PREFACE. 



I AM awaro that for the most part the title of my 

 book is an allegory rather than an actual description ; 

 but readers who have followed me heretofore, I trust, 

 will not be puzzled or misled in the present case by 

 any want of literalness in the matter of the title. If 

 the name carries with it a suggestion of the wild and 

 delectable in nature, of the free and ungarnered har- 

 vests which the wilderness everywhere affords to the 

 observing eye and ear, it will prove sufficiently ex- 

 plicit for my purpose. 



ESOPUS, N. Y. 



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