OUT-DOOR INFLUENCES IN 

 LITERATURE. 



The earth is the great reservoir of phys- 

 ical forces, and whilst no scientist has yet 

 been able to discover how intimate or how per- 

 fect is the connection between the mental and 

 the physical, there exists, no doubt, a correla- 

 tion between the processes by which the body 

 and the soul are kept healthy and vigorous by 

 draughts on the great reserves of Nature. 

 One grows tired of books and cloyed with all 

 manner of art. Then comes a hunger and a 

 thirst for Nature. Real thought-gathering is 

 like berry-gathering — one must go to the wild, 

 vines for the racy-flavored fruit. Art and Na- 

 ture are really the antipodes of each other — 

 one is original, the other second-hand. When 

 we go from the library or the studio to the 

 woods and fields, we go to get back what 

 Art has robbed us of — the freshness of Nature. 

 Art presents compositions ; Nature offers the 

 original elements. The suggestions of Nature 

 come, as the flowers and leaves and breezes 

 come — out of the mysterious, invisible gener- 

 ator ; but Art merely reflects its suggestions 

 back upon Nature. 



What genuine poet or novelist has not caught 

 his charmingest conceits from some subtle and 

 indescribable influence of out-door things ? 

 In-door poets, like Dante G. Rossetti, always 

 lack the dewy freshness of Helicon, the thymy 

 fragrance of Hybla, no matter how much of 



