Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/440

 414 FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS. [1859,

reau s journals, since I had introduced Brown to him, and he to Emerson, in March, 1857 ; and specially from those pages that Thoreau had written after the news of Brown s capture in Virginia had reached him. It was first given in the vestry of the old parish church in Concord (where, in 1774, the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts had met to prepare for armed resistance to British tyranny) ; was repeated at Worcester the same week, and before a great audience in Boston, the following Sunday, after which it was published in the newspapers, and had a wide reading. Mr. Alcott in his diary mentions it under date of Sunday, Octo ber 30, thus : &quot; Thoreau reads a paper on John Brown, his virtues, spirit, and deeds, this even ing, and to the delight of his company, the best that could be gathered at short notice, and among them Emerson. (November 4.) Thoreau calls and reports about the reading of his lecture on Brown at Boston and Worcester. He has been the first to speak and celebrate the hero s courage and magnanimity ; it is these that he discerns and praises. The men have much in common, the sturdy manliness, straightforwardness, and independence. (No vember 5.) Ricketson from New Bedford ar rives ; he and Thoreau take supper with us. Thoreau talks freely and enthusiastically about