Unexplored Spain

Unexplored Spain

THE undertaking of a sequel to Wild Spain, we are warned, is dangerous. The implication gratifies, but the forecast alarms not. Admittedly, in the first instance, we occupied a virgin field, and naturally the almost boyish enthusiasm that characterised the earlier bookand probably assured its successhas in some degree abated. But its not all gone yet; and any such lack is compensated by longer experience (an aggregate, between us, of eighty years) of a land we love, and the sounder appreciation that arises therefrom. Our own resources, moreover, have been supplemented and reinforced by friends in Spain who represent the fountain-heads of special knowledge in that country. No foreigners could have enjoyed greater opportunity, and we have done our best to exploit the advantageso far, at least, as steady plodding work will avail; for we have spent more than two years in analysing, checking and sorting, selecting and eliminating from voluminous notes accumulated during forty years. The concentrated result represents, we are convinced, an accuratethough not, of course, a completeexposition of the wild-life of one of the wildest of European countries. No, for this book and its thoroughness neither doubt nor fear intrudes; but we admit to being, in two respects, out of touch with modern treatment of natural-history subjects. Possibly we are wrong in both; but it has not yet been demonstrated, by Euclid or other, that a minority even of two is necessarily so? Nature it is nowadays customary to portray in somewhat lurid and sensational colourspresumably to humour a popular taste. Reflection might suggest that nothing in Nature is, in fact, sensational, loud, or extravagant; but the lay public possess no such technical training as would enable them to discern the line where Nature stops and where fraud and faking begin. At any rate we frequently read purring approval of what appears to us meretricious imposture, and see writers lauded as constellations whom we should condemn as charlatans. Beyond the Atlantic President Roosevelt (as he then was) went bald-headed for the Nature-fakers, and in America the reader has been put upon his guard. If he still likes sensationswell, thats what he likes. But he buys such fiction forewarned. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 41593
Author: Buck, Walter John
Release Date: Dec 10, 2012
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Contributor (Author): Chapman, Abel, 1851-1929

Illustrator: Caldwell, E. (Edmund G.) , Crawhall, Joseph, 1821-1896