Page:Thoreau - His Home, Friends and Books (1902).djvu/199

Rh that is the possibility that you may recover to a better state than you were ever in before." The following year he alludes to "ridiculous feebleness" and inability to take long tramps.

From this continued illness, called by him "two years' invalidity," he recovered sufficiently to take a later excursion to Cape Cod with Channing, and to the Maine Woods and White Mountains in 1857 and 1858. The excursion to the White Mountains, made with Edward Hoar, had the unusual luxuries of a horse and wagon, involving, in Thoreau's opinion, a loss of independence. It was on this trip, in exploring Tuckerman's Ravine, that Thoreau slipped and sprained his ankle and, at almost the same minute, found the arnica plant, arnica mollis, for which they had been searching as a botanical specimen. This opportune aid lessened the severity of the pain, but for five days Thoreau and Hoar, joined by two other friends, kept camp, while Thoreau entertained his friends with a lively recital of botanical facts, Indian legends and poetic selections. His health was not permanently re-established, however, for the next year he refers to another illness. This year, after his father's death, he was closely confined at home and in indoor business; he once mentions in his journal, "some very irksome affairs on account of my family." His