his presence creates an interesting conflict between Sylvia's loyalty between nature and her desires for love and money. Still, to help us understand Sylvia's conflicting emotions, we must further appreciate the differences between the industrial and rural world. This is achieved by the quality of the industrial and rural world's descriptions. Upon reading about the rural farm, we learn that the air is "soft and sweet" while the industrial town is described as "noisy" and "crowded" (133). We also get to see more clashes between the industrial and rural world when we read about the description of the hunter's whistle as "determined and somewhat aggressive" (133). I believe this whistle is symbolic it is unlike a friendly bird's whistle, and by offering us the differences between the two whistles, we learn that the natural world appeals more to Sylvia's emotions and sensitivities than the industrial one and its manufactured devices. While Sylvia may consider the bird's whistle as unfriendly and an invasion of her natural world, she also seems intimidated by the hunter. His values represent a scientific and emotionally detached world. His ambition for collecting and preserving birds threatens Sylvia as the following passage summarizes by stating, "Alas, if the great wave of human interest which flooded for the first time this dull little life should sweep away the satisfactions of an existence heart to heart with nature and the dumb life of the forest" (136). The presence of the hunter indicates that his industrial world is keen on collecting and developing untamed forces, particularly the heron. The hunter's world seems inconsiderate of nature and his world becomes a paradox because its industrial values seem to kill the things it proposes to love. An effective example of this paradox occurs when the hunter offers Sylvia $10 in exchange for locating his next hunting prize, the white heron. The hunter treasures the...
