Our Friend John Burroughs

by Clara Barrus

The simplicity and gentleness of this author and his strong interest in people endear him to the reader; we feel these qualities in his writings long before meeting him—a certain urbanity, a tolerant insight and sympathy, and a quiet humor. These draw us to him. Perhaps after cherishing his writings for years, cherishing also a confident feeling that we shall know him some day, we obey a sudden impulse, write to him about a bird or a flower, ask help concerning a puzzling natural-history question, tell him what a solace "Waiting" is, what a joy his books have been; possibly we write some verses to him, or express appreciation for an essay that has enlarged our vision and opened up a new world of thought. Perhaps we go to see him at Slabsides, or in the Catskills, as the case may be; perhaps in some unexpected way he comes to us—stops in the same town where we live, visits the college where we are studying, or we encounter him in our travels. In whatever way the personal relation comes about, we, one and all, share this feeling: he is no longer merely the favorite author, he is our friend John Burroughs.

I question whether there is any other modern writer so approachable, or one we so desire to approach. He has so written himself into his books that we know him before meeting him; we are charmed with his directness and genuineness, and eager to claim the companionship his pages seem to offer. Because of his own unaffected self, our artificialities drop away when we are with him; we want to be and say and do the genuine, simple thing; to be our best selves; and one who brings out this in us is sure to win our love.

(Illustration of Slabsides. From a photograph by Charles S. Olcott)

Mr. Burroughs seems to have much in common with Edward FitzGerald; we may say of him as has been said of the translator of the "Rubaiyat": "Perhaps some worship is given him... on account of his own refusal of worship for things unworthy, or even for things merely conventional." Like FitzGerald, too, our friend is a lover of solitude; like him he shuns cities, gets his exhilaration from the common life about him; is inactive, easy-going, a loiterer and saunterer through life; and could say of himself as FitzGerald said, on describing his own uneventful days in the country: "Such is life, and I believe I have got hold of a good end of it." Another point of resemblance: the American dreamer is like his English brother in his extreme sensitiveness—he cannot bear to inflict or experience pain. "I lack the heroic fibre," he is wont to say. FitzGerald acknowledged this also, and, commenting on his own over-sensitiveness and tendency to melancholy, said, "It is well if the sensibility that makes us fearful of ourselves is diverted to become a case of sympathy and interest with nature and mankind." That this sensibility in Mr. Burroughs has been so diverted, all who are familiar with his widespread influence on our national life and literature will agree.

In a bright descriptive article written a few years ago, Miss Isabel Moore dispels some preconceived and erroneous notions about Mr. Burroughs, and shows him as he is—a man keenly alive to the human nature and life around him. "The boys and girls buzzed about him," she says, "as bees about some peculiarly delectable blossom. He walked with them, talked with them, entranced them... the most absolutely human person I have ever met—a born comrade, if there ever was one; in daily life a delightful acquaintance as well as a philosopher and poet and naturalist, and a few other things." She describes him riding with a lot of young people on a billowy load of hay; going to a ball-game, at which no boy there enjoyed the contest more, or was better informed as to the points of the game. "Verily," she says, "he has what Bjornson called 'the child in the heart.'"

It is the "child in the heart," and, in a way, the "child" in his books, that accounts for his wide appeal. He often says he can never think of his books as works, because so much play went into the making of them. He has gone out of doors in a holiday spirit, has had a good time, has never lost the boy's relish for his outings, and has been so blessed with the gift of expression that his own delight is communicated to his reader.

And always it is the man behind the book that makes the widest appeal. In 1912, a Western architect, in correspondence with the writer concerning recent essays of Mr. Burroughs, said:—

I have had much pleasure and soul-help in reading and re-reading "The Summit of the Years." In this, and in "All's Well with the World," is mirrored the very soul of the gentlest, the most lovable man-character I have ever come across in literature or life....To me all his books, from "Wake-Robin" to "Time and Change," radiate the most joyous optimism.... During the past month I have devoted my evenings to re-reading (them).... He has always meant a great deal more to me than merely intellectual pleasure, and, next to Walt Whitman, has helped me to keep my life as nearly open to the influences of outdoors and the stars as may be in a dweller in a large town.

As I write, a letter comes from a Kansas youth, now a graduate student at Yale, expressing the hope that he can see Mr. Burroughs at Slabsides in April: "There is nothing I want to say—but for a while I would like to be near him. He is my great good teacher and friend.... As you know, he is more to me than Harvard or Yale. He is the biggest, simplest, and serenest man I have met in all the East."

I suppose there is no literary landmark in America that has had a more far-reaching influence than Slabsides. Flocks of youths and maidens from many schools and colleges have, for the past fifteen years, climbed the hill to the rustic cabin in all the gayety and enthusiasm of their young lives. But they have seen more than the picturesque retreat of a living author; they have received a salutary impression made by the unostentatious life of a man who has made a profound impression on his day who has made a profound impression on his day and age; they have gone their separate ways with an awakened sense of the comradeship it is possible to have with nature, and with an ennobling affection for the one who has made them aware of it. And this affection goes with them to whatever place on the globe their destinies carry them. It is transmitted to their children; it becomes a very real part of their lives.