In many ways Thoreau was much like other men. He was a devoted son, a brotherly brother, a helpful neighbor, a genial companion. We have his own word for it that he could out-sit the longest sitter in the village tap-room if there were occasion. On the other hand, he was not ‘approachable’ in the common meaning of the word. He puzzled many people. He could be angular, stiff, remote, encrusted. Howells saw him in 1860, ‘a quaint stump figure of a man.’[44] He sat on one side of the room, having first placed his visitor in a chair on the other side. It was more difficult to get near him spiritually than physically. He seemed almost unconscious of his caller’s presence. Emerson edited Thoreau’s letters so as to present ‘a most perfect piece of stoicism.’ It was the side of his friend’s character in which he most rejoiced. The book should be read exactly as Emerson intended it to be read. Later it should be supplemented by the _Familiar Letters_, which brings into relief the affectionate and winning side of Thoreau’s character. III THE WRITER Thoreau was a painstaking student of the art of expression, but never for its own sake, always as a means to an end. One may conclude that it was not mere author’s vanity which led him to resent editorial tampering with his manuscript. He had good reasons for believing that neither Curtis of ‘Putnam’s’ nor Lowell of ‘The Atlantic’ could change his text to advantage. The question was not one of mere nicety of phrase, but of that subtile quality of style due to the inextricable interweaving of the thought and the language in which the thought is expressed. An out-of-doors writer, Thoreau’s power to produce was in direct ratio of his intercourse with Nature. If shut up in the house he could not write at all. When he walked he stored up literary virtue. He believed that nothing was so good for the man of letters as work with the hands. It cleared the style of ‘palaver and sentimentality.’ The fresh wild beauty of Thoreau’s style (when he is at his best) may be praised without reserve. There is no danger of exaggerating its perfect novelty and attractiveness; the danger is that we may take the hint of these qualities for the reality. Thoreau could be commonplace when he chose. IV THE BOOKS Early in September, 1839, the Thoreau brothers, John and Henry, made a voyage down the Concord and Merrimac rivers. The boat used was of their own building. It was painted blue and green, had wheels by which it could be dragged around the dams, and must have been as ugly as it was useful. _A Week on the Concord and Merrimack_ records the unadventurous adventures of the two young men both on this and other excursions.