XI 
Preface 
The simple truth is that these observations of mine, though 
they are all true, do not tell more than a small fraction of the 
interesting things that wild animals do continually in their native 
state, when they are not frightened by dogs and hunters, or 
when we are not blinded by our preconceived notions in watch¬ 
ing them. I have no doubt that romancing is rife just now on the 
part of men who study animals in a library ; but personally, with 
my note-books full of incidents which I have never yet recorded, 
I find the truth more interesting, and I cannot understand why 
a man should deliberately choose romance when he can have the 
greater joy of going into the wilderness to see with his own eyes 
and to understand with his own heart just how the animals live. 
One thing seems to me to be more and more certain : that we 
are only just beginning to understand wild animals, and it is 
chiefly our own barbarism, our lust of killing, our stupid stuffed 
specimens, and especially our prejudices which stand in the way 
of greater knowledge. Meanwhile the critic who asserts dog¬ 
matically what a wild animal will or will not do under certain 
conditions only proves how carelessly he' has watched them and 
how little he has learned of Nature's infinite variety. 
WILLIAM J. LONG 
Stamford, Connecticut 
