Page:Summer - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/259

Rh elbows on her knees and her face in her hands, and that peculiar vacant stare, perhaps looking out the window between us, not repelling us in the least, but perfectly indifferent to our presence. She was bom on that spot. Her grandfather also lived on the same spot, though not in the same house. He was the last of her race who could speak Indian. She had heard him pray in Indian, but could only understand &quot;Jesus Christ.&quot; Her only companion was a miserable tortoise-shell kitten, which took no notice of us. She had a stone chimney, a small cook ing stove without fore-legs, and set up on bricks within it, and a bed covered with dirty bed clothes. Said she hired out her field as pasture; better for her than to cultivate it. The question she answered with most interest was, &quot;What do you call that plant?&quot; and I reached her the aletris from my hat. She took it, looked at it a moment, and said, &quot;That's husk-root. It's good to put into bitters for a weak stomach.&quot; The last year's light-colored and withered leaves surround the present green star like a husk. This must be the origin of the name. Its root is described as intensely bitter. I ought to have had my hat full of plants.

June 27, 1856. [New Bedford.] Went with R and his boys in the steamer Eagle's Wing, with a crowd and band of music, to the