Having left my note-book at home, I strip off a piece of birch bark for paper . . .

  I sit under the oaks at the east end of Hubbard’s Grove, and hear two wood pewees singing close by . . .

  Channing’s poem “Near Home” was printed (if not published) by James Munroe and Co. Boston. C. brought it to me some seven weeks ago with the remark—“Knowing your objection to manuscript, I got it printed”—and I do not know that he presented it to anyone else. I have not been to the city of late, but Emerson told me that he found a small pile of them at Munroe’s, and bought two or three; though Munroe said that he was forbidden to advertise it. Of course this is equivalent to dedicating it “to whom it may concern.” Others also have bought it, for fifty cents; but C. still persists, in his way, in saying that it is not published. Ought not a poem to publish itself?

  I am glad if you are not weary of the Maine Woods, partly because I have another and a larger slice to come. As for the presidency,—I cannot speak for my neighbors, but, for my own part, I am politically so benighted (or belighted?) that I do not know what Seward’s qualifications are. I know, however, that no one in whom I could feel much interest would stand any chance of being elected. But the nail which is hard to drive is hard to draw.

  Yours truly

  Henry D. Thoreau