Ralph Waldo Emerson writes in his journal:
Last night came to me a beautiful poem from Henry Thoreau, “Sympathy.” The purest strain & the loftiest, I think, that has yet pealed from this unpoetic American forest. I hear his verse with as much triumph as I point to my Guido when they praise half-poets & half-painters.
(Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 7:230-1)
Ellen Sewall writes to her father Edmund Quincy Sewall Sr.:
Oh, I can not tell you half I have enjoyed here till I get home! I have had so many delightful walks with Aunt [Prudence Ward] and the Mr. Thoreaus that a full account of them all would fill half a dozen letters. I have wished Edmund [Edmund Quincy Sewall Jr.] with me again and again, and the rest of you too; he would have enjoyed these pleasant excursions as well as me and I should have admired to have him with us . . .
She [Prudence Bird Ward] and Aunty send a great deal of love to you all and Mr’s John and Henry desire their respects. Mrs. Thoreau does not know I am writing or she would send love too.
I shall certainly be with you Saturday unless there is a violent storm, which I trust will not be the case. They are all very urgent for me to remain another week, but I of course say decidedly no.
(transcript in The Thoreau Society Archives at the Thoreau Institute at Walden Woods, Lincoln, Mass.; MS, private owner)
