A WEEK ON WALDEN'S EIDGE. 127 



scenery," happened not to suit the conven- 

 ience of a naturally selfish man, now ten 

 times more selfish than usual as is the 

 rule because he was on his annual vaca- 

 tion, it does not follow that it was essentially 

 bad. The rains were needed, the heat was 

 to have been expected, and the cold, un- 

 seasonable and exceptional, was not peculiar 

 to Tennessee. As for the snow, it was no 

 more than I have seen before now, even in 

 Massachusetts, a week or two earlier in 

 the month ; and it lent such a glory to the 

 higher Alleghanies, as we passed them on 

 our way homeward, that I might cheerfully 

 have lain shivering for two nights in that 

 unplastered bedroom, with its window that 

 no man could shut, rather than miss the 

 spectacle. Eastern Tennessee, I have no 

 doubt, is a most salubrious country ; prop- 

 erly recommended by the medical fraternity 

 as a refuge for consumptive patients. If to 

 me its meteorological fluctuations seemed 

 surprisingly wide and sudden, it was per- 

 haps because I had been brought up in the 

 equable climate of New England. It would 

 be unfair to judge the world in general by 

 that favored spot. 



