IN OLD CONCORD 97 



and her men. The seed of the Kentish heroes of 

 Harold's time has grown since in many soils. In 

 Concord when time was ripe it found fluid there 

 some of the ichor of the immortals coursing 

 through farming tools to the making of fire for 

 heroic deeds. The Concord fight did not happen ; 

 it had to be. It was not that every Concord 

 farmer's barn was full of munitions of war. 

 Every Concord farmer's blood was full of pow- 

 der. The shot had to be fired there. 



For nearly three-quarters of a century this 

 mysterious essence of greatness that one feels 

 must always be present in places where great 

 deeds have taken place seems to have flashed no 

 spark to the outer world. Grass waved on Concord 

 farms and fell before the scythe, and new genera- 

 tions of farmers grew up to take the places of 

 those which passed unmarked outside their com- 

 munity. For that space of time Concord was, 

 very much as Troy was, the scene of a memorable 

 fight. Then came Emerson to bring back to the 

 place something of the nobility of spirit and in- 

 dependence of thought and action that must have 

 come to it with his ancestor the Rev. Peter Bulke- 



