194 HOW NATURE STUDY SHOULD BE TAUGHT 



must go to nature for a long, refreshing recu- 

 perating draught. John Burroughs says of the 

 man who writes : 



" I once saw a cow that had lost her cud. How 

 forlorn and desolate and sick at heart that cow 

 looked. No more rumination, no more of that 

 second and finer mastication, no more of that 

 sweet and juicy revery under the Spreading trees, 

 or in the stall. Then the farmer took an elder 

 and scraped the bark and put something with it, 

 and made the cow a cud, and after due waiting, 

 the experiment took, a response came back, and 

 the mysterious machinery was once more in mo- 

 tion, and the cow was herself again." 



Have you, O poet, or essayist, or story-writer, 

 never lost your cud, and wandered about days and 

 weeks without being able to start a single thought 

 or an image that tasted good, — your literary 

 appetite dull or all gone, and the conviction daily 

 growing that it is all over with you in that direc- 

 tion? A little elder-bark, something fresh and 

 bitter from the woods, is about the best thing you 

 can take. 



Bryant also tells us that the author must make 

 visits to the " lonely stream " for refreshment and 

 inspiration : 



