. In God's out-of-doors. Natural history. A WALK ALONG A RAILROAD IN JUNE. 'iHE season was mid-June. The region was a prairie. The place was a five-mile stretch of railroad running eastward, undeviatingly as the flight of an arrow. Landing at a village in the early morning, with three hours to wait for my train, the out-of-doors challenged me to walk to the next hamlet; and, my custom being never to take a dare from nature if my employment will allow me leisure, 1 swung out right gayly to answer the challenge. The day was dustless, rains having sprinkled field and road and gardens quite recent
. In God's out-of-doors. Natural history. A WALK ALONG A RAILROAD IN JUNE. 'iHE season was mid-June. The region was a prairie. The place was a five-mile stretch of railroad running eastward, undeviatingly as the flight of an arrow. Landing at a village in the early morning, with three hours to wait for my train, the out-of-doors challenged me to walk to the next hamlet; and, my custom being never to take a dare from nature if my employment will allow me leisure, 1 swung out right gayly to answer the challenge. The day was dustless, rains having sprinkled field and road and gardens quite recently; the skies were dimmed with a veil of cloud not dense enough to obscure the sun nor to dim the blue completely, but enough to calm the sunlight into entire pleasantness for a walk like mine. A pleasant wind blew from the east and kept the track unhesitatingly as a locomotive, while 1, with the butterflies and wild bees, drifted from side to side as flowers and grasses and tangle of vines invited me. Now, a railroad is what our friend Ruskin railed at with his delight- ful spleen ; and the logic of his complaint was that the railroad stood for utility and John Ruskin stood for nature, and what John Ruskin stood for was what should be. Ruskin had all the sweet dogmatism and self-confidence of a little child. I like his love of field and flood; more still, 1 love it, but scarcely enjoy his vituperation, though put into English sweet enough to make even scolding charming, nor enjoy it at all when he raves against those modern appliances which have changed the economic world and us, from provincials into cosmopolites. And 127. Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Quayle, William A. (William Alfred), 1860-1925. Cincinnati, Jennings & Pye; New York, Eaton & Mains
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectnatural, bookyear1902
