Page:Thoreau - As remembered by a young friend.djvu/130

 In 1837, the boy of twenty, just graduated, and his writings, had been brought to Mrs. Emerson's notice by Mr. Emerson's sister, Mrs. Brown, who boarded with the Thoreaus. In that year, Mr. Emerson wrote: “My good Henry Thoreau made this else solitary afternoon sunny with his simplicity and clear perception. How comic is simplicity in this double-dealmg, quacking world. Everything that boy says makes merry with society, though nothing can be graver than his meaning.”

Here is a pleasant record of friendship in a letter written to Carlyle in 1841: “One reader and friend of yours dwells now in my house, and, as I hope, for a twelvemonth to come, — Henry Thoreau, — a poet whom you may one day be proud of, — a noble, manly youth, full of melodies and inventions. We work together day by day in my garden, and I