g springs, and wild laurel. It was barricaded with fallen
tree-trunks and moss-covered rocks that had never felt the foot of man
since that foot had worn a moccasin. Around the preserve was a high
fence stout enough to keep poachers on the outside and to persuade
the wild animals that inhabited it to linger on the inside. These wild
animals were squirrels, rabbits, and raccoons. Every day, in sunshine
or in rain, entering through a private gate, Herrick would explore this
holy of holies. For such vermin as would destroy the gentler animals
he carried a gun. But it was turned only on those that preyed upon his
favorites. For hours he would climb through this wilderness, or, seated
on a rock, watch a bluebird building her nest or a squirrel laying in
rations against the coming of the snow. In time he grew to think he knew
and understood the inhabitants of this wild place of which he was the
overlord. He looked upon them not as his tenants but as his guests. And
when they fled from him in terror to caves and hollow tree-trunks, he
wished he might call them back and explain he was their friend, that it
was due to him they lived in peace. He was glad they were happy. He was
glad it was through him that, undisturbed, they could live the simple
life.

His fall came through ambition. Herrick himself attributed it to his
too great devotion to nature and nature's children. Jackson, he of the
frivolous mind, attributed it to the fact that any man is sure to come
to grief who turns from the worship of God's noblest handiwork, by which
Jackson meant woman, to worship chipmunks and Plymouth Rock hens. One
night Jackson lured Herrick into New York to a dinner and a music hall.
He invited also one Kelly, a mutual friend of a cynical and combative
disposition. Jackson liked to hear him and Herrick abuse each other, and
always introduced subjects he knew would cause each to lose his temper.

But, on this night, Herrick needed no goading. He was in an ungrateful
mood. Accustomed to food fresh from the soil and the farmyard, he
sneered at hothouse asparagus, hothouse grapes, and cold-storage quail.
At the music hall he was even more difficult. In front of him sat a
stout lady who when she shook with laughter shed patchouli and a man who
smoked American cigarettes. At these and the steam heat, the nostrils of
Herrick, trained to the odor of balsam and the smoke of open wood fires,
took offense. He refused to be amused. The monologue artist,