Concord Days

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at best; one even questions, at times, whether the residents of cities, where art has thrown around them a world of its own, are compensated by all this luxury of display,-to say nothing of the social artifices wont to steal into their costly compliments,-for the simple surroundings of the countryman, which prompt to manliness and true gentility. A country dwelling without shrubbery, hills near or in the distance, a forest and water view, if but a rivulet, seems so far incomplete as if the o

ires of Nat

e livelies

OR

nner than any whom it has been my happiness to know. Lover of the wild, he lived a border

were al

brageous

d they chanced to be his contemporaries. As it was, he came nearer the antique spirit than any of our native poets, and touched the fields and groves and streams of his native town with a classic interest that shall not fade. Some of his verses are suffused with an elegiac tenderness, as if the woods and brooks bewailed the

-then drink and be cool! He seemed one with things, of nature's essence and core, knit of strong timbers,-like a wood and its inhabitants. There was in him sod and shade, wilds and waters manifold,-the mould and mist of earth and sky. Self-poised and sagacious as any denizen of the elements, he had the key to every animal's brain, every plant; and were an Indian to flower forth and reveal the scents hidden in his cranium, it w

s: too purely so to be appreciated at once. A scholar by birthright, and an author, his fame had not, at his decease, travelled far from the banks of the rivers he described in his books; but one hazards only the truth in affirming of his prose, that in substance and pith, it surpasses that of any naturalist of his time; and he is sure of large reading in the future. There are fairer fishes in his pages than any swimming in our streams; some sleep of his on the banks of the Merrimack by moonlight that Egypt never rivalled; a morning of which Memnon might have envied the music, and a greyhound he once had, meant for Adonis; frogs, better than any of Aristophanes; apples wilder than Adam's. His senses seemed double, giving him access to secrets not easily read by others; in sagacity resembling that of the beaver,

outwardly appear, yet he was the hearty worshipper of whatsoever is sound and wholesome in nature,-a piece of russet probity and strong sense, that nature delighted to own and honor. His talk was suggestive, subtle, sincere, under as many mask

ed into their souls, not as idolators, but as idealists. His religion was of the most primitive type, inclusive of all natural creatures and things, even to "the sparrow that falls to the ground," though never by shot of his, and for whatsoever was manly in men, his worship was comparable to

man who l

n town, his

streams its

ircumscrib

when he his w

rformed far m

nds he took

muse and mot

self had built his sentences and seasoned the sense of his paragraphs with her own vigor and salubrity

nd little in political or religious establishments answering to his wants, tha

eemen sun themselves in the clefts of rocks, rather than sell their liberty for this pottage of slavery. We, the few honest neighbors, can help one an

and see how soon they must needs go to pieces, the sooner for the virtue thus withdrawn from them. All the manliness of individuals is sunk in that partnership in trade. Not only must I come out of institutions, but come out of myself, if I will be free and independent. Shall one be denied the privilege on coming of mature age of choosing whether he will be a

gh born to b

econdary

rving man an

n state through

sole trust in my own strength of body and soul." The ancient crest of a pick-axe, with the motto, "Either I will find a way or make one,"

in his

.' Again, 'Earl Rognvald was King Harald's dearest friend, and the king had the greatest regard for him. He was married to Hilda, a daughter of Rolf Nalfia, and their sons were Rolf and Thorer. Rolf became a great Viking, and of so stout a growth that no horse could carry him, and wheresoever he went, he went on foot, and therefore he was

ent, got the same territory his father Rognvald had possessed. His brother Einar going into battle to take vengeance on h

Thorer sit

de the mead b

at 'he cut a spread eagle on

the family were descended the kings o

nal I find

thoughtless, sh

e this being

when upon a

rust, more than

y, unpainted boards, its grassy, unfenced door-yard. The house is somewhat isolate and remote from thoroughfares. The Virginia road is an old-fashioned, winding, at length deserted pathway, the more smiling for its forked orchards, tumbling walks, and mossy banks. About the house are pleasant, sunny meadows, deep with their beds of peat

ariable an ancestry as can well be afforded, with marked family characters on both sides. About a year and a half from Henry's birth, the family removed to the town of Chelmsford, thence to Boston, coming back, however, to Concord when he was of a very tender age; his earliest memory of most of the town was a ride to Walden Pond with his grandmother, when he thought that he should be glad to live there. He

er weak or near-sighted; the forehead not unusually broad or high, full of concentrated energy and purpose; the mouth, with prominent lips, pursed up with meaning and thought when shut, and giving out when open a stream of the most varied and unusual and instructive sayings. His hair was a dark brown, exceedingly abundant, fine, and soft, and for several years he wore a comely beard. His whole figure had an active earnestness as if he had not a moment to waste. The clenched hand betokened purpose. In walking he made a short cut if he could, and

ery Ch

-PRI

sday

f-privacy in

th, and lines t

ortable, if simply dispatched. And the more significant, as the more familiar and private. Life were the less sweet and companionable if cumbered with affairs, overloaded with thought, dizzied

clipses, darke

are our b

s leaves; or perhaps the newspaper, once an accident, and coming irregularly, links his evening with morning, morning with evening; newspaper before breakfast, before business, before sleep; daily bread. One almost defines his culture, his social standing, by the journals he takes. Observe the difference between persons and neighborhoods familiar with current newspapers and those who are not. Very different from the times when a country boy must ride his miles after his Saturday's work to get some glimmering of what

plicable to the superficial culture which this of itself fosters: "Total ignorance were in no wise a thing so vile and wick

tely the census of civility, and cast the horoscope of the coming time. Nor do I sympathize with some of my friends in their dislike of reporters. One defends himself from intrusion, as a general rule; but where the public have a generous interest in one's thoughts, his occupation

Y LEC

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rve preservation. They have relation to the drift of thinking in our New-England community especially, and are of historical importance. If not accepting all that has been spoken on this platform by the successive speakers, one may take a hearty interest in these adventures into the world of thought and duty; nor can any who have attended steadily from Sunday to Sunday question their ser

ship of some of our most cultivated persons,-scholarships being provided for such as had not the means of defraying the necessary expenses,-thus enabling bright young men and women, whether college graduates or not, to complete what colleges do not give. Not every student comes into that intellectual sympathy with his prof

ER

day,

green bough, or an apple, so you, Ph?drus, it would seem, might lead me about all Attica, and, indeed, wherever else you please, by extending to me discourses out of your books." Not less aptly Goethe describes him, in his letters to Schiller, where he calls the rhapsodist, "A wise man, who, in calm thoughtfulness, shows what has happened; his discourse aiming less to excite than to calm his auditors, in order that they shall listen to him with contentment and long. He apportions the inte

we listen. Even his hesitancy between the delivery of his periods, his perilous passages from paragraph to paragraph of manuscript, we have almost learned to like, as if he were but sorting his keys meanwhile for opening his cabinets; the spring of locks following, himself seeming as eager as any of us to get sight of his specimens as they come forth from their pro

of mild

r-coated

ling winds th

one to the ru

however it may chance chime with its accompaniments in the piece, as a waltz of wandering stars, a dance of Hesperus with Orion. His rhetoric dazzles by its circuits, contrasts, antitheses; imagination, as in all sprightly minds, being his wand of Power. He comes along his own paths, too, and in his own fashion. What though he build his piers downwards from the firmament to the tumbling tides, and so throw his radiant span across the fissures of his

, since his art, more than another's, has clothed it with beauty, and made it the place of popular resort, our purest organ of intellectual entertainment for New England and the Western cities. And besides this, its immediate value to his auditors everywhere, it has been serviceable in ways they least suspect; most of his works, having had t

cely mind

to keep a

poets would se

ehold them

audiences; in the smallest towns, and to the humblest companies. Such has been his appeal to the mind of his countrymen, such his acceptance by them. He has read lectures in the principal cities of England also. A poet, speaking to individuals as few others can speak, and to persons in their privileged moments, he is heard as none other

is views have wrought in our methods of thinking; how he has won over the bigot, the unbeliever, at l

hining

ect ch

hornets o

m a brie

hought ha

ound library's

arious wisdom

in which wisdom and fair learning are, for the most part, held at arm's-length, planets' width, from his grasp, by graduating from this college. His books are surcharged with vigorous thoughts

Bacon, Selden, Sir Thomas Browne, Cowley, Coleridge, Goethe,-with whose delightful essays, notwithstanding all the pleasure they give us, we still plead our disappointment at not having been admi

e delightful deference ever to our free sense and right of opinion. He might take for his motto the sentiment of Henry More, where, speaking of himself, he says: "Exquisite disquisition begets diffidence; diffidence in knowledge, humility; humility, good manners and meek conversation. For my part, I desir

method is that of the sun against his rival for the cloak, and so is free from any madness of those, who, forgetting the strength of the solar ray, go blustering against men's prejudices, as if the wearers would run at once against these winds of opposition into their arms for shelter. What higher praise can we bestow on any one than to say of

than these ordinarily furnish. Yet to gratify this is a task as difficult as delicate, requiring a diffidency akin to that with which one would accos

things, he seeks all accessible displays of both for draping his thoughts and works. And how is his page produced? Is it imaginable that he conceives his piece as a whole, and then sits down to execute his task at a heat? Is not this imaginable rather, and the key to the construction of his works? Living for composition as few authors can, and holding company, studies, sleep, exercise, affairs, subservient to thought, his products are gathered as they ripen, stored in his commonplaces; their contents transcribed at intervals, and classified. It is the order of ideas, of imagination observed in the arrangement, not of logical seq

ic sorrow swe

rnished their perspectives, rounded and melodized them. These good things have been talked and slept over, meditated standing and sitting, read and polished in the utterance, submitted to all various tests, and, so accepted, they pass into print. Light fancies, dreams, moods, refrains, were set on foot, and sent jauntin

content with th

, slender and s

in haunts which

ood-gods over

the freedom o

secret senate

angerous lords t

planets partie

y rock-like,

ays of thought

s, in sweeping sh

ley;-break awa

morn's soft a

ling by yon lo

ff, and nearer

ying before fro

sing a delic

tardy concer

arer rides th

d, the marriag

lemnized. The

ummer's beauty

e, hill-side,

th Genius. Yon

faces in a th

gentle

lore of colors

ble tenement

e of gener

g concords

nts and in the

inked purpose

prize, found

me plain-deali

und me impoli

me, but in v

low of the

d that bent me

e can heal. A

er-grapes, a m

or rock-lov

y worst

ood-gods murmu

manners? Canst

pride forgot,

r night's exti

shine now,

tent feel th

-worshipped moon

, stems, foliag

ne, none are

bounds of social or literary decorum. What is more delightful than personal magnetism? 'Tis the charm of good fellowship as of good writing. To get and to give the largest measure of satisfaction, to fill ourselves with the nectar of select experiences, not without some intertinctures of egotism so charming in a companion, is what we seek in books of the class of his, as in their authors. We associate diffidence properly with learning, fr

virtu

umors, and at

ding can spoil. Sometimes manners the most distant are friendly foils for holding eager dispositions subject to the measures of r

t with words,

bsent, and thy

ve me with a f

ove with zeal

ate, the bold

e avowed, and

embered as unlike any others in his calendar of experiences. I may say for me they have made ideas possible by hospitalities given to a fellowship so enjoyable. Shall I describe them as s

will, foreknowl

r

'ring ma

Milton

ain through sta

cending to th

place and poise for customary employment; half a dozen annually being full as many as the stoutest heads may well undertake without detriment. Certa

ve no mea

their

vinity of friendship come down from childhood, and surviving yet in memory if not in expectation, the rumor of excellence of any sort being like the arrival of a new gift to mankind, and he the first to proffer his recognition and hope. His affection for conversation, for clubs, is a lively intimation of this relig

like Tacitus, to be quoted as a masterpiece of historical painting, and perpetuating the New-Englander's fame with that of his race. 'Tis a victory of eyes over hands, a triumph of ideas. Nor has there been for some time any criticism of a people so characteristic and complete. It remains for him to do like justice to New England. Not a metaph

ve men, had something whereof man did not partake, pure intellect and knowledge, and they kept on their way quietly. The beasts, being below men, had something whereof man had less, sense and growth, so they li

Genius ranges through this threefold dominion,

ividing prism, the resident never long of the tracts he surveyed, yet their persistent Muse nevertheless? And so housed in the Mind, and sallying forth from thence in quest of his game, whether of persons or things, he was the Mercury, the merchantman of ideas to his century. Nor was he

ng times, these masterly Idealists substantiate beyond all question thei

REA

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most a month later, our winter hardly opening till New-year's, nor spring till All Fools' Day, the date of which can hardly fall amiss, and with All Saints' may be left indefinite in wit's almanac. Doubtless there is a closer sympathy than we suspect between souls and

t every

am to p

hen the s

tastic

fire, th

dhead dot

d, my lines

byls, throu

next the

kes, or do

cy carols,

spirit co

things into his diction, and clothe them in a rhetoric robust and racy, addressing the senses and mind at once. One is surprised at finding how a little exercise, though taken for the thousandth time, and along familiar haunts even, refreshes and strengthens body and mind. A turn about his grounds, a sally into the woods, climbing the hill-top, sauntering by brook-sides, brings him back with new senses and a new soul. One's h

ere else is conversation possible? A countryman without an open fire will consider whether he can afford to spend himself and family to spare his wood-lot. It was comforting to see the other day on a bookseller's counter, tiles of porcelain, with suggestive

ll, thou lucky

ittering chimne

esirable. For recreation, the due allowance taken from business, leisures

, business, ent

ndisturbed as

would have, but

er, but the cho

e a cott

, and shoul

is use, n

, manners of the inmates, and are not to be left out of account. Yet, without nobility to grace them, what were the costly palace, its parlors and parks, luxuries and elegancies, within or without,-the handsome house owing its chief beauty to th

gs money

and int

hat are wicked. By this means the soul will be not only unpolluted, but not disturbed; the fountain will run clear and unsullied, and the streams that flow from it will be just and honest deeds, full of satisfaction, a brisk energy of spirit which makes a man an enthusiast in his joy, and a tenacious memory sweeter than hope, which, as Pi

ALOG

day

be a native or not, less for its natural history an

eared, the rivers

altars vanish

s that intercourse is had seldomer than of old; names of kindred hardly surviving save in the fresh recollections of childhood by the dwellers apart; far more of lif

. We are not the less national for honoring our forefathers. Blood is a history. Blood is a destiny. How persistent it is, let the institutions of England, Old and New, bear testimony, since on this pre

ngue the bards

ir dark knowle

s his prophes

e world of fame

son of Mars, an

t Christian wort

sand more, wh

lable great Sha

and ready to spring in defence of privileges and titles; magnanimous none the less, and merciful, as in the times of St. George and Bonduca. One needs but read Tacitus on the Manners of the Ancient G

pear in individuals. And we best study the fortunes of families, of races and peoples, here at their sources. Even heraldries have their significance. And it

em of watchfulness and of wisdom; of vigilance and of perseverance, and Semper Vi

the

HE C

Lights! wha

of day, hast

bird? To a

ay thou has

etism work

of paradise

eir candle

nd lighted