Page:Thoreau - His Home, Friends and Books (1902).djvu/65

Rh practical industry with lofty ideals, love of nature and of books, interest in all reform agitations, and delight in refined, domestic life. All the children were keen in mind, strong and individual in character. All sought to attain that "higher end" with which Henry accredits his father. They had an independence and pride, born of conscious power, which never failed to serve the chance need of friend or stranger, but refused to accept flattery or condescension. Mr. Sanborn has said,—"To meet one of the Thoreaus was not the same as to encounter any other person who might happen to cross your path. Life to them was something more than a parade of pretensions, a conflict for ambitions, or an incessant scramble for the objects of desire. They were fond of climbing to the hilltop, and could look with a broader and kindlier vision than most of us on the commotions of the plain and the mists of the valley."

All of the Thoreau children were teachers. Helen, the older sister, five years the senior of Henry, taught for some time at Taunton, and her brother John was a teacher at the same place for a time; later they were both at Roxbury, as Henry's letters indicate. Helen's letters, only a few of which have ever been published but which have been loaned for use in this volume, show an earnest, practical