A SirARP LOOKOUT 



own neighborhood without a guide, turning 

 up to his neighbor's gate or door as un- 

 erringly as if he had the best of eyes, but 

 who would go many miles on an errand to 

 a new part of the country. He seemed to 

 carry a map of the township in the bottom 

 of his feet, a most minute and accurate sur- 

 vey. He never took the wrong road, and he 

 knew the right house when he had reached 

 it. He was a miller and fuller, and ran his 

 mill at night while his sons ran it by day. 

 He never made a mistake with his custom- 

 ers' bags or wool, knowing each man's by 

 the sense of touch. He frightened a colored 

 man whom he detected stealing, as if he had 

 seen out of the back of his head. Such 

 facts show one how delicate and sensitive a 

 man's relation to outward nature through 

 his bodily senses may become. Heighten 

 it a little more, and he could forecast the 

 weather and the seasons, and detect hidden 

 springs and minerals. A good obser\^er has 

 something of this delicacy and quickness of 

 perception. All the great poets and natural- 

 ists have it. Agassiz traces the glaciers 

 like a rastrcador ; and Darwin misses no 

 step that the slow but tireless gods of physi- 

 cal change have taken, no matter how they 



217 



