26 NATURE IN A CITY YARD 



nature ? man more than mountains? much 

 acquaintance more than few? No, to 

 each of these propositions. A mob is 

 physically and mentally repellent to me, 

 and its clothes and its behavior have little 

 to do with this repugnance. Nature means 

 liberty, and liberty means life. 



Mr. Bellamy's hopeful but fanciful econ- 

 omy has not considered one of the origins 

 for the evils that threaten us: crowding. 

 Americans are growing afraid of that 

 wholesome rural life that gave force and 

 composure to their fathers, and that is re- 

 flected so sweetly by the English and New 

 England writers. They are falling into the 

 town habit, which, like most habits, grows 

 by what it feeds on, and is commonly ac- 

 quired by crediting the fallacy that life, 

 society, gaiety, art, letters, learning, and 

 all forms of progress come of physical 

 aggregation. 



What force is in numbers, except brute 

 force ? Because we do justice, keep order, 

 and claim privileges for each other, does 

 it follow that we must associate with all 

 men, including dirty men, mean men, 



