Log Search Results

After 15 August 1844. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in reply to Isaac Thomas Hecker’s letter of 15 August:

  I improve the occasion of my mothers sending to acknowledge the receipt of your stirring letter. You have probably received mine by this time. I thank you for not anticipating any vulgar objections on my part—Far travel, very far travel, or travail, comes near to the worth of staying at home—Who knows whence his education is to come! Perhaps I may drag my anchor at length, or rather when the winds which blow over the deep fill of my sails, may stand away for distant ports—for now I seem to have a firm ground anchorage, though the harbor is low-shored enough, and the traffic with the natives inconsiderable—I may be away to Singapoor by the next tide.

  I like well the ring of your last maxim—“It is only the fear of death makes us reason of impossibilities”—and but for fear death itself is an impossibility.

  Believe me I can hardly let it end so. If you do not go soon let me hear from you again.

Yrs in great haste
Henry D. Thoreau

(The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau, 158)
after 16 January 1842. Concord, Mass.

Lidian Jackson Emerson writes to her sister Lucy Jackson Brown:

  You have received my letter with the news of J Thoreau’s [John Thoreau Jr.] death, I suppose before this time. Mr E [Ralph Waldo Emerson] gave it to G. P. B. [George Patridge Bradford] to take to you. Seldom has a death caused a more general feeling of regret—every one speaks in praise of the departed—heartily too not in commonplace expressions. Mr Frost [Brazillai Frost] preached last Sunday a funeral sermon in which he portrayed an uncommonly beautiful character and yet did no more than justice as it seemed to me. Henry behaves worthily of himself. He says John is not lost but nearer to him than ever for he knows him better than he ever did before and to know a friend better brings him nearer. I asked him if this sudden fate gave any shock to John when he first was aware of his danger. He said “none at all.” After J. had taken leave of all the family he said to Henry now sit down and talk to me of Nature and Poetry. I shall be a good listener for it is difficult for me to interrupt you. During the hour in which he died, he looked at Henry with “a transcendent smile full of Heaven” (I think this was H’s expression) and Henry “found himself returning it and this was the last communication that passed between them.” A few weeks I believe before John’s death he gave Sophia [Sophia Thoreau] some verses he had written religious verses. Mr Frost introduced them in his sermon—Mr E. thinks them very good which is great praise if his fastidious taste is correct—
(The Selected Letters of Lidian Jackson Emerson, 100)
After 16 July 1845. Walden Pond.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  I have carried an apple in my pocket to-night—a sopsivine they call it—till, now that I take my handkerchief out, it has got so fine a fragrance that it really seems like a friendly trick of some pleasant dæmon to entertain me with. It is redolent of sweet scented orchards of innocent teeming harvests I realize the existence of a goddess Pomona, and that the gods have really intended that men should feed divinely, like themselves, on their own nectar and ambrosia. They have so painted this fruit, and freighted it with such a fragrance, that it satisfies much more than an animal appetite.
(Journal, 1:371-372)

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  When I play my flute to-night, earnest as if to leap the bounds [of] that narrow fold where human life is penned, and range the surrounding plain, I hear echo from a neighboring wood a stolen pleasure, occasionally not rightfully heard, much more for other ears than ours, for ‘t is the reverse of sound. It is not our own melody that comes back to us, but an amended strain. And I would only hear myself as I would hear my echo, corrected and repronounced for me. It is as when my friend reads my verse.
(Journal, 1:375)
after 16 September 1841. Concord, Mass.

Ralph Waldo Emerson writes to Margaret Fuller:

  Richard [Fuller, Margaret’s brother] whom I like very much has come back from his walk with Henry T. and says he will not come, which I regret (The Letters of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 2:450).
After 2 September 1850. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  One of my neighbors of whom I borrowed a horse, cart and harness to-day, which last was in a singularly dilapidated condition, considering that he is a wealthy farmer, did not know but I would make a book about it (Journal, 2:62).
after 21 August 1838. Concord, Mass.

Ralph Waldo Emerson includes Thoreau in a list of people to whom he sends his Divinity College Address (The Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 12:180).

After 21 June? 1850.

Thoreau travels to Cape Cod alone via steamer from Boston to Provincetown (Cape Cod, 1).

After 23 April 1858. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes to Mary Brown Dunton:

  I think that they [Mayflowers] amount to more than grow in Concord. The blood-root also, which we have not at all, had not suffered in the least. Part of it is transferred to my sister’s garden. Preserving one splendid vase full, I distributed the rest of the Mayflowers among my neighbors, Mrs. Emerson, Mrs. Ripley, Mr. Hoar and others . . . They have sweetened the air of a good part of the town ere this… I should be glad to show you my Herbarium, which is very large; and in it you would recognize many specimens which you contributed… Please remember me to Father and Mother, whom I shall not fail to visit whenever I come to Brattleboro, also to the Chesterfield mountain, if you can communicate with it; I suppose it has not budged an inch.
(The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau, 510)
After 23 December 1845. Walden Pond.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  [Alek] Therien, the wood chopper, was here yesterday, and while I was cutting wood, some chickadees hopped near pecking the bark and chips and the potato-skins I had thrown out. “What do you call them,” he asked. I told him. “What do you call them,” asked I. “Mezezence,” I think he said. “When I eat my dinner in the woods,” said he, “sitting very still, having kindled a fire to warm my coffee, they come and light on my arm and peck at the potato in my fingers. I like to have the little fellers about me.” Just then one flew up from the snow and perched on the wood I was holding in my arms, and pecked it, and looked me familiarly in the face.

 

(Journal, 1:399)
after 26 February 1842. Concord, Mass.

Lidian Jackson Emerson writes to her husband Ralph Waldo:

  Henry is better-nearly well. But his headache or the cause of it, made his eyes so weak that he did not read or write much for two days or more (The Selected Letters of Lidian Jackson Emerson, 105).

Return to the Log Index

Donation

$