Page:Thoreau - His Home, Friends and Books (1902).djvu/282

252 perplexing question in literary England over the unique genius of Whitman. In November, 1858, Cholmondeley came again to Concord and urged Thoreau to join him in a trip south, but the severe illness of Thoreau's father prevented. His letters disclose fine scholarship in this young Englishman, so soon to suffer tragic death abroad; he was well versed in past and current science and history; he was alert with the euphoria and hope of early manhood. Mr. Ricketson, who met him at Thoreau's home, mentioned a striking resemblance to George William Curtis. Devoted to Thoreau, he imbibed many of his ideas on the simplification of life. It is related that on his first visit he came to Concord with the customary luggage of a rich Englishman, not omitting a valet; the keen, caustic, yet philosophic comments of Thoreau on the superfluities of custom so influenced him that on his second visit he was most simply clad and unburdened by paraphernalia.

A mystery long lurked about a "Western correspondent" of Thoreau during his later years. He has been identified as Mr. Calvin Greene of Rochester, Michigan. The acquaintance arose, as did others of the later friendships, from the books which Thoreau had published. Mr. Greene was an ardent admirer of free, original thought and also an