ON BOOKS OF ADVENTURE 



me as though I were either an old hunter or an 

 admiring audience, or as though you were afraid 

 somebody might think you were making too much of 

 the matter. I want to know how you really felt. 

 Were you scared or nervous.^ or did you become 

 cool ? Tell me frankly just how it was, so I can see 

 the thing as happening to a common everyday human 

 being. Then, even at second-hand and at ten 

 thousand miles distance, I can enjoy it actually, 

 humanly, even though vicariously, speculating a bit 

 over my pipe as to how I would have liked it myself. 



Obviously, to write such a book the author must 

 at the same time sink his ego and exhibit frankly 

 his personality. The paradox in this is only ap- 

 parent. He must forget either to strut or to blush 

 with diffidence. Neither audience should be for- 

 gotten, and neither should be exclusively addressed. 

 Never should he lose sight of the wholesome fact 

 that old hunters are to read and to weigh; never 

 should he for a moment slip into the belief that he is 

 justified in addressing the expert alone. His atti- 

 tude should be that many men know more and have 

 done more than he, but that for one reason or 

 another these men are not ready to transmit their 

 knowledge and experience. 



To set down the formulation of an ideal is one 

 thing: to fulfil it is another. In the following pages 



9 



