Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1890-10-11
A DAY AT BROOK FARM
Visiting tho Scenes Of q Famous En-
terprise.
A TRANSCENDENTAL PICNIC.
incidents Of q Recent Visit 20 tho Home
Of theCommunity-Where Hawthorne
Hoed and Other Famous Men sought
m Ideal Existence.
Written for THE EVENING SrAH.

books and in magazine articles. The
major and were talking Of the names in lit
| erature that had been associated with that
early experiment in communal life, and we
| concluded to spend day in search Of the spot.
There 10 no place in all New England that
l would rather see, said the major. ''Ply-
mouth Rock il all very we'll, but Brook Farm
touches the present generation"
We had very little to guide US az the start.
No one that We met in our vacation knew the
site of the farm, though it Is within 10 miles of
| the heart Of the city OF Boston-and ono of
the most charming spots that can be imag-
ined. 1t is still very much as Hawthorne pic
tured it in 1.-The Biithedaie Romance" Some
| intelligent Bostonese Of whom we inquired
had not 80 much as heard that there was any
such place as Brook Farm. But Conway's life
of Nathaniel Hawthorne. in the Great Writer
SERIES had been noticed in one of the Boston
dailies that week. and from the newspaper
notice we got the general direction. That was
enough, for on such a charming day as we
selected for our searth part OF the enjoyment
would consist in not having too explicit direc-
lions. The major was fond of O walk and q
talk in the perfect Neg England country roads,
So we bought our tickets for the Spring street
station in West Roxbury-a point about 8
miles out on tho Boston and Albany railway.
HUNT FOR THE FARM.
Arrived at the station we asked for Brook
Farm. No one had ever heard Of such Mace.
Then we began to inquire for the Lutheran
Orphan Home, recalling that the place had
been devoted to the uses of an orphanage. A
walk of two miles brought us in sight Of the
classic ground. What would we not have given
if for an hour the scene had shifted to fifty
years ago, when Ripley and Dana and Brisbane
and Hawthorne and George William Curtis
and others, were here in this sylvan retreat
milking cows, making hay and hauling manure
out of what Hawthorne calls 1.-The gold mine {"
That was day when, as Emerson said every
man carried in his vest pocket a scheme for
recognizing society. This group Of enthusiasts
has become famous.
The "Blithedale Romance" calls them q
knot OF visionary transcendentaists, who
were seeking for the better life." Emer-
son seriously weighed the matter and con-
cluded not to join them. looking on the expert
ment as kind of transcendental picnic.
George Ripley the prime mover in the enter
prise and afterward SO well known by long
Years of service on the New York Tribune was
slightingly referred to by Carlyle az a 'Socinian
minister, who left his pulpit in order to reform
the world by cultivating onions"
Only few of the famous group are left. Dana
and Curtis might give US a "reminiscences that
would be OF exceeding interest. Adm Ballou,
one of the company, died during the past
summer. What they did as a community was
very little. Hawthorne soon tired of the dreary
monotony. One day, as he was hoeing corn,
the conviction came over HIM that be was in
some other mans place, and he vanished 1t
was twelve years later that he came
to live in the vicinity and revive
his recollections while writing 'Blithedale"
Here was an honest attempt by sincere men
to make life sweeter. They worked in COM
mon, MIXED cows, dug in the gold mine and
demonstrated for little time that the diamond
can be used in cutting rock. But the sequel
has proved that in the long run the world does
not sympathize with any purely ideal life. 1t
is practical world, in which bills are to be
paid and interest secured. These failing there
will be foreclosure. whether it be Brook Farm
or any other badly managed institution.
PIE AND PHILOSOPHY.
But here we are in sight Of the place. Hun
cry and tired we sit down under great elm,
hail passing bakers wagon, buy an apple pie
and discuss characterization.
The pie crust is a trihe tough and the major
remarks that he always thinks, when eating q
tough pie, OF EmersOns answer to one who re-
buked him for his pie-eating propensity: What
would you do with pie if you didn't eat it?''
Talking of the endurance of the pilgrim
fathers, the major suggests that the pilgrim
mothers were most to be admired. They en-
dured all that the fathers endured and in adj
dition they endured the pilgrim fathers.
"By the way" the ma or said, ''what an
amount OF sarcasm and epigram has been fired
at our early ancestors. The boy wrote in his
school essay that our forefathers came to this
land to worship their own Dictates 1t is a
chestnut about their landing here, falling upon
their knees, then rising to fall upon the aborig-
mes. And even older than that is the remark
that our pilgrim fathers came to this land
where they might be free to worship God and
make everybody else do the same.
The major has merry twinkle in his eyes,
and hrs drolleries are qualnter far than they
can be made to appear on paper.
In talking Of this curious experiment at
Brook Farm | suggest that there is one point
in the incident very much like what transpired
| in the history OF several Japanese who came
to this country and joined one of the Ameri-
can communities. The man who was after
ward minister resident in Washington had
been the baker in the community. Mr. Mort,
who was assassinated year ago, who was hon
ored in many ways by his own government,
the baker of the community of which Thomas
Harris was leader and Laurence Oliphant was
for years member.
as once wearing homespun frock and "tre-
mendous pair Of cowhide boots, with soles two
inches thick, as he writes In May, 184L.
ON COW ISLAND.
Yonder is the knoll which he frequently re-
fers to as the .'Cow Island" 1t rises abruptly
from sea Of green to the height of fifty feet
l.
tence or two from one of Hawthorne's letters
which is still the best description one could
| make of the place:
Mr.. Ripley summoned US into the COW yard
and introduced me to an instrument with four
| prongs, commonly entitled dung fork. With
| this tool / have already assisted to load twenty
or thirty carts of manure and shall take part in
| loading three hundred more. Besides have
! planted potatoes and pease. cut straw and hay
| for the cattle and done various other mighty
works. This very morning l MIXED three cows
| and milk two or three every night and morn
| ing. The weather has been SO unfavorable
that we have worked comparatively little in the
/ fields.
"This is one of the most beautiful places
ever saw III my life and secluded as if it were
| hundred miles from any city or village.
! There are woods in which can ramble all
day without meeting anybody or scarcely see
| ing house Our house stands apart from the
| main road, SO that We are not troubled even
with passengers looking at us. Once in a while
/ we have transcendental visitor, such as MIR.
| Alcott; but generally we pass whole days with
out seeing q single face save those OF the breth-
| rem. The whole fraternity eat together, aud
such delectable way of life has never been
| seen on earth since the days Of the early Chris
tlans." This letter was signed ''Nath. Haw-
| thorne, Ploughman."
II seems little singular that four men out
| OF this famous group-Greeley, Ripley. Dana
and Curtis-should later become the great
lights Of the newspaper fraternity in New
York. Horace Greeley's interest in Brook
Farm was deep and genuine. A clever rhym-
ster of that day ridiculed the movement in
verse. which hit off the ludicrous side of the
Brook farmers picnic. Some of the lines ran
thus:
| "And others. once as poor rs IL
| are ErowInx rich because they try.