THE PERSONALITY OF THOREAU
As I recall the seven years and a month during
which I knew Henry Thoreau; seeing him every
day during much of that period, from March 25,
1855, to his death in early May, 1862, unless
he or I were absent from Concord, and visiting
with him many of those spots in the wide town
ship which his pen has pictured for the delight
of many readers; a great regret is felt that no
written record was made of those conversations
and walks. But it did not occur to his friends in
those years before the Civil War that he would
so soon pass from our sight; nor, in fact, did
many of us then appreciate, to the full, his re
markable gifts and their rare and original qual
ity. We had come to know him first, perhaps,
from Emerson s description of his younger friend ;
at any rate, we had earlier and more affection
ately admired Emerson; and some of us were
not free from that delusion, sedulously propa-
