United States or Cuba ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Mine, probably, was the first human shape that they had seen all day long, at least, if they had been stationary in that spot; but perhaps they had winged their way over miles and miles of country, had breakfasted on the summit of Greylock, and dined at the base of Wachusett, and were merely come to sup and sleep among the quiet woods of Concord.
I cannot now reconstitute from memory the sequence of my mental processes; but while my problem was still wrestling with my brain there dawned upon me one of those concrete perceptions which turn inward darkness into light give substance to shadow. The Wachusett was lying at Callao, the seaport of Lima, as dull a coast town as one could dread to see.
Two large birds wheeled and hovered above it, high in the blue, fronting the sunlight. "Eagles, by Jove!" cried Sir Oliver. Ruth drew a breath and watched them. She had never before seen an eagle. "Will they have their nest in the cliffs?" she asked. "Perhaps. . . . No, more likely they come from Wachusett; more likely still, from the mountains beyond. They are here seeking food."
But next winter, when I saw the "yellow-birds" and the red-poll linnets feeding together in Commonwealth Avenue, I thought at once of my Wachusett friend. Here was the very scene he had so faithfully described, some of the flock with no red at all, some with red crowns, and a few with bright carmine crowns and breasts.
Verplanck, Gulian Crommelin, literary rank, 33. Virginia, University of, 299. Volcano, illustration, 113. Voltaire, 409. Voting, done reluctantly, 152, 153. Wachusett, Mount, 70. Walden Pond: allusion, 22, 70, 72; cabin, 142, 143. War: outgrown, 88, 89; ennobling, 298. Ware, Henry, professorship, 52. Ware, Henry, Jr.: Boston ministry, 55; correspondence, 124-127.
It was at no time darker than twilight within the tent, and we could easily see the moon through its transparent roof as we lay; for there was the moon still above us, with Jupiter and Saturn on either hand, looking down on Wachusett, and it was a satisfaction to know that they were our fellow-travellers still, as high and out of our reach as our own destiny.
The Andover sunsets blazed behind Wachusett, and between the one window of my little room and the fine head of the mountain nothing intervened.
There lay Wachusett, the object of our journey, lowering upon us with unchanged proportions, though with a less ethereal aspect than had greeted our morning gaze, while further north, in successive order, slumbered its sister mountains along the horizon. We could get no further into the Aeneid than atque altae moenia Romae, and the wall of high Rome,
I don't mind telling you that your help in the matter was of the greatest value; and when Greenfield got up in the Senate yesterday, and put in his best licks for the Wachusett route, you'd have thought they'd been struck by a cyclone.
On a walking trip to Wachusett, which they once made together, Hawthorne showed a great interest in sitting in the bar-rooms of country taverns, to listen to the talk of the attendant farmers and villagers. The manner in which he was approached had a great deal to do with his response.
Word Of The Day