INTRODUCTION. 



Our name, "Wild Scenes and Wild Hunters," must 

 tell for itself, in a great measure, for surely it has abundant 

 significance of its own. " Wild Scenes and Wild Hunters of 

 the World" certainly seems a rather comprehensive title for 

 Buch space as we have here. 



It is to be remembered, however, that all things are 

 comparative ; and that as I had to begin somewhere, it had 

 as well have been with taking the Flood for granted, in our 

 "Wild Scenes," — and accepting Nebuchadnezzar as having 

 "gone to grass," among our "Wild Hunters !" This being 

 acknowledged, I may be permitted to say, that, I have chosen 

 rather to look upon the Wild Scenes and Wild Hunters of the 

 World from the starting-point of my own life, and within the 

 sphere of my own and cotemporary experience. 



Beginning with the dawn of sensation in the infant, I have 

 endeavored to trace the passions of the Hunter-Naturalist, 

 through their gradual development, up to the stern and 

 strong individualities of such men as Audubon, Wilson, 

 Boone, etc. 



The portraits I have given of these men on wood, may 

 be relied upon as accurate ; while in my verbal sketches — 

 especially in that of the illustrious Audubon, — I have endea- 

 vored to present the Hunter-Naturalist in plain, unvarnished 

 *^ guise, amidst Wild Scenes of the Primitive Nature he lived 



^ in and so loved. 



J^l^ The beautiful, the grotesque, the perilous and strange 



