Excerpt from The Brook Book: A First Acquaintance With the Brook and Its Inhabitants Through the Changing Year Throughout the year a brook is captivating. It is as companionable as a child, and as changeful. It hints at mysteries. But does it tell secrets other than its own? Does it tell where the wild things come down to drink? Does it tell where the birds take their baths, or where the choicest wild flowers lurk? I fain would know the story of its playfellows and dependents. The brook has made its own way down the hill, through the woods and across the meadow. May we not follow it? Is it not a type of the best kind of human life? - the steep hillside of youth, the wild dash, the splashing through and under and between difficulties, the firm, steady flow down the gradual slope of middle age, - finally the safe and tranquil passing into the unknown? And yet, in spite of its mysteries, one may really know a brook. A river is too distant, - too much an institution and too little an individual. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.