File:Historic fields and mansions of Middlesex (1874) (14597636759).jpg

Identifier: historicfieldsma01drak (find matches)
Title: Historic fields and mansions of Middlesex
Year: 1874 (1870s)
Authors: Drake, Samuel Adams, 1833-1905
Subjects:
Publisher: Boston : J.R. Osgood and Company
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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rogs sang jubilee in every key from the deep diapason of thepatriarchal croaker to the shriU piping of juvenile amphibian.Discord unspeakable followed the shores of the Concord alongits w^indings even to its confluence with the Assabeth. The dinof these night-disturbers seemed to us, as we stood on the riv-ers bank, like the gibings of many demons let loose to murdersleep. And one fellow — doubt it if you will, reader — actu-ally brayed with the lungs of a donkey. As the worn war-horse, at the triimpets soiiiid,Erects his mane and neighs and paws the ground. Walking around to the rear of the Manse, we see a sectionof the roof continued down into a leanto, — a thing so unusualthat we make a note thereon, the gambrel being the successor ofthe leanto in our architecture. The back entrance is completelyembowered in syringas, whose beautiful waxen flowers form astriking contrast with the gray walls. Vines climb .and clingto the house as if inefiectually seeking an entrance, imparting
Text Appearing After Image:
THE RETEEAT FEOM CONCORD. . 391 to it a picturesqueness answerable to and harmonizing withthe general eflect of the mansion. We give a glance at thegarden where Hawthorne grew his summer squashes, of- whichhe talks so poetically. What, Hawthorne delving among pota-toes, cabbages, and squashes ! We can scarce bend our imagina-tion to meet such an exigency. It is only a little way down tothe river where he moored his boat, in which he floated anddreamed with Ellery Channing. We enter the house. A hall divides it in the middle, givingcomfortable apartments at either hand. Some mementos ofthe old residents serve to carry us back to their day and gener-ation. A portrait of the Eev. Dr. Ripley, the successor of Mr.Emerson, and inhabitant of the house many years, hangs uponthe wall. His descendants still possess the Manse. On themantel is framed an invitation to General Washingtons table,addressed, perhaps, to Dr. Emerson. The ink is faded and thegrammar might be improved ; but the dinner, w

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