Sixth year, a poor Indian boy gave him a Yellow Marble, the first he had ever seen. This he thought a great deal of, and kept it a good while; but at last he lost it beyond recovery. It took years to heal the wound, and I think he cried at times about it."
He had a rough time in this "University of the West," as Thoreau called his early life. He was dressed in buckskin and fars, and spent long days in the woods, with only cattle or sheep for his companions. He tells us that he was for a time "quite skeptical," but the Bible triumphed over all the other books that he was able to read; and he tells, too, of having the "free use of a good library." He "joined the church" (Orthodox Congregational) at Hudson, Ohio, in 1816, and never wavered in his Puritan belief. He was, he tells us, "naturally fond of females" as a boy, yet "diffident in their company." We have evidence that in his mature life
