Note 12 — XX

It was when he was attending the academy, that young Burroughs first saw that wonderful being—a living author:—

“I distinctly remember with what emotion I gazed upon him,” he said, “and followed him about in the twilight, keeping on the other side of the street. He was of little account,—a man who had failed as a lawyer, and then had written a history of Poland, which I have never heard of since that time; but to me he was the embodiment of the august spirit of authorship, and I looked upon him with more reverence and enthusiasm than I had ever before looked upon any man with. I cannot divine why I should have stood in such worshipful fear and awe of this obscure individual, but I suppose it was the instinctive tribute of a timid and imaginative youth to a power he was just beginning to see,—or to feel,—the power of letters.”