the Adirondacks, he says, "If I should ever live to get this wonderful
thing written, I expect it will show one thing, if no more; and that
is, that every thing has an opposite. I expect to show in this that
literature has an opposite, if I do not show any thing els. We could
not enjoy the blessings and happiness of riteousness if we did not
know innicuty was in the world: in fact, there would be no riteousness
without innicuty." Writing also of his great enjoyment of being in the
woods, especially since he has had the society there of some people he
names, he adds, "And since I have Literature, Siance, and Art all spread
about on the green moss of the mountain woods or the gravell banks of a
cristle stream, it seems like finding roses, honeysuckels, and violets
on a crisp brown cliff in December. You know I don't believe much in the
religion of seramony; but any riteous thing that has life and spirit in
it is food for me." I must not neglect to mention an essay, continued
in several numbers of his local paper, on "The Growth of the Tree," in
which he demolishes the theory of Mr. Greeley, whom he calls "one of the
best vegetable philosophers," about "growth without seed." He treats
of the office of sap: "All trees have some kind of sap and some kind of
operation of sap flowing in their season," the dissemination of seeds,
the processes of growth, the power of healing wounds, the proportion of
roots to branches, &c. Speaking of the latter, he says, "I have thought
it would be one of the greatest curiosities on earth to see a thrifty
growing maple or elm, that had grown on a deep soil interval to be two
feet in diameter, to be raised clear into the air with every root and
fibre down to the minutest thread, all entirely cleared of soil, so that
every particle could be seen in its natural position. I think it would
astonish even the wise ones." From his instinctive sympathy with
nature, he often credits vegetable organism with "instinctive judgment."
"Observation teaches us that a tree is given powerful instincts, which
would almost appear to amount to judgment in some cases, to provide for
its own wants and necessities."

Here our study must cease. When the primitive man comes into literature,
he is no longer primitive.

VI. CAMPING OUT

It seems to be agreed that civilization is kept up only by a constant
effort: Nature claims its own speedily when the effort is relaxed. If
you clear a patch of fertile ground in