. Old Concord. reputa-tion several elective or appointive offices, and wasalways much respected. Personally he was a manof oddities. He had a formidable temper; oc-casionally at the Hawthornes could be heard thedistant sound of his tremendous wrath. When inpublic life, he wore a silk hat, shaved carefully, andwore a wig of glossy yellow-brown hair. But whenhe retired, a transformation occurred almost asstartling as those in a theatre, and he appeared asan aged man with snow white beard, nearly bald,oftenest seen in a dressing gown and little blacksilk cap, tending his plants lovingly. He died
. Old Concord. reputa-tion several elective or appointive offices, and wasalways much respected. Personally he was a manof oddities. He had a formidable temper; oc-casionally at the Hawthornes could be heard thedistant sound of his tremendous wrath. When inpublic life, he wore a silk hat, shaved carefully, andwore a wig of glossy yellow-brown hair. But whenhe retired, a transformation occurred almost asstartling as those in a theatre, and he appeared asan aged man with snow white beard, nearly bald,oftenest seen in a dressing gown and little blacksilk cap, tending his plants lovingly. He died in1895 and is buried near his famous neighbor. Thebest memorial of him is the ancient original grape-vine, still to be seen by its trellis, near the littleGrapevine Cottage. Lexington Road leads on to Meriams Corner,where the tablet in the wall marks the beginningof the running fight with the British. From thisplace one can almost see, up the old road to Bed-ford and beyond the Meriam homestead, the site [ Ho]. Ac adcv. ?sissy Chiefly Literary of Thoreaus birthplace. But the house has beenmoved away, and indeed it would be difficult tolimit ones memories of Thoreaus early years tothe confines of a house. His strong taste for anoutdoor life possessed him through his youth, andsteadily growing stronger after his college days,at last made it impossible for him to live theconventional life. He did indeed make the firstventure common to the young college graduate —school-teaching. In the old schoolhouse on theSquare he tried this profession, though on the newprinciple of avoiding corporal punishment. Butfor those days this was too ideal. The school com-mittee complained. Thoreau tried their method bywhipping a half dozen scholars on the same day,and that night sent in his resignation because hisarrangements had been interfered with. He thentaught with his brother John in the new ConcordAcademy, the site of which is recalled by the nameof the street on which it stood, Academy Lane.
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublisherbosto, bookyear1915
