THE PLOUGHBOY WHO BECAME A FAMOUS NATURALIST.
One evening, in the town of Dunbar, Scotland, an excited lad hurried
through the streets shouting to his schoolmates: "I'm gaun tae
Amaraka the morn!" When they refused to believe him he said,
"Weel--just you see if I am at skule the morn."
The lad was John Muir. That evening, as he and his brother, David
sat by the fireside learning their lessons, his father walked in and
said, "Bairns, you needna learn your lessons the nicht, for we're
gaun to America the morn!" The boys were wild with joy. Even the
natural heart-pain of parting from their grandparents, whom they
deeply loved, was quickly quenched as they conjured up pictures of
the life they were to lead across the seas. Mr. Muir decided to take
with him John, who was eleven years of age, David, a brother, aged
nine, Sarah, who was thirteen. Mrs. Muir and four children remained
in Scotland until the new home was ready for them.
After a voyage of nearly seven weeks, in a sailing ship, the
immigrants arrived in America and very soon after settled on their
claim in Wisconsin. With the help of some neighbours, Mr. Muir built
a shanty in less than a day, after the materials for the roof and
walls were ready. From the first John Muir fell in love with his
surroundings. To him the wilderness was a glorious place. He
watched the birds and animals, the trees and the flowers, the streams
and lakes--everything around him filled him with delight. It was a
backwoods farm, and the hard work of clearing the farm began at once.
John enjoyed piling up immense quantities of brushwood and making
huge fires. Mr. Muir bought a yoke of oxen and the task of clearing
the land began in earnest. The lads were up early and late, doing
their best to help their father get the place cleared and a frame
house built, so that the other members of the family, who had been
left behind in Scotland, could join them. Late in the fall, just
before the winter snow began to fall, the house was ready, and Mrs.
Muir and the other four children arrived.
John was the eldest of the boys, and his father looked to him to do
almost a man's work. The summer work was heavy, and especially
harvesting and corn-hoeing. All the ground had to be hoed over the
first few years and John had scarcely a minute to rest. They had no
proper farm implements to begin with, and the hoes had to be kept
moving up and down as if they were worked by machinery. John took
great pride in the amount of work he was able to do, and very often
worked sixteen and seventeen hours a day.
In winter time John and his brothers arose early to feed the cattle,
grind axes, bring in the wood, and dozens of other jobs that needed
to be done. No matter what the weather was, there was work to be
done. It was pioneer farming, and it was only by long and hard
effort that it was possible to earn a livelihood.
John was put to work at the plough at twelve years of age, when his
head little more than reached the handles. For many years the bulk
of the ploughing on that hard backwoods farm fell to his lot. From
the first he determined to do as good ploughing as though he were a
man, and in this he did not fail. None could draw a straighter
furrow. The work was made especially hard because of the tree stumps
which were everywhere on the half-cleared land.
To John's lot also fell the task of splitting rails for the long
lines of zig-zag fences. Making rails was hard work and required no
little skill. Sometimes John would cut and split one hundred rails a
day from short, knotty, oak timbers, swinging the heavy mallet from
early morning to late at night, until his hands were sore. He was
proud of the amount of work that he was able to do, but the heavy
exertions of those days probably prevented his growth and earned for
him the title of the "Runt of the Family."
After eight years of very hard work the farm was at last cleared.
John had worked as hard as any man, often rising at four o'clock in
the morning and toiling till late at night. He made the rash vow
that he would do a man's work, and even when he was not well, he made
good his pledge. Then, when at last the land was cleared, his father
bought a half section of wild land four or five miles away, and the
task of clearing, breaking up, and fencing began all over again.
Soon after the entire family moved to the new farm, which was known
as Hickory Hill Farm. It was high and dry, and very good land, but
there was no living water, and so a well, ninety feet deep, had to be
dug. With the exception of the first ten feet of ground, was hard,
fine-grained sandstone. Mr. Muir tried to blast the sandstone, but
failed, and he decided to have John do all the work with mason's
chisels. This was a long, hard job, with a good deal of danger in
it. He had to sit cramped in a place about three feet in diameter,
and chip, chip away, day after day, for months. In the morning Mr.
Muir and David lowered John in a windlass, then went away to the farm
work and returned at noon to haul him up for dinner. After dinner he
was promptly lowered again and left there until evening.
One day he was almost suffocated by carbonic acid gas which had
settled at the bottom during the night. He was almost overcome as
soon as he had been let down, but managed to shout, "Take me out".
He was hauled up almost more dead than alive. Water was thrown down
to absorb the gas, and a bundle of hay attached to a light rope was
dropped and used to carry down pure air to stir up the poison. At
last water was secured and two iron-bound buckets swung, which drew
water from the well for many a long year.
It was fortunate for John that he had made good progress at school
before he left Scotland, for he had few opportunities to study after
he arrived on the backwoods farm.
For many years nearly every waking moment was spent in doing some
kind of manual work. However, he was hungry for knowledge, and
eagerly read the few books which came his way. Among these were the
Bible, parts of Shakespeare's poems, and selections from Milton,
Cowper and others, not often read by boys of his age.
When he was twenty-three he decided to attend the State University.
His father told him that he would have to support himself by his own
efforts. This he did, first by living very simply, and then by
seizing every opportunity to earn a dollar. He taught school and
worked in the harvest fields during the long summer vacations. When
in college he lived so frugally that sometimes he did not spend more
than half a dollar a week.
The greatest interest of John Muir's life had always been the things
he found in nature. From the days when, as a little fellow, he
played around the fields and streams near Dunbar in Scotland, he had
loved the open air and the hundreds of things which lived and grew
there. When he did finish his course at college he suffered from eye
trouble, and was even threatened with blindness. He there and then
decided to live in the open and see as much of the world as possible.
He set out on a walking tour through several States. He visited
Cuba, then the Isthmus of Panama, and then went straight to San
Francisco, where he arrived with less than a dollar in his pocket.
This distance was all covered on foot. He slept in the open most of
the time and gathered biological specimens as he went. Sometimes he
ran completely out of money, and when this happened he secured work
until he had sufficient to proceed.
Soon after he arrived in San Francisco he visited the Sierra Nevada
Mountains, and from then until the time of his death he found these
great hills a source of never-ending joy. He tramped among them
until he knew them thoroughly. It was chiefly through his efforts
that Congress set aside Yosemite as a national park. He was often
called "Father of the Yosemite."
In 1876 he was appointed a member of the United States Coast and
Geodetic Survey, and he saw Alaska, where he travelled hundreds of
miles alone. Later he visited Siberia, Norway, and Switzerland. He
did not hurry through those lands as many tourists do, but wherever
he went he studied, with much care, the flowers and the animals that
lived in the great open spaces. Things which others passed with only
a glance he closely observed. His passion to study these things led
him to visit India, Russia, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil and many
other countries. He travelled thousands of miles on foot and
generally slept in camps and tents.
He wrote several books and a great many articles which appeared in
the big magazines. He wrote about animals, insects, and flowers, and
his information was gained at first hand. He knew these things
because he lived among them and loved them. His knowledge was
recognized and appreciated. Harvard and several other universities
conferred honourary degrees upon him, but he cared little for these
things. From his travels abroad he returned to the Sierra Mountains
which he loved so passionately. Several universities invited him to
become professor, but he preferred to live his simple life among the
mountains. After his death, in 1914, these beautiful lines were
written about him by Odell Shepard:
THE PRAYER OF JOHN MUIR.
Let me sleep among the shadows of the mountain when I die,
In the murmur of the pines and gliding streams,
Where the long day loiters by
Like a cloud across the sky,
And the night is calm and musical with dreams.
Lay me down within a canyon of the mountains, far away,
In a valley filled with dim and rosy light;
Let me hear the streams at play
Through the vivid golden day,
And a voice of many waters in the night.
Let me lie where glinting rivers ramble down the slanting glade,
Under bending alders, garrulous and cool,
Where the sycamores have made
Leafy shrines of shifting shade,
Tremulous about the ferned and pebbled pool.