viii PREFACE 



think that I was just a bump on a log. More 

 than a score of species of birds this day alighted 

 near by without giving me a second look. Toward 

 evening a mink came out of the brook at the 

 end of the log, looked at me three or four times, 

 and then proceeded to take a dust bath. But 

 a beaver who came out of the water had scarcely 

 looked at me when he apparently caught my 

 scent. With a splashing dive he disappeared 

 down stream. Once as I lay on a pile of bould- 

 ers a number of Bighorn sheep passed near by, ut- 

 terly unconcerned at my form which they ap- 

 parently mistook for a boulder. 



Long before I thought of becoming a Nature 

 Guide I moved slowly, so as not to alarm the 

 thousand kinds of wild people of the woods who 

 are eternally vigilant with eyes or ears for the 

 sight or the scent of a swiftly moving object. 

 And I went frequently to the same place and 

 often waited long in the wilderness. 



I tracked bears, hunted fossils geologic ani- 

 mals camped in beaver colonies, watched storms 

 on the heights, going into the places where they 

 roared the loudest, and went in search of coast- 

 ing snowslides and landslides. 



In every state in the Union there are numer- 

 ous wild places in which if one wait in the 

 wilderness he will see the wild folks come. 

 Many of the unsuspected plays and ways of 



