vi PREFACE 



Lowes, in his Road to Xanadu, proved that " Coleridge got his 

 alligators from one o£ the most delightful books which he 

 or anybody else ever read, William Bartram's Travels ..." 

 Finally, as recently as May, 1929, a reviewer of Mr. Van 

 Doren's reprint of the Travels, writing in the Christian Science 

 Monitor, enthusiastically compared Bartram with Coleridge and 

 came to the conclusion that " There is a poetry in his [Bar- 

 tram's] prose that even the master lyrist [Coleridge] does not 

 surpass." 



A work that possesses such vitality deserves careful study. 

 What are its qualities that have drawn this acclaim ? Much has 

 been written, especially within the last quarter of a century, 

 about Bartram as a traveler and naturalist; many comments have 

 been made about his probable contribution to the literature of 

 Nature and his influence upon English poetry, yet Bartram him- 

 self remains unknown — an eighteenth-century shadow — and his 

 work remains by reputation a treasured curiosity of uncertain 

 value. Moreover, the brief articles that have so far been written 

 about Bartram have generally treated him as the author of one 

 work, the Travels, and while it is true that this book remains 

 his most important achievement, yet he has also published a few 

 short essays and has left in manuscript a diary, parts of his 

 journals, a pharmacopoeia, numerous notes, and other miscel- 

 lany, besides a voluminous correspondence. 



This study aims to determine with some measure of compre- 

 hensiveness the influence of Bartram on the development of 

 nature description; to show, in the light shed by all available 

 materials, the special combination of gifts which he brought to 

 his observation of the American landscape, so that he came to 

 be recognized as " the first native born American to produce a 

 book of literary distinction upon Natural History "; and to dis- 

 cuss the factors outside of Bartram and his work which have 

 contributed to his popularity among literary men, especially in 

 Europe. 



It is a pleasure to acknowledge the assistance I have received 

 in the course of this work. To Professor Gilbert Chinard, I owe 

 a primary debt for first directing my attention to Bartram and 

 for many helpful suggestions. Professor Raymond D. Havens 



