Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 May 1884 — Emerson's Friend, Henry David Thoreau. [ARTICLE]

Emerson's Friend, Henry David Thoreau.

Henry David Thorean, the son of a maker of lead pencils at Concord, Massachusetts, was born either in that place or Boston July 12, 1817. After graduating at Harvard University in 1837, he taught for three years; but his love for solitude led him to abandon that employment andrihe remainder of his life he devoted to study, working at one trade or another only long enough to earn enough for the bare necessities of life. From March, 1845-7 lie lived as a hermit on Walden Pond, near Concord, having built his own house, and during this time the expenses amounted to bat S7O per annum. He was ingenious and could turn bis hand to almost aDy work, but nothing bnt want could draw him from study. His favorite 1 looks were Homer and other ancient classic writers, the old English literature, and Oriental poetry and philosophy. He wrote much, but published little, and that little was ,<-e imingly forced from him after long deliberation. For instance, in 1849 lie published a .liook written ten years before, entiled “A Week on the.. Concord and Merrimack Rivers”— a minute, description ■ of the country, supplemented with observations of plants and animals along the route.’ His second book, “Walden : or- Life in the,/Woods,” Appeared in 1854, after a simlarly long period of delay. Bptb works abound in the transcendental philosophy, which he shared in Common wi' h Emerson, his friend. To this companion of many years the world owes most of its knowledge of Thorean, for after the latter’s death Emerson published his manuscripts, in several volumes, among them “The Main Woods.” “Excursions in Field and Forest,” “Cape Cod,” “A Yankee iri Canada, with Anti-slavery and Reform Papers,” together with several poems. Thorean was in all his life exceedingly eccentric. He never attended chnrch, voted, or paid taxes, and seldom ate any meat He died at Concord May 5, 1862.-— lnter Ocean.