ard.

One day there was a _conversazione_ at which Alcott, the "Oracle of
Concord," was to be the chief personage, and, as he had the habit of
monopolizing the talk when he took any part, it was suggested that
I should try my strength against his. Although Emerson had a high
opinion of Alcott, he seemed to me a shallow and illogical thinker,
and I have always felt that the good opinion of Emerson was due rather
to the fact that Alcott presented him with his own ideas served up
in forms in which he no longer recognized them, and so appeared to
Emerson as original. Such originality as he had was rather in oracular
and often incomprehensible verbiage than in profundity of thought,
but, as no one attempted to bring him to book, bewildered as his
audience generally was by the novelty of the propositions he made or
by their absurdity, he used to go on until suggestion, or breath,
failed him. I have forgotten, long ago, the subject of debate, but
Alcott started out with one of his characteristic mysticisms, and,
after allowing him to commit himself fully, I interrupted him with a
question. He was a little irritated at being stopped in the flow of
his discourse, and showed it, but this did not disturb me, and I
insisted on an explanation of what he had said. He was not in the
habit of explaining himself, and replied very much at random, but the
training of old Dr. Nott stood me in good stead, and I followed him up
with question and objection until he assumed a position diametrically
opposed to that from which he started, when I called his attention
to the fact that what he then said contradicted what he had at first
said. He got angry, and replied that "a man was not bound to be
consistent with himself, and that it did not matter." But he lost
his thread as well as his temper, and the _conversazione_ came to a
premature end, to the great satisfaction of the conspirators, most of
whom had at one time or another been silenced in their attempts to
bring him to logical conclusions, by his autocratic way of carrying on
the debate without regard to objections, which they had not had the
courage to urge.

He seemed to me a shallow philosopher, but I must confess that my
treatment of him did not become a man so much younger than he. I felt,
however, a certain amount of honest indignation at what seemed to
me his charlatanic manner of putting off on people his random and
improvised suggestions regarding questions which seemed to me th