nion were in prospect. But his daughter's view of philosophy
was tinged with irony, as was not unnatural in a high-spirited woman who
had borne the burden of the family's support, and had even worked out in
domestic service, while her unworldly parent was transcendentalizing
about the country, holding conversation classes in western towns, from
which after prolonged absences he sometimes brought home a dollar, and
sometimes only himself. "Philosophy can bake no bread, but it can give
us God, freedom, and immortality" read the motto--from Novalis--on the
cover of the _Journal of Speculative Philosophy_, published at Concord
in those years, under the editorship of Mr. William T. Harris; but bread
must be baked, for even philosophers must eat, and an occasional
impatience of the merely ideal may be forgiven in the overworked
practician.

On Mr. Frank Sanborn's wide, shady verandah, I found Mr. Alcott, a most
quaint and venerable figure, large in frame and countenance, with
beautiful, flowing white hair. He moved slowly, and spoke deliberately
in a rich voice. His face had a look of mild and innocent solemnity, and
he reminded me altogether of a large benignant sheep or other ruminating
animal. He was benevolently interested when I introduced myself as the
first fruits of the stranger and added that I was from Connecticut. He
himself was a native of the little hill town of Wolcott, not many miles
from New Haven, and in youth had travelled through the South as a Yankee
peddler. "Connecticut gave him birth," says Thoreau; "he peddled first
her wares, afterwards, he declares, his brains."

Mr. Sanborn was the secretary of the School, and with him I enrolled
myself as a pupil and paid the very modest fee which admitted me to its
symposia. Mr. Sanborn is well known through his contributions to Concord
history and biography. He was for years one of the literary staff of
_The Springfield Republican_, active in many reform movements, and an
efficient member of the American Social Science Association. Almost from
his house John Brown started on his Harper's Ferry raid, and people in
Concord still dwell upon the exciting incident of Mr. Sanborn's arrest
in 1860 as an accessory before the fact. The United States deputy
marshal with his myrmidons drove out from Boston in a hack. They lured
the unsuspecting abolitionist outside his door, on some pretext or
other, clapped the handcuffs on him, and tried to get him into the hack.
But the