This is an autobiographical anthology of experiences and memories. In his preface, John Buchan says that he had thought "that a diary of a pilgrimage, a record of the effect upon one mind of the mutations of life might interest others who travel a like road". Rather than an autobiography, he would like readers to think of it as a record of the impressions made upon him by the outer world, rather than the weaving of such impressions into a personal philosophy. Nevertheless, there are elements of anthology, autobiography and philosophy here.