Addresses — Thoreau's Study in the Woods. 253 



Thoreau devoted his genius with such entire devotion to the fields, 

 hills and waters of his native town, that he made them known and 

 interesting to all Americans and to people over the sea. Thoreau 

 says: " Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life 

 of equal simplicity, and I may say innocence, with nature herself. 

 I have been as sincere a worshipper of Aurora as the Greeks. I 

 got up early and bathed in the ponds; that was a religious exercise; 

 and one of the best things which I did. That man who does not 

 believe that each day contains an earlier, more sacred, and auroral 

 hour than he has yet profaned, has despaired of life, and is pursu- 

 ing a descending and darkening way. The Vidas say all intelli- 

 gences awake with the morning." 



The morning hour was not one of slumber for this disciple of 

 Aurora, for with wakefulness came life and action. His intimate 

 friends, the birds, bees, insects, animals and flowers, had each a se- 

 cret to whisper into his willing ear, and how could he sleep, the 

 birds sang around and flitted through his house. The rustic mouse 

 crept stealthily up to his hand to share the bread and cheese; the 

 squirrels chattered on the roof overhead, or under the floor beneath 

 his feet; the wild geese and laughing loon were bathing in his 

 pond, and the sumach was growing so luxuriantly before his eyes 

 in front of the window, that in the silence he could hear it burst 

 asunder and fall to the ground. The wind, fog, rain and sunshine, 

 each had its secret to communicate; had he time for brooding, 

 sleeping, or discontent? 



Some days he says he grew like corn in the night; those days 

 were when he sat in the sunny doorway from sunrise until noon 

 wrapt in a reverie amidst the pines, hickories, and sumachs, in un- 

 disturbed silence and stillness. " I then realized what the orientals 

 meant by contemplating and the forsaking of works; these were 

 not days subtracted from my life, but so much over and above my 

 usual allowance." 



Emerson says: "It was a pleasure and a privilege to walk with 

 him; for he knew the country like a fox or a bird, and passed 

 through it as freely by paths of his own. Under his arm he carried 

 an old music book to press plants; in his pocket a diary, spy glass, 

 microscope, jackknife, and twine. * * He waded into the pool 

 for the water plants, and his strong legs were no insignificant part 

 of his armor. On the day I speak of, he looked for the menyan- 



