50 
WALDEN. 
and lapped, so that it was perfectly impervious to rain; 
but before boarding I laid the foundation of a chimney 
at one end, bringing two cartloads of stones up the 
hill from the pond in my arms. I built the chimney 
after my hoeing in the fall, before a fire became neces¬ 
sary for warmth, doing my cooking in the mean while out 
of doors on the ground, early in the morning: which 
mode I still think is in some respects more convenient 
and agreeable than the usual one. When it stormed 
before my bread was baked, I fixed a few boards over 
the fire, and sat under them to watch my loaf, and passed 
some pleasant hours in that way. In those days, when 
my hands were much employed, I read but little, but 
the least scraps of paper which lay on the ground, my 
holder, or tablecloth, afforded me as much entertain¬ 
ment, in fact answered the same purpose as the Iliad. 
It would be worth the while to build still more de¬ 
liberately than I did, considering, for instance, what 
foundation a door, a window, a cellar, a garret, have in 
the nature of man, and perchance never raising any 
superstructure until we found a better reason for it than 
our temporal necessities even. There is some of the 
same fitness in a man’s building his own house that 
there is in a bird’s building its own nest. Who knows 
but if men constructed their dwellings with their own 
hands, and provided food for themselves and families 
simply and honestly enough, the poetic faculty would 
be universally developed, as birds universally sing 
when they are so engaged ? But alas! we do like 
cowbirds and cuckoos, which lay their eggs in nests 
which other birds have built, and cheer no traveller 
