LITERARY TREATMENT OF NATURE 



guided more by the sense of smell than by anything 

 else. Maeterlinck in his "Life of the Bee" has 

 much to say about the " spirit of the hive," and it 

 does seem as if there were some mysterious agent 

 or power at work there that cannot be located or 

 defined. 



This current effort to interpret nature has led one 

 of the well-known prophets of the art to say that in 

 this act of interpretation one "must struggle against 

 fact and law to develop or keep his own individ- 

 uality." This is certainly a curious notion, and I 

 think an unsafe one, that the student of nature 

 must struggle against fact and law, must ignore or 

 override them, in order to give full swing to his 

 own individuality. Is it himself, then, and not the 

 truth that he is seeking to exploit ? In the field of 

 natural history we have been led to think the point 

 at issue is not man's individuality, but correct ob- 

 servation — a true report of the wild life about us. 

 Is one to give free rein to his fancy or imagination ; 

 to see animal life with his " vision," and not with his 

 corporeal eyesight; to hear with his transcendental 

 ear, and not through his auditory nerve ? This may 

 be all right in fiction or romance or fable, but why 

 call the outcome natural history ? Why set it down 

 as a record of actual observation ? Why penetrate 

 the wilderness to interview Indians, trappers, guides, 

 woodsmen, and thus seek to confirm your obser- 

 vations, if you have all the while been "struggling 

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