In his orchard by the highroad, with its trees
rising to a great height from a basin-shaped side lawn (which may
originally have been marshy ground), he seemed to me a perfect soul.
We all enjoyed greatly seeing him there, as we wended to and from our
little town. No doubt the garden of children at the beginning of his
career inspired him likewise; and in it he must have shown the same
tender solicitude and benevolence, and beamed upon his young scholars
with a love which exquisitely tempered his fantastical suppositions.
He often spoke humbly, but he never let people think he was humble.
His foibles appeared to me ridiculous, and provoked me exceedingly,--
the brave cat of the proverb must be my excuse,--but I awakened
to the eternal verity that some such husks are rather natural to
persons of purely distinctive minds, perhaps shielding them. And I
think one comes to value a bent blessed with earnest unconsciousness;
a not too clever Argus vision; a childlike gullibility and
spontaneity. This untarnished gullibility and gentle confidence, for
all his self-laudations, Alcott had, and when he did not emerge either
from his apple orchard or his inspirations he was essentially
wholesome, full of an ardent simplicity, and a happy faith in the
capacities given him by his Creator. So that his outline is one of
much dignity, in spite of the somewhat capricious coloring of his
character; the latter being not unlike the efforts of a nursery artist
upon a print of "The Father of His Country," for whom, as he stands
proudly upon the page, a green coat and purple pantaloons were not
intended, and are only minor incidents of destiny.
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