DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.68288#0130
94 MEMORIES OF A SCULPTOR’S WIFE
five of us — in a row slightly uphill with our hands under
our heads, and talked philosophy until we heard the train
shrieking in the distance.’
Frank Sanborn was one of the picturesque figures of the
community, long and lank, with a kind of graceful awk-
wardness which is, I think, one of the peculiarities of the
Americans, both in New England and in the West. With
rather long flat hair, a bright color, and twinkling eyes, he
had a way of folding himself up in a chair, settling down in
it, drooping his head to one side, and holding forth. I often
think of the well-known story of how the anti-abolitionists
tried to abduct him; how he spread his long limbs like a
windmill, and of course they never got him in through the
door of the coach. And when his sister-in-law seized the
whip and lashed the horses into a frenzy, how surprised
those abductors must have been!
Thoreau I was never fortunate enough even to see, al-
though he was a byword among my friends, having died
before those years of my life in Concord. He was laughed
at and criticised a great deal, and must have been in many
ways a trial to the farmers, having a way of ignoring their
rights, and telling them that their complaints about fires
in their forests or clearings were stupid, because after all
the landscape belonged quite as much to him as to them.
Still, he was greatly appreciated by all the people of a lit-
erary or intellectual turn of mind. I loved to hear the
farmers talk about him. One of them used to say:
‘Henry D. Thoreau — Henry D. Thoreau,’ jerking out
the words with withering contempt. ‘His name ain’t no
more Henry D. Thoreau than my name is Henry D.
Thoreau. And everybody knows it, and he knows it. His
name’s Az-a-vid Henry and it ain’t never been nothing
five of us — in a row slightly uphill with our hands under
our heads, and talked philosophy until we heard the train
shrieking in the distance.’
Frank Sanborn was one of the picturesque figures of the
community, long and lank, with a kind of graceful awk-
wardness which is, I think, one of the peculiarities of the
Americans, both in New England and in the West. With
rather long flat hair, a bright color, and twinkling eyes, he
had a way of folding himself up in a chair, settling down in
it, drooping his head to one side, and holding forth. I often
think of the well-known story of how the anti-abolitionists
tried to abduct him; how he spread his long limbs like a
windmill, and of course they never got him in through the
door of the coach. And when his sister-in-law seized the
whip and lashed the horses into a frenzy, how surprised
those abductors must have been!
Thoreau I was never fortunate enough even to see, al-
though he was a byword among my friends, having died
before those years of my life in Concord. He was laughed
at and criticised a great deal, and must have been in many
ways a trial to the farmers, having a way of ignoring their
rights, and telling them that their complaints about fires
in their forests or clearings were stupid, because after all
the landscape belonged quite as much to him as to them.
Still, he was greatly appreciated by all the people of a lit-
erary or intellectual turn of mind. I loved to hear the
farmers talk about him. One of them used to say:
‘Henry D. Thoreau — Henry D. Thoreau,’ jerking out
the words with withering contempt. ‘His name ain’t no
more Henry D. Thoreau than my name is Henry D.
Thoreau. And everybody knows it, and he knows it. His
name’s Az-a-vid Henry and it ain’t never been nothing