CONCORD, January 16, 1843.
DEAR RICHARD,--I need not thank you for your present, for I hear its
music, which seems to be playing just for us two pilgrims marching
over hill and dale of a summer afternoon, up those long Bolton hills
and by those bright Harvard lakes, such as I see in the placid Lucerne
on the lid; and whenever I hear it, it will recall happy hours passed
with its donor.
When did mankind make that foray into nature and bring off this booty?
For certainly it is but history that some rare virtue in remote times
plundered these strains from above and communicated them to men.
Whatever we may think of it, it is a part of the harmony of the
spheres you have sent me; which has condescended to serve us
Admetuses, and I hope I may so behave that this may always be the
tenor of your thought for me.
If you have any strains, the conquest of your own spear or quill, to
accompany these, let the winds waft them also to me.
I write this with one of the "primaries" of my osprey's wings, which I
have preserved over my glass for some state occasion, and now it
offers.
Mrs. Emerson sends her love.