn- 

 ing; Thoreau, with the heat of noonday; Jef- 

 feries, with just a touch of twilight shadowing 

 all his pages. We want them severally as they 

 are ; Mr. Burroughs as he is, neither wandering 



