After making a hasty meal at the house, I started, full of
pleasing anticipations, for the wood; for how pleasant a place it
was to be in! What a wild beauty and fragrance and melodiousness
it possessed above all forests, because of that mystery that drew
me to it! And it was mine, truly and absolutely--as much mine as
any portion of earth's surface could belong to any man--mine with
all its products: the precious woods and fruits and fragrant gums
that would never be trafficked away; its wild animals that man
would never persecute; nor would any jealous savage dispute my
ownership or pretend that it was part of his hunting-ground. As
I crossed the savannah I played with this fancy; but when I
reached the ridgy eminence, to look down once more on my new
domain, the fancy changed to a feeling so keen that it pierced to
my heart and was like pain in its intensity, causing tears to
rush to my eyes. And caring not in that solitude to disguise my
feelings from myself, and from the wide heaven that looked down
and saw me--for this is the sweetest thing that solitude has for
us, that we are free in it, and no convention holds us--I dropped
on my knees and kissed the stony ground, then casting up my eyes,
thanked the Author of my being for the gift of that wild forest,
those green mansions where I had found so great a happiness!

Elated with this strain of feeling, I reached the wood not long
after noon; but no melodious voice gave me familiar and expected
welcome; nor did my invisible companion make itself heard at all
on that day, or, at all events, not in its usual bird-like
warbling language. But on this day I met with a curious little
adventure and heard something very extraordinary, very
mysterious, which I could not avoid connecting in my mind with