ort
he secured a school at forty dollars a month, which was much more than
he could have earned in the East. Yet he gave up his position at the
end of six months. "I came back," he says, "because of 'the girl I
left behind me'; and it was pretty hard to stay even as long as I
did."

Soon afterward he married. His total capital at the time was fifty
dollars, a sum which was reduced one fifth by the wedding expenses.
For several years he continued to teach, and at the age of twenty-five
we find him in charge of a school near West Point. Up to this time his
interest in nature and his aptitude for observation lay dormant. But
now it was awakened by reading a volume of Audubon which chanced to
fall into his hands. That was a revelation, and he went to the woods
with entirely new interest and enthusiasm. He began at once to get
acquainted with the birds, his vision grew keen and alert, and birds
he had passed by before, he now saw at once.

Meanwhile the Civil War was going on, and it aroused in Burroughs a
strong desire to enlist. He visited Washington to get a closer view of
army life, but what he saw of it rather damped his military ardor. It
seemed to him that the men were driven about and herded like cattle;
and when a peaceful position in the Treasury Department was offered
him he accepted it, and for nine years was a Government clerk.

[Illustration: "SLABSIDES"]

At the Treasury he guarded a vault and kept a record of the money that
went in or out. The duties were not arduous, and in his long
intervals of leisure his mind wandered far afield. It dwelt on the
charm of flitting wings and bird melodies, on the pleasures of
rambling along country roads and into the woodlands; and, sitting
before the Treasury vault, at a high desk and facing an iron wall he
began to write. There was no need for notes. His memory was
all-sufficient, and the result was the essays which make
"Wake-Robin,"--his first book.

By 1873 Burroughs had had enough of the routine of a Government
clerkship, and he resigned to become the receiver of a bank in
Middletown, New York. Later he accepted a position as bank examiner in
the eastern part of the State. But his longing to return to the soil
was growing apace, and presently he bought a little farm on the west
shore of the Hudson. He at once erected a substantial stone house and
started orchards and vineyards, yet it was not until 1885 that he felt
he could relinquish his Government positi