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7 January 1852, Wednesday; 7:00 p.m.
Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or Centre School House, High School Room
"An Excursion to Canada" (I)
[Back to Calendar of Lectures]
NARRATIVE OF EVENT: Thoreau’s journal
entry for 22 August 1851 is both a harbinger of his 7 January 1852 lecture and a partial
preview of its contents. He says therein:
I found last winter that it was
expected that I would give some account of canada because I had visited it and
because many of them had & so felt interested in the subject—visited it as the
bullet visits the wall at which it is fired & from which it rebounds as quickly &
flattened (somewhat damaged, perchance)— Yes a certain man contracted to take 1500
live Yankees through Canada—at a certain rate & within a certain time— It
did not matter to him what the commodity was— If only it were dilivered to him
according to agreement at the right place & time—and rightly ticketed—so
much in bulk—wet or dry[,] on deck or in the hold—at the option of the carrier
how to stow the cargo & not always right side up— In the mean while it was
understood that the freight was not to be willfully & intentionally debarred from
seeing the country if it had eyes— It was understood that there would be a country to
be seen on either side—though that was a secret advantage which the contractors
seemed not to be aware of—
I fear that I have not got much to say[,]
not having seen much—for the very rapidity of the motion had a tendency to keep my
eye lids closed— What I got by going to Canada was a cold and not till I get a fever
shall I appreciate it. (PEJ4 pp. 7-8)
What Thoreau also got by going to Canada was the lecture that he gave to his
townspeople as the sixth lecture of eighteen in the Concord Lyceum’s season course a
few months after penning this entry (MassLyc, pp. 165-66). The records of the
Concord Lyceum read, "Wednesday Jan 7th 1852 Lecture by H. D. Thoreau. Subject: Excursion
to Canada" (MassLyc, p. 166).
ADVERTISEMENTS, REVIEWS, AND
RESPONSES: None known.
DESCRIPTION OF TOPIC: See
lecture 33 above. Again, Thoreau apparently read the first half of the extant lecture
manuscript housed at CSmH (HM 949). |