Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N.Y.
JOHN MUIR AND JOHN BURROUGHS
Called "John o' Mountains" and "John o' Birds" by
their friends
Thoreau died in 1862, having published only two books, the "Week" (1849) and "Walden" (1854). After his death there were printed no less than ten volumes prepared from his great accumulation of essays in manuscript, and notes and diaries. The four entitled "Spring," "Summer," "Autumn," and "Winter" are mines of treasure to the Nature student. They consist of dated paragraphs from Thoreau's voluminous journals, the selections being mainly notes on animals and plants seen about Concord at all seasons of the year, with the queries and musings that occurred to him at the moment. They are books to be owned and referred to by the naturalist rather than to be read for entertainment.
The literary magazines now began to print articles of open-air observation, most of which, then as now, dealt with bird life. This was not only because birds are singularly attractive, and the most easily studied of all animal groups, but largely because the United States has been very fortunate in the ornithologists that first made American birds known to the people. Instead of beginning with mere classifiers of dull, unimaginative mind, we were truly blessed in having such pioneers in our ornithology as Wilson and Audubon—one a true poet, to whom birds were emblems of the graces, and the other a painter, whose descriptions are imbued with color and vivacity.
THE HOUSE OF JOHN MUIR—in California
THE MUIR VINEYARDS AND ORCHARDS
Near Martinez, California
John Burroughs