Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1875-04-16
EMERSON AND THOREAU.
correspondent of the New York Times hay

A correspondent of the New York Times hay
ing visited Concord, Mass, writes as follows:
About quarter of mile further on, we came
to the home of Ralph Waldo Emerson. 1t is
quadrangular building with three red chimneys,
standing back short distance from the street, and
is surrounded by rather pretty grove Of ash and
pine trees. 1t has more modern look than the
Hawthorne and Alcott homesteads, and is in toll
cradle repair. A stranger would hardly single 1t
out as different from other houses, and it is only
the fame Of its owner That sheds around 1t such an
air of romance and interest. Within its walls
have been thought and written those wonderful
essays which have puzzled the best theologians of
the day, and there also were created the sweet
sentiments of poesy and prose that have won for
him the reputation he now possesses as poet, an
essayist, and philosopher. If you GO through
the house you will be struck by its remarkable
quiet, its neatness, and its air of comfort MIR.
Emersons study is the chief feature of attraction.
1t is commodous, well lighted, and not very dis
orderly, as are the studies of most great writers.
Books Of travel, Of philosophy, history, science,
theology, art, education, volumes of foreign books,
the magazines OF the world, reports of Legisla.
lures, societies. and literary organizations, daily
papers, weekly papers, religious papers, papers on
all and every subject. are piled up in heaps; the
shelves are heavily laden with their weight, the
floor is strewn with them and the room is filled
with theirinhuence.
We left the grounds of the great transcendent-
alist after brief stay, and slowly drove into
town. After passing the old First Church, which
stood there during the days Of the Revolution, we
entered the square, and turning down very quiet
but comfortable street, reached, after few min
utes' ride, the house Of Thoreau before he became
a hermit. 1t is now occupied by Mr.. Frank San
born, the concord school-master," as they call
him in Boston, one of the editors of the Spring
field Republican. Thence we proceeded to Wal
den Grove where the dreamy and eccentric writer
| lived for years in rude hut. Some Of the re-
mains of his hermitage stand yet, and the cellar
can easily be distinguished. He was out Of pa
thence with society and its customs. He never
was married, he never voted, never attended
church, and he never paid taxes. He was ar
rested once by the Town Constable, who tried to
collect his tax, and after brief Imprisonment he
was set at liberty. In 1916, in order to completely
separate himself from the world. he constructed
this shanty, and lived there in quiet and solitude
The house cost him $28.l2h. His crop Of beans
and vegetables the first year valued at $23. A.
and the outgoes were Ssl472 for groceries he paid
in eight months 1914, and for clothing, $50
making a total expenditure during the year OF
SOL .093-4. He was q confirmed misanthrope, sell
fish and stubborn, and he lived complete litera.
ry barbarism. Lowell said of him: "The tub Of
Dogenes had sounder bottom; he squatted on
another mans land he borrowed an axe; his
boards his nails, his bricks, his mortar, his books,
his lamp, his fish-hook, his plough, his hoe-all
turn States evidences against him, as an accom-
pce in the sin of that artificial civilization which
| rendered it possible that such person as Henry
d. Thoreau should exist at all"