48 BIRDS AND POETS 



The true poet knows more about Nature than the 

 naturalist because he carries her open secrets in his 

 heart. Eckermann could instruct Goethe in orni- 

 thology, hut could not Goethe instruct Eckermann 

 in the meaning and mystery of the bird 1 It is my 

 privilege to number among my friends a man who 

 has passed his life in cities amid the throngs of 

 men, who never goes to the woods or to the coun- 

 try, or hunts or fishes, and yet he is the true natii- 

 alist. I think he studies the orbs. I think day 

 and night and the stars, and the faces of men and 

 women, have taught him all there is worth knowing. 

 We run to Nature because we are afraid of man. 

 Our artists paint the landscape because they cannot 

 paint the human face. If we could look into the 

 eyes of a man as coolly as we can into the eyes of 

 an animal, the products of our pens and brushes 

 would be quite different from what they are. 



v 

 But I suspect after all it makes but little differ- 

 ence to which school you go, whether to the woods 

 or to the city. A sincere man learns pretty much 

 the same things in both places. The differences are 

 superficial, the resemblances deep and many. The 

 hermit is a hermit, and the poet a poet, whether he 

 grow up in the town or the country. I was forci- 

 bly reminded of this fact recently on opening the 

 works of Charles Lamb after I had been reading 

 those of our Henry Thoreau. Lamb cared nothing 

 for nature, Thoreau for little else. One was as at- 



