I was born upon thy bank, river, My blood flows in thy stream, And thou meanderest forever At the bottom of my dream. This great but silent traveller which had been so long moving past my door at three miles an hour,—might I not trust myself under its escort? * * * * * In friendship we worship moral beauty without the formality of religion. * * * * * Consider how much the sun and the summer, the buds of spring and the sered leaves of autumn, are related to the cabins of the settlers which we discover on the shore,—how all the rays which paint the landscape radiate from them. The flight of the crow and the gyrations of the hawk have reference to their roofs. * * * * * Friends do not interchange their common wealth, but each puts his finger into the private coffer of the other. They will be most familiar, they will be most unfamiliar, for they will be so one and single that common themes will not have to be bandied between them, but in silence they will digest them as one mind; but they will at the same time be so two and double that each will be to the other as admirable and as inaccessible as a star. He will view him as it were through "optic glass,"—"at evening from the top of Fesolé." And after the longest earthly period, he will still be in apogee to him. * * * * * It [the boat] had been loaded at the door the evening before, half a mile from the river, and provided with wheels against emergencies, but, with the bulky cargo which we stevedores had stowed in it, it proved but an indifferent land carriage. For water and water-casks there was a plentiful supply of muskmelons from our patch, which had just begun to be ripe, and chests and spare spars and sails and tent and guns and munitions for the galleon. And as we pushed it through the meadows to the river's bank, we stepped as lightly about it as if a portion of our own bulk and burden was stored in its hold. We were amazed to find ourselves outside still, with scarcely independent force enough to push or pull effectually. The robin is seen flying directly and high in the air at this season, especially over rivers, where in the morning they are constantly passing and repassing in company with the blackbird. * * * * * I have never insisted enough on the nakedness and simplicity of friendship, the result of all emotions, their subsidence, a fruit of the temperate zone. The friend is an unrelated man, solitary and of distinct outline. * * * * * Must not our whole lives go unexplained, without regard to us, notwithstanding a few flourishes of ours, which themselves need explanation? * * * * *