670 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIX. No. 



be capable of nourishing tlie normal growing 

 mind — then let us see to it that it be pursued 

 and taught according to the full measure of 

 its possibilities as a legitimate source of in- 

 spiration.* 



By just such a curious inconsequence as 

 might have been expected from one given to 

 ' speaking with tongues ' as above, Mr. Long 

 insists that he has been careful never to record 

 an observation until he has ' verified ' it from 

 the testimony of another. The ' confirmation ' 

 of most of his stories has come from the guides 



* No objection is here implied to the frankly 

 imaginative treatment of nature. The same 

 ' fact ' may Be differently apperoeived and trans- 

 formed by the same mind for different purposes. 

 There is an artistic observation as well as a scien- 

 tific observation; accuracy being fundamental to 

 both. Nobody can object, on scientific grounds, 

 either to Shelley's relatively objective poems of 

 nature, or even to Wordsworth's humanizing muse. 

 jEsop's ' Fables ' and Kipling's ' Jungle Books ' 

 are likewise secure from scientific attack. (This 

 of course apart from a possible ' science of criti- 

 cism.') 



There is undeniably a place for sympathy in 

 our relations with dumb animals, as in our rela- 

 tions with children; although between ,the mind 

 of the most ' sagacious ' mammal below man and 

 the mind of the child which has outgrown the 

 ' mewling and puking ' age, there is probably 

 an interval of considerable psychological signifi- 

 cance. Josephine Dodge Daskam's clever stories 

 about children, although not fce'ohnioally psy- 

 chological, are nevertheless not contrary to fact. 

 Her diminutive heroes and heroines are not made 

 to appear interesting by being fantastically repre- 

 sented as stronger and wiser than their parents, or 

 (like Mr. Long's animals) as differing radically 

 in different localities — the youngsters of Massa- 

 chusetts, for example, being revolutionary in- 

 novators in science and art and conscious critics 

 of government, whereas children elsewhere stupidly 

 make mud pies and dress dolls and harmlessly 

 ' play police.' 



But artistic creation apart, the ' natural his- 

 tory ' point of view as distinguished from the 

 formulation of quantitative or genetic ' laws,' 

 represents at once a stage in the development of 

 all natural science and a permanent aspect of 

 its pursuit, as exemplified and expressed by no- 

 body so sincerely and so happily withal as by 

 the acknowledged masters of investigation them- 



and trappers of his acquaintance. But in a 

 ' world of suggestion and freedom and inspira- 

 tion ' why bother about verification 1 Why 

 trouble the trappers? Perhaps the trappers 

 appreciate Mr. Long's ' struggle against fact,' 

 and cheerfully lend their aid in behalf of the 

 development and maintenance of his individ- 

 uality ! 



But Mr. Long is not a consistent dreamer 

 of dreams and confirmer of the same through 

 the cross-questioning of trappers; he thinks 

 it important to remind his readers that ' for 

 over twenty years ' he has ' gone every season 

 deep into the woods.'* And his publishers, 

 Messrs. Ginn and Company, have issued a 

 little pamphlet,t by way of apologizing for 

 their literary protege and incidentally adver- 

 tising his books (to all of which Mr. Long 

 submits as if it were quite a dignified thing 

 to be thus personally defended and adver- 

 tised), in which the public is favored with 

 reproductions from photographs of Mr. Long 

 in his boat, of his camp in the woods, and the 

 like. Mr. Long has teen on the ground! But 

 so have his ' wood folk.' Mr. Long has teen a 

 field observer from his youth! As much may 

 be said of the wild ass. 



Possibly even Mr. Long recognizes that 

 mere camping out among the ' wood folk ' is 



selves. Fiu'thermore, the perception of ' law ' has 

 repeatedly given classic expression to what a 

 scientific student of philosophy, the late Henry 

 Sidgwick, first called ' cosmic emotion.' I am 

 not even prepared to deny the legitimacy of meta- 

 physical construction (possibly a species of quasi- 

 poetry?) upon the basis of an assumed psychic 

 homogeneity of the universe, such as we find 

 reflected in polite literature, as, e. g., in Robert 

 Louis Stevenson's impressive Pulvis et Umbra 

 (reprinted in the volume entitled 'Across the 

 Plains,' Scribners, 1900). 



* Op. cit., p. 691. 



t ' William J. Long and His Books: A Pamphlet 

 Consisting Chiefly of Typical Letters and Re- 

 views in Reply to Mr. Burroughs's Unwarranted 

 Attack on Mr. Long.' — The unfortunate form of 

 this authorized ' defence ' of Mr. Long places one 

 imder an unpleasant obligation to refer more or 

 less specifically to his personal qualifications, — 

 an obligation from which one could wish to be 

 released. 



