The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 4 — John Shaqi
The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 4Various
History
The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 4
Various
Massachusetts -- Periodicals; New England -- Periodicals
Returning from the cemetery to the square, we still follow the British
down the Boston road and pass at the corner near the church another
building from which stores were taken and on the left houses of
historical fame, the house and shop of Captain Brown who led the second
company in the fight, the home of the patriot Lee and John Beatton who
left funds for church purposes. Below this house which is two hundred
years old, a guard was posted on the day of the fight and before it
stand two elms so old that they are filled with bricks inside, and
mended outside with plaster in order to preserve them. The next house on
the right is the home of Emerson, a plain wooden building with trees
near the western side, and a fine old-fashioned garden in the rear. His
study was in the front of the house at the right of the entrance. One
side is filled to the ceiling with books, and a picture of the Fates
hangs above the grate, a table occupies the centre, at the right of
which is the rocking chair in which he often sat, and his writing
implements lie near on the table. From the study two doors lead to the
long parlor with its large fire-place around which so many noted people
have gathered.
After passing the home of Emerson the road turns toward the left and
leads past the farm and greenhouses of John B. Morse, the agricultural
author, to the School of Philosophy which has just completed its seventh
session with success, the attendance having steadily improved certainly
as far as culture is considered. It stands in the grounds of the Orchard
House now the home of Dr. Harris who has carried out the idea of Mr.
Alcott of whom he bought the place, by laying out beautiful walks over
the crest of the wooded hill. He has surrounded a tall pine on the hill
top with a strong staircase by which it can easily be climbed to a
height of 54 feet from the base and 110 feet from the road in front of
the school building or chapel. Orchard House was for years the home of
the Alcott family where Louisa wrote and May painted and their father
studied philosophy. A broken rustic fence one of the last traces of Mr.
Alcott's mechanical skill forms the slight barrier between the grounds
at the Orchard House and Wayside, which Mr. Alcott bought in 1845 and a
few years later sold to Nathaniel Hawthorne who owned it at the time of
his death. The house is a strange mixture of the old and new, as the
rear part bears evident traces of antiquity, at the right were the
Hawthorne parlors and reception rooms, at the left of the entry his
library, sometimes called the den, and in front a small room with a low
window separates the dining room from the reception room and the whole
is crowned with a tower built by Mr. Hawthorne for a study where he
found the quiet and seclusion which he loved. Much of Mr. Hawthorne's
composition seems to have been done as he wandered up and down the shady
paths which wind in every direction along the terraced hillside, and a
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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