The Murmurs Of Many A Famous
River On The Other Side Of The Globe Reach Even To Us Here, As To
More Distant Dwellers On Its Banks; Many A Poet's Stream Floating
The Helms And Shields Of Heroes On Its Bosom.
The Xanthus or
Scamander is not a mere dry channel and bed of a mountain
torrent, but fed by the everflowing springs of fame; -
"And thou Simois, that as an arrowe, clere
Through Troy rennest, aie downward to the sea"; -
and I trust that I may be allowed to associate our muddy but much
abused Concord River with the most famous in history.
"Sure there are poets which did never dream
Upon Parnassus, nor did taste the stream
Of Helicon; we therefore may suppose
Those made not poets, but the poets those."
The Mississippi, the Ganges, and the Nile, those journeying atoms
from the Rocky Mountains, the Himmaleh, and Mountains of the
Moon, have a kind of personal importance in the annals of the
world. The heavens are not yet drained over their sources, but
the Mountains of the Moon still send their annual tribute to the
Pasha without fail, as they did to the Pharaohs, though he must
collect the rest of his revenue at the point of the sword.
Rivers must have been the guides which conducted the footsteps of
the first travellers. They are the constant lure, when they flow
by our doors, to distant enterprise and adventure, and, by a
natural impulse, the dwellers on their banks will at length
accompany their currents to the lowlands of the globe, or explore
at their invitation the interior of continents. They are the
natural highways of all nations, not only levelling the ground
and removing obstacles from the path of the traveller, quenching
his thirst and bearing him on their bosoms, but conducting him
through the most interesting scenery, the most populous portions
of the globe, and where the animal and vegetable kingdoms attain
their greatest perfection.
I had often stood on the banks of the Concord, watching the lapse
of the current, an emblem of all progress, following the same law
with the system, with time, and all that is made; the weeds at
the bottom gently bending down the stream, shaken by the watery
wind, still planted where their seeds had sunk, but erelong to
die and go down likewise; the shining pebbles, not yet anxious to
better their condition, the chips and weeds, and occasional logs
and stems of trees that floated past, fulfilling their fate, were
objects of singular interest to me, and at last I resolved to
launch myself on its bosom and float whither it would bear me.
-
SATURDAY.
"Come, come, my lovely fair, and let us try
Those rural delicacies."
_Christ's Invitation to the Soul._ ^Quarles^
-
SATURDAY.
- * -
At length, on Saturday, the last day of August, 1839, we two,
brothers, and natives of Concord, weighed anchor in this river
port; for Concord, too, lies under the sun, a port of entry and
departure for the bodies as well as the souls of men; one shore
at least exempted from all duties but such as an honest man will
gladly discharge. A warm drizzling rain had obscured the
morning, and threatened to delay our voyage, but at length the
leaves and grass were dried, and it came out a mild afternoon, as
serene and fresh as if Nature were maturing some greater scheme
of her own. After this long dripping and oozing from every pore,
she began to respire again more healthily than ever. So with a
vigorous shove we launched our boat from the bank, while the
flags and bulrushes courtesied a God-speed, and dropped silently
down the stream.
Our boat, which had cost us a week's labor in the spring, was in
form like a fisherman's dory, fifteen feet long by three and a
half in breadth at the widest part, painted green below, with a
border of blue, with reference to the two elements in which it
was to spend its existence. It had been loaded the evening before
at our door, half a mile from the river, with potatoes and melons
from a patch which we had cultivated, and a few utensils, and was
provided with wheels in order to be rolled around falls, as well
as with two sets of oars, and several slender poles for shoving
in shallow places, and also two masts, one of which served for a
tent-pole at night; for a buffalo-skin was to be our bed, and a
tent of cotton cloth our roof. It was strongly built, but heavy,
and hardly of better model than usual. If rightly made, a boat
would be a sort of amphibious animal, a creature of two elements,
related by one half its structure to some swift and shapely fish,
and by the other to some strong-winged and graceful bird. The
fish shows where there should be the greatest breadth of beam and
depth in the hold; its fins direct where to set the oars, and the
tail gives some hint for the form and position of the rudder. The
bird shows how to rig and trim the sails, and what form to give
to the prow that it may balance the boat, and divide the air and
water best. These hints we had but partially obeyed. But the
eyes, though they are no sailors, will never be satisfied with
any model, however fashionable, which does not answer all the
requisitions of art. However, as art is all of a ship but the
wood, and yet the wood alone will rudely serve the purpose of a
ship, so our boat, being of wood, gladly availed itself of the
old law that the heavier shall float the lighter, and though a
dull water-fowl, proved a sufficient buoy for our purpose.
"Were it the will of Heaven, an osier bough
Were vessel safe enough the seas to plough."
Some village friends stood upon a promontory lower down the
stream to wave us a last farewell; but we, having already
performed these shore rites, with excusable reserve, as befits
those who are embarked on unusual enterprises, who behold but
speak not, silently glided past the firm lands of Concord, both
peopled cape and lonely summer meadow, with steady sweeps.
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