160 THE FACE OF THE FIELDS 



man-things, the "winged creeping things which 

 have four feet," and which were an abomination 

 to the ancient Hebrews, but which the readers 

 of modern nature-writing do greedily devour — 

 are these the things I have seen ? And for an 

 answer he sets about a reexamination of all he 

 has written, from " Wake-Robin " to " Far and 

 Near," hoping " that the result of the discussion 

 or threshing will not be to make the reader love 

 the animals less, but rather to love the truth 

 more." 



But the result, as embodied in " Ways of Na- 

 ture" and in "Leaf and Tendril," is quite the 

 opposite, I fear; for these two volumes are more 

 scientific in tone than any of his other work; and 

 it is the mission, not of science, but of literature, 

 to quicken our love for animals, even for truth. 

 Science only adds to the truth. Yet here, in 

 spite of himself, Mr. Burroughs is more the writer, 

 more the interpreter, than the investigator. He is 

 constantly forgetting his scientific thesis, as, for 

 instance, in the account of his neighbor's errant 

 cow. He succeeds finally, however, in reducing 

 her fairly well to a mechanical piece of beef act- 

 ing to vegetable stimuli upon a nerve ganglion 



