Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1903-03-21
BURROUGHS AROUSED
Famous Naturalist's Criticism
Of Thompson Seton's Stories.
HIS FOXES CAUGHT IN AFTEB TRAP

called ny the &Seu A"Ahof y"
uraI History-He says There Are
No schools Tor iii Anim@Is-No
Automatic crows.
John Burroughs, cur representative
prose poet, a y the New York Amer
lean. whose exotic "reminiscences are
of wild thyme odors. mingled with the
brier rose scent of the Hudson valley
and the Catskills. has fallen across the
path IF Ernest Thompson Seton (Seton-
Thompson that was), the author, who
has blended the love Of fiction with the
love of nature in his animal novel,
wild Animals / Have Known
In the current Atlantic Monthly Mr..
Burroughs says that Mr.. Seton's book
justifes the phrase, Shan Natural
History"-that is, Mr. Burroughs play
fully pulls Mr.. Seton over very hot
Goals by saying that the line between
fact and fiction is deliberately crossed
and that the reader is thrown into such
a spell that he does not know he has
crossed into the land of make believe.
Mr.. Burroughs is a naturalist him.
self, and a thoroughgoing eountryman'
a tillef of the soil rather ttln a slave
of the pen, and when he has things to
say does so wholly untran.meled ard
unhurried and very interestingly. Prob
ably he would never have written his
paper. Real and Sham Natural His
tory" If MI. Seton had not with EN-
phatic assertion protested that his
stories were true. 1t is this which has
riled Mr.. Burroughs. and which, he
writes, makes the judicious grieve.'
Ne expert student, writes Mr.. u
roughs, has anything to report Il a
comes within gunshot of what appears
to have been Mr. Seton's daily expert
ence, and no other person in the world
has ever seen such dogs, wolves, foxes,
rabbits, mustangs or crows.
Mr.. Burroughs writes that MIR. Sc
tons stories are pleasing, but he insists
that it is not the way to write bed&s on
natural history. why did he NOT say
that their groundwork was fact ana
their finish hction?'' asks the old farm
er and companion of wild life. why
does he constantly aim to convey the
idea that wild creatures drill and in
struct their young, we Furnishing them
at times for disobedience of orders
There is not a shadow of truth in it"
About Mr.. Seton's well known fox
story Mr.. Burroughs writes: Every
hunter knows that the fox when pur-
sued by hounds will often resort TO
devices that look like cunning tricks to
confuse and mlslead the dog. Thus a
fox, hotly pushed, will run through a
flock of sheep. Mr.. Seton goes several
better and makes his fox jump upon
the back of a sheep and ride several
hundred yards. OF course no fox ever
did that.
again, the fox will sometimes take
to the railroad track and walk upon
the rail, doubtless with the vague no
ton of eluding his pursuers. Mr.. Seton
makes his fox so very foxy that he de
liberately lures the hounds upon the
long ~trestle, where he knows they will
be lust in time to meet and be killed
by a passing train, as they are. The
presumption is that the fox had O
watch and a time table about his per
son--but such is the way of romance.
'Jn all of the animal stories of Mr.,
Seton that / have read" continues Mr
Burroughs. the same liberties are tax
en- with facts. In his story of the rab'
bit Raggyug he says: 'Those who dc
not know the animals may well think
/ have humanized them. but those who
have lived so near them as to know
something of their ways and theii
minds will not think So This is the
old trick of the romancer-he swears
his tale is true because he knows his
readers want this assurance; it makes
the thing taste better. But those who
know the animals are just the ones
Mr.. Thompson Seton cannot fool
In regard to Mr.. Seton's story of the
crow Silver Spot, Mr.. Burroughs differs
radically from Mr.. Seton. Grows dc
not dart into a bush when pursued by
a kingbird or a purple martin" says
the aged observer. 'They are not
afraid OF a hawk; they cannot count
six (Silver Spot could count thirty
they do not cav when you stand un'
der them in winter to turn their course.
they do not drill their young; they dc
uOL HUGH loStlLtE III JQACs ivy C"N
worry a fox into giving up half his din
ner; they do not, as far as we know
have perpetual sentries; they have nc
calls that we can be sure answer t6
our words mount descend form
line forage etc. 1t is simply Mr.. Sc
toms strokes of fancy. The crows &c
not train their young. They have nc
fortress or schools or colleges or exam
lining bird or diplomas or medals OF
honor or hospitals or churches or tele
phones or postal deliveries or anything
of that sort. Indeed, the poorest back
woods hamlet has more of the appur
tenances of civilization than the bes'
Of organized crows or other wild AMI
NAL communities in the land.
why should any n palm or suci
stuff on an unsuspecting public as yer
table natural historyT When a man
writing or speaking of his own experl