t secure on the pedestal where
long ago he placed him. Likewise with Thoreau: If shortcomings were to
be pointed out in this favorite, he wished to be the one to do it. And
so, before taking Thoreau to task for certain inaccuracies, he takes
Lowell to task for criticizing Thoreau. He then proceeds, not without
evident satisfaction, to call attention to Thoreau's "slips" as an
observer and reporter of nature; yet in no carping spirit, but, as he
himself has said: "Not that I love Thoreau less, but that I love truth
more."

The "Short Studies in Contrasts," the "Day by Day" notes,
"Gleanings," and the "Sundown Papers" which comprise the latter part
of this, the last, posthumous volume by John Burroughs, were written
during the closing months of his life. Contrary to his custom, he
wrote these usually in the evening, or, less frequently, in the early
morning hours, when, homesick and far from well, with the ceaseless
pounding of the Pacific in his ears, and though incapable of the
sustained attention necessary for his best work, he was nevertheless
impelled by an unwonted mental activity to seek expression.

If the reader misses here some of the charm and power of his usual
writing, still may he welcome this glimpse into what John Burroughs
was doing and thinking during those last weeks before the illness came
which forced him to lay aside his pen.

CLARA BARRUS

WOODCHUCK LODGE

ROXBURY-IN-THE-CATSKILLS

CONTENTS

I. EMERSON AND HIS JOURNALS

II. FLIES IN AMBER

III. ANOTHER WORD ON THOREAU

IV. A CRITICAL GLANCE INTO DARWIN

V. WHAT MAKES A POEM?

VI. SHORT STUDIES IN CONTRASTS:

The Transient and the Permanent

Positive and Negative

Palm and Fist

Praise and Flattery

Genius and Talent

Invention and Discovery

Town and Country

VII. DAY BY DAY

VIII. GLEANINGS

IX. SUNDOWN PAPERS:

Re-reading Bergson

Revisions

Bergson and Telepathy

Meteoric Men and Planetary Men

The Daily Papers

The Alphabet

The Reds of Literature

The Evolution of Evolution

Following One's Bent

Notes on the Psychology of Old Age

Facing the Mystery

INDEX

The frontispiece portrait is from a photograph by Miss Mabel
Watson taken at Pasadena, California,