The Project Gutenberg EBook of Wake-Robin, by John Burroughs

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Title: Wake-Robin

Author: John Burroughs

Posting Date: July 7, 2009 [EBook #4203]
Release Date: July, 2003
First Posted: December 1, 2001

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WAKE-ROBIN ***

Produced by Jack Eden. HTML version by Al Haines.

WAKE-ROBIN

THE WRITINGS OF JOHN BURROUGHS

WITH PORTRAITS AND MANY ILLUSTRATIONS

VOLUME I

PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION

This is mainly a book about the Birds, or more properly an invitation
to the study of Ornithology, and the purpose of the author will be
carried out in proportion as it awakens and stimulates the interest of
the reader in this branch of Natural History.

Though written less in the spirit of exact science than with the
freedom of love and old acquaintance, yet I have in no instance taken
liberties with facts, or allowed my imagination to influence me to the
extent of giving a false impression or a wrong coloring. I have reaped
my harvest more in the woods than in the study; what I offer, in fact,
is a careful and conscientious record of actual observations and
experiences, and is true as it stands written, every word of it. But
what has interested me most in Ornithology is the pursuit, the chase,
the discovery; that part of it which is akin to hunting, fishing, and
wild sports, and which I could carry with me in my eye and ear
wherever I went.

I cannot answer with much confidence the poet's inquiry,--

"Hast thou named all the birds without a gun?"

but I have done what I could to bring home the "river and sky" with
the sparrow I heard "singing at dawn on the alder bough." In other
words, I have tried to present a live bird,--a bird in the woods or
the fields,--with the atmosphere and associations of the place, and
not merely a stuffed and labeled specimen.

A more specific title for the volume would have suited me better; but
not being able to satisfy myself in this direction, I cast about for a
word thoroughly in the atmosphere and spirit of the book, which I hope
I have found in "Wake-Robin," the common name of the white Trillium