Bird And Bough

PREFACE Two or three years ago, a writer in one of the leadingNew York papers, commenting unfavorably upon some recent utterances of mine in one of the magazines, said that my readers could forgive me everything but my poetry. Now I am going to presume that some of them, at least, can forgive me even that. Have I not had letters from a few of them I do not say how many expressing a desire to see my verses collected in a volume Could any poet withstand the appeal of even a few disinterested persons who expressed so reasonable and so modest a wish At any rate, I shall let their suggestion overweigh the adverse opinion of the hard-hearted critic just referred to. The one thing that I claim for my verses is that they keep a little closer to our wild nature to the birds, the flowers, the seasons than most of our minor poetry has done. I do not believe the reader will find a hint of any Flora or Fauna but our own in my pages. Then if I have also succeeded in bringing home the bough with the bird I heard singing upon it, or some suggestion of its place in the fields and woods and in the season, my title will need no explanation. January, 1906. J - B vii