228 Idle Days in Patagonia. 



imagine that Thoreau was such a one. At all events, 

 although he was without the Darwinian lights which 

 we have, and these feelings were always to him 

 " strange," " mysterious," " unaccountable," he does 

 not conceal them. This is the " something uncanny 

 in Thoreau " which seems inexplicable and startling 

 to such as have never been startled by nature, nor 

 deeply moved; but which, to others, imparts a 

 peculiarly delightful aromatic flavour to his writings. 

 It is his wish towards a more primitive mode of life, 

 his strange abandonment when he scours the wood 

 like a half-starved hound, and no morsel could be 

 too savage for him ; the desire to take a ranker 

 hold on life and live more as the animals do ; the 

 sympathy with nature so keen that it takes his 

 breath away ; the feeling that all the elements were 

 congenial to him, which made the wildest scenes 

 unaccountably familiar, so that he came and went 

 with a strange liberty in nature. Once only he had 

 doubts, and thought that human companionship 

 might be essential to happiness ; but he was at the 

 same time conscious of a slight insanity in the 

 mood ; and he soon again became sensible of the 

 sweet beneficent society of nature, of an infinite and 

 unaccountable friendliness all at once like an 

 atmosphere sustaining him. 



In the limits of a chapter it is impossible to do 

 more than touch the surface of so large a subject as 

 that of the instincts and remains of instincts exist- 

 ing in us. Dr. Wallace doubts that there are any 

 human instincts, even in the perfect savage ; which 



