CONCORD, November 14, 1847.
DEAR FRIEND,--I am but a poor neighbor to you here,--a very poor
companion am I. I understand that very well, but that need not prevent
my _writing_ to you now. I have almost never written letters in my
life, yet I think I can write as good ones as I frequently see, so I
shall not hesitate to write this, such as it may be, knowing that you
will welcome anything that reminds you of Concord.
I have banked up the young trees against the winter and the mice, and
I will look out, in my careless way, to see when a pale is loose or a
nail drops out of its place. The broad gaps, at least, I will occupy.
I heartily wish I could be of good service to this household. But I,
who have only used these ten digits so long to solve the problem of a
living, how can I? The world is a cow that is hard to milk,--life does
not come so easy,--and oh, how thinly it is watered ere we get it! But
the young bunting calf, he will get at it. There is no way so direct.
This is to earn one's living by the sweat of his brow. It is a little
like joining a community, this life, to such a hermit as I am; and as
I don't keep the accounts, I don't know whether the experiment will
succeed or fail finally. At any rate, it is good for society, so I do
not regret my transient nor my permanent share in it.
Lidian [Mrs. Emerson] and I make very good housekeepers. She is a
very dear sister to me. Ellen and Edith and Eddy and Aunty Brown keep
up the tragedy and comedy and tragic-comedy of life as usual. The two
former have not forgotten their old acquaintance; even Edith carries a
young memory in her head, I find. Eddy can teach us all how to
pronounce. If you should discover any rare hoard of wooden or pewter
horses, I have no doubt he will know how to appreciate it. He
occasionally surveys mankind from my shoulders as wisely as ever
Johnson did. I respect him not a little, though it is I that lift him
up so unceremoniously. And sometimes I have to set him down again in a
hurry, according to his "mere will and good pleasure." He very
seriously asked me, the other day, "Mr. Thoreau, will you be my
father?" I am occasionally Mr. Rough-and-tumble with him that I may
not miss _him_, and lest he should miss _you_ too much. So you must
come back soon, or you will be superseded.
Alcott has heard that I laughed, and so set the people laughing, at
his arbor, though I never laughed louder than when I was on the
ridge-pole. But now I have not laughed for a long time, it is so
serious. He is very grave to look at. But, not knowing all this, I
strove innocently enough, the other day, to engage his attention to my
mathematics. "Did you ever study geometry, the relation of straight
lines to curves, the transition from the finite to the infinite? Fine
things about it in Newton and Leibnitz." But he would hear none of
it,--men of taste preferred the natural curve. Ah, he is a crooked
stick himself. He is getting on now so many _knots_ an hour. There is
one knot at present occupying the point of highest elevation,--the
present highest point; and as many knots as are not handsome, I
presume, are thrown down and cast into the pines. Pray show him this
if you meet him anywhere in London, for I cannot make him hear much
plainer words here. He forgets that I am neither old nor young, nor
anything in particular, and behaves as if I had still some of the
animal heat in me. As for the building, I feel a little oppressed when
I come near it. It has no great disposition to be beautiful; it is
certainly a wonderful structure, on the whole, and the fame of the
architect will endure as long as it shall stand. I should not show you
this side alone, if I did not suspect that Lidian had done complete
justice to the other.
Mr. [Edmund] Hosmer has been working at a tannery in Stow for a
fortnight, though he has just now come home sick. It seems that he was
a tanner in his youth, and so he has made up his mind a little at
last. This comes of reading the New Testament. was n't one of the
Apostles a tanner? Mrs. Hosmer remains here, and John looks stout
enough to fill his own shoes and his father's too.
Mr. Blood and his company have at length seen the stars through the
great telescope, and he told me that he thought it was worth the
while. Mr. Peirce made him wait till the crowd had dispersed (it was a
Saturday evening), and then was quite polite,--conversed with him, and
showed him the micrometer, etc.; and he said Mr. Blood's glass was
large enough for all ordinary astronomical work. [Rev.] Mr. Frost and
Dr. [Josiah] Bartlett seemed disappointed that there was no greater
difference between the Cambridge glass and the Concord one. They used
only a power of 400. Mr. Blood tells me that he is too old to study
the calculus or higher mathematics. At Cambridge they think that they
have discovered traces of another satellite to Neptune. They have been
obliged to exclude the public altogether, at last. The very dust which
they raised, "which is filled with minute crystals," etc., as
professors declare, having to be wiped off the glasses, would ere long
wear them away. It is true enough, Cambridge college is really
beginning to wake up and redeem its character and overtake the age. I
see by the catalogue that they are about establishing a scientific
school in connection with the university, at which any one above
eighteen, on paying one hundred dollars annually (Mr. Lawrence's fifty
thousand dollars will probably diminish this sum), may be instructed
in the highest branches of science,--in astronomy, "theoretical and
practical, with the use of the instruments" (so the great Yankee
astronomer may be born without delay), in mechanics and engineering to
the last degree. Agassiz will ere long commence his lectures in the
zoölogical department. A chemistry class has already been formed under
the direction of Professor Horsford. A new and adequate building for
the purpose is already being erected. They have been foolish enough to
put at the end of all this earnest the old joke of a diploma. Let
every sheep keep but his own skin, I say.
I have had a tragic correspondence, for the most part all on one side,
with Miss ----. She did really wish to--I hesitate to write--marry
me. That is the way they spell it. Of course I did not write a
deliberate answer. How could I deliberate upon it? I sent back as
distinct a _no_ as I have learned to pronounce after considerable
practice, and I trust that this _no_ has succeeded. Indeed, I wished
that it might burst, like hollow shot, after it had struck and buried
itself and made itself felt there. _There was no other way._ I really
had anticipated no such foe as this in my career.
I suppose you will like to hear of my book, though I have nothing
worth writing about it. Indeed, for the last month or two I have
forgotten it, but shall certainly remember it again. Wiley & Putnam,
Munroe, the Harpers, and Crosby & Nichols have all declined printing
it with the least risk to themselves; but Wiley & Putnam will print it
in their series, and any of them anywhere, at _my_ risk. If I liked
the book well enough, I should not delay; but for the present I am
indifferent. I believe this is, after all, the course you advised,--to
let it lie.
I do not know what to say of myself. I sit before my green desk, in
the chamber at the head of the stairs, and attend to my thinking,
sometimes more, sometimes less distinctly. I am not unwilling to think
great thoughts if there are any in the wind, but what they are I am
not sure. They suffice to keep me awake while the day lasts, at any
rate. Perhaps they will redeem some portion of the night ere long.
I can imagine you astonishing, bewildering, confounding, and sometimes
delighting John Bull with your Yankee notions, and that he begins to
take a pride in the relationship at last; introduced to all the stars
of England in succession, after the lecture, until you pine to thrust
your head once more into a genuine and unquestionable nebula, if there
be any left. I trust a common man will be the most uncommon to you
before you return to these parts. I have thought there was some
advantage even in death, by which we "mingle with the herd of common
men."
Hugh [the gardener] still has his eye on the Walden _agellum_, and
orchards are waving there in the windy future for him. That's the
where-I'll-go-next, thinks he; but no important steps are yet taken.
He reminds me occasionally of this open secret of his, with which the
very season seems to labor, and affirms seriously that as to his
wants--wood, stone, or timber--I know better than he. That is a
clincher which I shall have to avoid to some extent; but I fear that
it is a wrought nail and will not break. Unfortunately, the day after
cattle-show--the day after small beer--he was among the missing, but
not long this time. The Ethiopian cannot change his skin nor the
leopard his spots, nor indeed Hugh--his Hugh.
As I walked over Conantum, the other afternoon, I saw a fair column of
smoke rising from the woods directly over my house that was (as I
judged), and already began to conjecture if my deed of sale would not
be made invalid by this. But it turned out to be John Richardson's
young wood, on the southeast of your field. It was burnt nearly all
over, and up to the rails and the road. It was set on fire, no doubt,
by the same Lucifer that lighted Brooks's lot before. So you see that
your small lot is comparatively safe for this season, the back fire
having been already set for you.
They have been choosing between John Keyes and Sam Staples, if the
world wants to know it, as representative of this town, and Staples is
chosen. The candidates for governor--think of my writing this to
you!--were Governor Briggs and General Cushing, and Briggs is elected,
though the Democrats have gained. Ain't I a brave boy to know so much
of politics for the nonce? But I should n't have known it if Coombs
had n't told me. They have had a peace meeting here,--I should n't
think of telling you if I did n't know anything would do for the
English market,--and some men, Deacon Brown at the head, have signed a
long pledge, swearing that they will "treat all mankind as brothers
henceforth." I think I shall wait and see how they treat me first. I
think that Nature meant kindly when she made our brothers few.
However, my voice is still for peace. So good-by, and a truce to all
joking, my dear friend, from