WINTER VISITORS. 
287 
the grass and the skunk-cabbage still put forth with 
perennial verdure, and some hardier bird occasionally 
awaited the return of spring. 
Sometimes, notwithstanding the snow, when I re¬ 
turned from my walk at evening I crossed the deep 
tracks of a woodchopper leading from my door, and found 
his pile of whittlings on the hearth, and my house filled 
with the odor of his pipe. Or on a Sunday afternoon, 
if I chanced to be at home, I heard the cronching of 
the snow made by the step of a long-headed farmer, 
who from far through the woods sought my house, to 
have a social “ crack; ” one of the few of his vocation 
who are “ men on their farms ; ” who donned a frock in¬ 
stead* of a professor’s gown, and is as ready to extract 
the moral out of church or state as to haul a load of 
manure from his barn-yard. We talked of rude and 
simple times, when men sat about large fires in cold 
bracing weather, with clear heads; and when other des¬ 
sert failed, we tried our teeth on many a nut which wise 
squirrels have long since abandoned, for those which 
have the thickest shells are commonly empty. 
The one who came from farthest to my lodge, through 
deepest snows and most dismal tempests, was a poet. 
A farmer, a hunter, a soldier, a reporter, even a philoso¬ 
pher, may be daunted; but nothing can deter a poet, for 
he is actuated by pure love. Who can predict his 
comings and goings ? His business calls him out at all 
hours, even when doctors sleep. We made that small 
house ring with boisterous mirth and resound with the 
murmur of much sober talk, making amends then to 
Walden vale for the long silences. Broadway was still 
and deserted in comparison. At suitable intervals there 
were regular salutes of laughter, which might have 
