546 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



out of the voice of the wilderness have 

 spoken the prophets that have swayed 

 mankind. 



We go into the forest to think; to 

 observe the ways of the wild things; to 

 sweeten our souls with the contempla- 

 tion of scenes of natural beauty not 

 to worry and fret and use up our time 

 in contending for the right to live. 

 And, to put this necessity under our 

 feet requires knowledge, power, skill, 

 judgment, the first requisites of a 

 woodsman. 



Everything nature requires of you, 

 personally, is somehow learnt with a far 

 greater zest than any lesson taught you 

 in preparation for the battle of civilized 

 life. 



How old must a boy be to start his 

 lessons in the school of the woods? 

 Well, I know many of seventy, and not 

 a few of seven years ; the former pathetic 

 in their unconscious regret for all those 

 years that have gone forever, when 

 now, at the evening of life, they are 

 learning the lessons, so long neglected. 

 I hear the wail, again and again,. from 

 these grey-beards "too old!" "What, I 

 go canoeing down a wilderness river? 

 I camp out in the mountains with rod 

 or rifle ? I hit a flying quail with a shot- 

 gun? alas! young man, my shooting 

 days are over; in fact, they never 

 began!" 



How absurd! What of John Bur- 

 roughs, and Dan Beard and John Muir, 

 that grand old man of the forest lately 

 gone from amongst us in the prime of a 

 hale old age. I will tell you a miracle, 

 one of the secrets of the forest; the 

 man who attends her school grows 

 young actually and physically, year 

 by year, younger! With most of us 

 age is not a matter of years but of wear 

 and tear. The ravages of civilization 

 are hard to repair and never can be 

 eradicated; but I have seen young men 

 of twenty-eight who looked forty-five, 

 and in four years of assiduous attendance 

 upon the school of nature put on the 

 physical trim of forty, and in another 

 two years actually catch up with their 

 own age in years and come out, at 

 thirty-four, actually thirty-four in phys- 

 ical body. And what of the mind, 

 meanwhile? Broadened, sweetened, in- 

 creased fourfold in vigor, cleansed of 



pessimism, of the little cantankerous 

 affections of the temper that had been 

 slowly eating away the soul all this 

 and more, those four years as really 

 earnest devotees of the outdoors ! 



Another wail: "I am too old to 

 learn now." One that we hear on 

 every hand. He doesn't know where to 

 begin; nature-books put him to sleep; 

 and, as fast as he loads on a store of 

 facts, they slip away from an indurated 

 memory-pad that long since has had to 

 depend upon notebooks to retain them. 



You are going at it wrong, brother; 

 your idea is one of those man-imagined 

 artificialities that Nature does not 

 recognize. Nothing in Nature can be 

 learnt from a book. You can read it 

 in a book; but if it is going to stay with 

 you, to become part of you, the lesson 

 must be practiced in the forest itself. 

 Take the book in hand into the forest, 

 if you will; but take the object studied 

 in your own hand; do with your own 

 body the directions written in the book ; 

 work at it until you really know that 

 is Nature's way! I tell you that to 

 become proficient in the six weapons of 

 the outdoorsman alone rifle, revolver, 

 shotgun; fly rod, baitcasting rod and 

 surf rod will furnish ambition enough 

 for a lifetime of recreation; and that 

 takes no account of the side arts that 

 go with the Big Six camp craft; 

 canoeing, both salt and fresh water; 

 woodcraft; forestry; horsemanship; dog 

 training; outdoor photography; snow 

 travel; and all the branches of natural 

 science. The more you know, the 

 greater your enjoyment of the forest 

 you can begin anywhere in the school 

 of the woods, and specialize according 

 to your tastes. 



There is an old legend connected with 

 the custom of clinking glasses when men 

 drink together. It is that it was done 

 to produce a sound, so that all the five 

 senses, the whole man, should partake 

 in the ceremony of a toast. In the 

 same way, at least one of the Big Six 

 arts of the outdoorsman should be 

 present in the equipment of any man 

 who goes into the forest, so that the 

 whole man may be present; for the 

 Six Arts rifle, revolver, shotgun and 

 the three fishing rods represent the 

 mastery of man over the forest ; without 



