Book Description

Excerpt from The Great Deserts and Forests of North America Having read the proof-sheets of this work, I am glad to comply with the publishers request that I should write a preface. In doing so I but make the author a moderate return for the pleasure I have had in following him in his wanderings in some of the waste and desert places of the earth. That rude, unspoilt nature he tells of best pleases me, and I have no doubt that it best pleases very many of us. Being what we are, children of the desert in our distant origin, it is but natural that the artificial conditions in which we are for the most time constrained to exist should pall upon us - that a breath from a fresher, more open world should at all times be grateful. It is true that the best reading is but a sorry substitute for the thing itself; nevertheless it is a substitute - there is unfortunately no other known to me; and I can honestly say that for a long time I have not found a better than this same book. That it is not by a literary man, a word-painter by vocation, is all in its favour; there is no mistaking the feeling which drew its author by rough ways into remote and uninhabited places; while in his simple, direct style he is well able to bring many a striking scene before our mental vision. The author does not claim to be in any sense a scientific naturalist, and that, too, may be an advantage to the general reader. When a man has a good deal of science he is apt to muffle himself up in it, even to the concealment of his natural features, so that we do not know whether he is one of us or not, or to what tribe he belongs. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.