Page:Thoreau - His Home, Friends and Books (1902).djvu/261

Rh the eye of a bird, the scent of a dog, the most acute, delicate intelligence. But no soul. No, Henry could not have had a human soul." While Emerson, in his inner truth, did not mean this analysis as it may sound to a casual reader, one cannot refrain from regret that such a half-truth should have been uttered and printed. Would Thoreau ever have said such enigmatical words of a friend? Such extreme and unexplained criticisms, sometimes uttered during Thoreau's life, must have caused deep grief to his proud, sensitive heart. His own published journal-extracts and letters, and the testimony of his sister and many friends, have fully established the warmth and constancy of the controlled emotional and spiritual qualities. Dr. Edward Emerson has well summarized this relationship between his father and Thoreau; "In spite of these barriers of temperament, my father always held him, as a man, in the highest honor."

Thoreau's kindly humanity and his rare fitness as companion were fully recognized by the Emerson household during his residence there. If the gentler traits were sometimes hidden from Emerson, they were revealed to Mrs. Emerson and the children, who have given the world loving memories of this household friend. In the "Familiar Letters" Mr. Sanborn has shown the tender,