In October I a-graping to the river meadows, and loaded
myself ers more precious for ty and fragrance
too, I admired, t gathe
cranberries, small s of the meadow grass, pearly
and red, whe
smoothe bushel
and to Boston and
Neined to be jammed, to satisfy tastes of lovers of
Nature tcongues of bison out of the
prairie grass, regardless of torn and drooping plant. the
barberrys brilliant fruit
I collected a small store of wild apples for coddling, whe
proprietor and travellers nuts were ripe
I laid up er. It ing at t
season to roam tnut hey
noh a bag on my
sick to open burs
al for t, amid tling of leaves and the loud
reproofs of ts
I sometimes stole, for ted o
contain sound ones. Occasionally I climbed and srees.
tree, w
overs, he
most of its
fruit; t coming in flocks early in the morning and picking
ts out of these
trees to ted tant woods composed wholly of
cnut. ts, as far as t, itute
for bread. Many otitutes might, perhaps, be found.
Digging one day for fis (Apios
tuberosa) on its string, tato of t of
fabulous fruit, if I had ever dug and
eaten in cold, and dreamed it. I had
often since seen its crumpled red velvety blossom supported by the
stems of ots kno to be the same.
Cultivation erminated it. It isaste,
muc of a frost-bitten potato, and I found it better
boiled ted. tuber seemed like a faint promise of
Nature to rear some
future period. In tted cattle and waving
grain-fields t, em of an Indian
tribe, is quite forgotten, or knos flo
let ure reign ender and luxurious
English grains will probably disappear before a myriad of foes, and
t seed
of corn to t cornfield of t,
; but t
exterminated ground-nut will pere of
frosts and self indigenous, and resume its ancient
importance and dignity as t of ter tribe. Some Indian
Ceres or Minerva must or and besto; and
ring of
nuts may be represented on our .
Already, by t of September, I hree
small maples turned scarlet across te
stems of t t of a promontory, next
ter. Aale told! And gradually from
o er of eacree came out, and it admired
itself reflected in the
manager of tituted some neure, distinguished
by more brilliant or he
walls.
to my lodge in October, as to er
quarters, and settled on my he walls
overimes deterring visitors from entering. Each morning,
, but I did
not trouble myself muco get rid of t complimented
by ter. they never
molested me seriously, they
gradually disappeared, into know, avoiding
er and unspeakable cold.
Like t into er quarters in
November, I used to resort to t side of alden, which
ted from tcony shore,
made t is so mucer and
han by an
artificial fire. I till glowing embers
wed er, .
o build my cudied masonry. My bricks,
being second-o be cleaned rowel, so
t I learned more ties of bricks and
troar on ty years old, and o be
still grohose sayings which men
love to repeat . Such sayings
t would
take many bloroo clean an old hem.
Many of tamia are built of second-hand bricks
of a very good quality, obtained from the
cement on till. may
be, I ruck by tougeel which bore
so many violent blo being . As my bricks had been
in a c read the name of
Nebuc its many fireplace bricks as I
could find, to save e, and I filled tween
t tones from the pond shore, and
also made my mortar e sand from the same place. I
lingered most about t vital part of the
ely, t t
the morning, a course of bricks raised a few inches
above t nig I did not get a
stiff neck for it t I remember; my stiff neck is of older date.
I took a poet to board for a fortnig times, which
caused me to be put to it for room. his own knife,
to scour ting to
the labors of cooking. I was pleased
to see my ed,
t, if it proceeded slo ed to endure a long
time. to some extent an independent structure,
standing on to the heavens;
even after t still stands sometimes, and its
importance and independence are apparent. tohe end
of summer. It was now November.
to cool t
took many eady bloo accomplis, it is so deep.
o evening, before I plastered my house,
ticularly he numerous
c I passed some cheerful evenings in
t cool and airy apartment, surrounded by the rough brown boards
full of knots, and rafters he bark on high overhead. My house
never pleased my eye so mucer it ered, though I was
obliged to confess t it able. S every
apartment in e some
obscurity over evening
about ters? to the fancy and
imagination tings or ot expensive
furniture. I no began to in my house, I may say, when I
began to use it for er. I a couple
of old fire-dogs to keep t did me
good to see t form on the chimney which I had
built, and I poked t and more satisfaction
tertain an
ec; but it seemed larger for being a single apartment and
remote from neigtractions of a house were
concentrated in one room; it chen, chamber, parlor, and
keeping-room; and isfaction parent or cer or
servant, derive from living in a all. Cato
says, ter of a family (patremfamilias) must have in his
rustic villa quot;cellam oleariam, vinariam, dolia multa, uti lubeat
caritatem expectare, et rei, et virtuti, et gloriae erit,quot; t is,
quot;an oil and it may be pleasant to
expect imes; it ue, and
glory.quot; I atoes, about ts
of peas tle rice, a
jug of molasses, and of rye and Indian meal a peck each.
I sometimes dream of a larger and more populous anding
in a golden age, of enduring materials, and gingerbread
of only one room, a vast, rude,
substantial, primitive ceiling or plastering, h
bare rafters and purlins supporting a sort of lower heaven over
ones o keep off rain and snow, whe king and
queen posts stand out to receive your homage, when you have done
reverence to trate Saturn of an older dynasty on stepping
over t reacorch
upon a pole to see the fireplace,
some in ttles, some at one end
of t anot on rafters he
spiders, if t into when you
side door, and the
raveller may
furter as you o reach in a
tempestuous nigaining all tials of a house, and
notreasures of
t one vies peg, t a man
s once kitcry, parlor, corehouse,
and garret; whing, as a barrel or a
ladder, so convenient a t boil,
and pay your respects to t cooks your dinner, and the
oven t bakes your bread, and ture and utensils
are ts; out, nor the
fire, nor tress, and perimes requested to
move from off trap-door, he
cellar, and so learn wh
you stamping. A
as a birds nest, and you cannot go in at t door and out at
t seeing some of its inants;
is to be presented to be
carefully excluded from seven eig, s up in a particular
cell, and told to make yourself at ary
confinement. No does not admit you to h,
but to build one for yourself somewhere in his
alley, and ality is t of keeping you at test
distance. t the cooking as if he had a
design to poison you. I am a I have been on many a mans
premises, and mig I am not
a I visit in my
old clothes a king and queen who lived simply in such a house as I
backing out of a
modern palace I so learn, if ever I am
caught in one.
It he very language of our parlors would lose
all its nerve and degenerate into palaver w
suceness from its symbols, and its metapropes are
necessarily so far fetcers, as it
chen and
workshe parable of a dinner,
commonly. As if only t near enougo Nature and
truto borrorope from the scholar, who dwells
a territory or tell w is
parliamentary in tchen?
s were ever bold enougo
stay and eat a y-pudding w crisis
approac a y retreat rat would shake
to its foundations. Nevert stood through a
great many y-puddings.
I did not plaster till it over
some e
s, a sort of conveyance which would have
tempted me to go muche
meanhe ground on every side. In
lato be able to send h a
single blo ion to transfer the
plaster from to tly and rapidly. I remembered
tory of a conceited felloo
lounge about to uring
one day to substitute deeds for words, urned up his cuffs,
seized a plasterers board, and ro
mis look tohing overhead, made a
bold gesture traigo e
discomfiture, received tents in his ruffled bosom. I
admired aneering, which so
effectually ss out takes a handsome finish, and I
learned ties to werer is liable. I
o see y the bricks were which drank up all
ture in my plaster before I , and how many
pailfuls of er it takes to cen a new he
previous er made a small quantity of lime by burning the shells
of tilis, whe sake of
t; so t I knew werials came from. I
mig good limestone
myself, if I o do so.
t and
s coves, some days or even he general
freezing. t ice is especially interesting and perfect,
being ransparent, and affords t opportunity
t ever offers for examining ttom w is shallow; for
you can lie at your lengter
insect on ter, and study ttom at your
leisure, only tant, like a picture behind a
glass, and ter is necessarily alhere are
many furroure ravelled about and
doubled on its tracks; and, for is strehe cases
of caddis-e grains of z. Perhaps
t, for you find some of the
furroo make. But the
ice itself is t of most interest, t improve
t opportunity to study it. If you examine it closely the
morning after it freezes, you find t ter part of the
bubbles, appeared to be , are against its
under surface, and t more are continually rising from ttom;
ively solid and dark, t is, you
see ter t. tieto an
eiger, very clear and beautiful, and you see
your face reflected in ty or
forty of to a square inche
ice narro half an inch long,
sener, if te
frese sply above another, like a
string of beads. But t so numerous nor
obvious as times used to cast on stones to try
trengthrough carried in
air e bubbles
beneato ty-eight hours
after till perfect,
tinctly by
t as t two days had been
very noransparent,
ser, and ttom, but
opaque and hick was hardly
stronger tly expanded under
t and run toget ty; they were no
longer one directly over anot often like silvery coins
poured from a bag, one overlapping anothin flakes, as if
occupying sligy of t
oo late to study ttom. Being curious to know w
position my great bubbles occupied o the new ice, I
broke out a cake containing a middling sized one, and turned it
bottom uphe bubble,
so t it was whe
lo close against ttish, or perhaps
sligicular, er of an inch deep
by four incer; and I o find t
directly under ted regularity
in to t of five eighths of
an incition the
er and thick; and in many
places tition out downward,
and probably t all under t bubbles,
er. I inferred t te number
of minute bubbles the under surface
of t eacs
degree, ed like a burning-glass on to melt
and rot it. ttle air-guns e to make
the ice crack and whoop.
At lengter set in good earnest, just as I had finished
plastering, and to had
not o do so till t after nighe geese
came lumbering in tling of wings,
even after to alight in
alden, and some flying looward Fair haven, bound
for Mexico. Several times, ten
or eleven oclock at nigread of a flock of geese,
or else ducks, on the woods by a pond-hole behind
my d honk or
quack of they hurried off. In 1845 alden froze
entirely over for t time on t of the 22d of
December, Flints and othe river having
been frozen ten days or more; in 46, t the
31st; and in 50, about th of
January; in 53, t of December. the snow had already covered
th of November, and surrounded me suddenly
er. I farto my shell,
and endeavored to keep a brighin
my breast. My employment out of doors noo collect the dead
, bringing it in my hands or on my shoulders, or
sometimes trailing a dead pine tree under eaco my shed. An
old forest fence days haul for
me. I sacrificed it to Vulcan, for it serving the god
terminus. eresting an event is t mans supper
o , nay, you might say,
steal, to cook it are s.
ts and e s
of most of our too support many fires, but
he young wood.
the
summer I of pitche bark on,
pinned toget. this I
ly on ter soaking then
lying ly sound, terlogged
past drying. I amused myself one er day his
piecemeal across ting beh
one end of a log fifteen feet long on my sher on
tied several logs togethe, and
t the end,
dragged tely erlogged and almost as
only burned long, but made a very fire;
nay, I t t tter for the
pitcer, burned longer, as in a lamp.
Gilpin, in of t borderers of England, says
t quot;ts of trespassers, and the houses and fences
t,quot; ;considered as great
nuisances by t law, and were severely punished under
tures, as tending ad terrorem ferarum -- ad
nocumentum forestae, etc.,quot; to tening of the
detriment of t. But I erested in tion
of t more ters or woodchoppers,
and as muche Lord arden himself; and if any
part myself by accident, I grieved
lasted longer and
of tors; nay, I grieved dohe
proprietors t our farmers w down
a forest felt some of t awe whey
came to t in t to, a consecrated grove (lucum
conlucare), t is, it is sacred to some god.
tory offering, and prayed, ever god or
goddess t to o me,
my family, and cc.
It is remarkable ill put upon wood even in
try, a value more permanent and
universal t of gold. After all our discoveries and
inventions no man is as precious to
us as it o our Saxon and Norman ancestors. If their
bo, ocks of it. Micy
years ago, says t the price of wood for fuel in New York and
P;nearly equals, and sometimes exceeds, t of t
al annually requires more
to tance
of tivated plains.quot; In tohe
price of steadily, and tion is, how
muc is to be t . Mechanics
and tradesmen on no other errand,
are sure to attend tion, and even pay a high price for
ter t is now many
years t men ed to t for fuel and the
materials of ts: the
Parisian and t, the farmer and Robin hood, Goody Blake and
parts of t,
till a feicks from
t to her could I do
them.
Every man looks at ion. I
love to ter to
remind me of my pleasing work. I had an old axe which nobody
claimed, er days, on the sunny side of
t tumps of my
bean-field. As my driver prophey warmed
me ting they
no fuel could give out more . As for
to get to quot;jumpquot; it;
but I jumped ting a o
it, made it do. If it least rue.
A fe pine treasure. It is
interesting to remember ill
concealed in ten
gone prospecting over some bare ch pine wood
ood, and got out t pine roots. t
indestructible. Stumps ty or forty years old, at least, will
still be sound at the sapwood has all become
vegetable mould, as appears by thick bark forming
a ring level ant from the
. ithe
marroore, yelloallow, or as if you ruck on a
vein of gold, deep into t commonly I kindled my fire
, wored up in my shed
before t makes the
woodche woods. Once in a
tle of ting
too gave notice to the various
s of alden vale, by a smoky streamer from my
c I was awake.--
Light-winged Smoke, Icarian bird,
Melting t,
Lark song, and messenger of dawn,
Circling above ts as t;
Or else, departing dream, and shadowy form
Of midnigs;
By nigar-veiling, and by day
Darkening t and blotting out the sun;
Go th,
And ask to pardon this clear flame.
cut, t little of t,
anster times left a good
fire o take a er afternoon; and when I
returned, ter ill alive and
gloy t was as if I
a c
lived trusthy. One
day, ting t I
look in at t on fire; it was
time I remember to icularly anxious on this
score; so I looked and sa a spark my bed, and I
in and extinguis w had burned a place as big as my
my ered a position, and
its roof I could afford to let t in
t any er day.
ted in my cellar, nibbling every tato, and
making a snug bed even t after plastering and
of bro animals love comfort and h
as er only because they are so
careful to secure them. Some of my friends spoke as if I was coming
to to freeze myself. the animal merely makes a
bed, man,
ment,
and , instead of robbing his bed, in
ed of more cumbrous clotain
a kind of summer in t of er, and by means of windows
even admit t, and thus he
goes a step or tinct, and saves a little time for the
fine arts. to t blasts a
long time, my orpid, whe
genial atmospies and
prolonged my life. But t luxuriously tle to
boast of in t, nor need rouble ourselves to speculate
last destroyed. It o
cut time tle s from the
norting from Cold Fridays and Great Sno a
little colder Friday, or greater sno a period to mans
existence on the globe.
t er I used a small cooking-stove for economy, since
I did not o; but it did not keep fire so he
open fireplace. Cooking part, no longer a
poetic, but merely a c ten, in
toves, t o roast potatoes in the ashes,
after tove not only took up room and
scented t it concealed t as if I had
lost a companion. You can alhe
laborer, looking into it at evening, purifies s of the
dross and earted during the day.
But I could no longer sit and look into tinent
recurred to me h new force.--
quot;Never, brigo me
thy.
but my up?
but my fortunes sunk so lo?
th and hall,
t welcomed and beloved by all?
as tence too fanciful
For our lifes common light, who are so dull?
Did t gleam mysterious converse hold
its too bold?
ell, rong, for no
Beside a ,
a fire
arms feet and o more aspire;
By ilitarian heap
t may sit doo sleep,
Nor fear ts w walked,
And of talked.quot;