Howard Pyle, a chronicle by Charles D. Abbott, with an introduction by N. C. Wyeth and many illustrations from Howard Pyle's works.

HOWARD PYLE: A CHRONICLE
style, and self-consciousness (I do not know how else to
describe it) in thought. The feet of my ideas seem clogged
with the difficulties of expression; I can't open the flood
gates of my mind and pour out my thougyhts onto the paper.
The sentences will not 'round up' so as to contain the
thought in the shell of a few distinctly expressed words. 1
have to strike again and again with simile and hyperbole
before I can crack that invisible, intangible wall that separates my internal thought from the perception of others.
One reason I so enj oy and pleasure in my fables is that
the thought finds, as it were, a more tangible form, rough
though it be, and clad in the rude garb of brute life. But
even in them, easy as that way is of exhibiting some of the
innumerable variations of human nature, I find in reading
them over that I have failed in laying my thought clear
and undimmed by diffuseness of language. It is as though
the particular thread in the woof of my thoughts broke
in my fingers as I strive to draw it forth.... 1
"November 25, 1 876.
"I worked yesterday morning at correcting the fable
illustrations for St. Nicholas and took them down town with
me. I also stopped at Goupil's and ordered a paper stretcher
I bought to be sent down to the Academy; it -was quite late
when I got there, so I did no work....
"When I called on Mr. Drake, he said that Mr. Smith
had been speaking about me and urged me again to go down
to Wills and take lessons under him. I did not, however,
incline much to that plan.
"Two of the illustrations of the fables I sent up to Mrs.
1I32]