230 FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS. [1852,
get a winter view of Plymouth Harbor, and see where your garden lies under the snow." The second letter follows :
TO MARSTON WATSON (AT PLYMOUTH).
CONCORD, December 31, 1852.
MR. WATSON, I would be glad to visit Plym outh again, but at present I have nothing to read which is not severely heathenish, or at least secular, which the dictionary defines as " re lating to affairs of the present world, not holy," though not necessarily unholy ; nor have I any leisure to prepare it. My writing at present is profane, yet in a good sense, and, as it were, sacredly, I may say ; for, finding the air of the temple too close, I sat outside. Don t think I say this to get off ; no, no ! It will not do to read such things to hungry ears. " If they ask for bread, will you give them a stone ? " When I have something of the right kind, depend upon it I will let you know.
Up to 1848, when he was invited to lecture before the Salem Lyceum by Nathaniel Haw thorne, then its secretary, Thoreau seems to have spoken publicly very little except in Concord ; nor did he extend the circuit of his lectures much until his two books had made him known as a thinker. There was little to attract a popular
