Page:The first and last journeys of Thoreau - lately discovered among his unpublished journals and manuscripts.djvu/23

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This strikes me as better than the shorter version previously printed.

At the opening of "Tuesday." too, after the high wind of Monday night, the two brothers were astir long before three A.M., and we have a passage never before printed, except a few words; it runs thus:

"At length, when all our effects were aboard, we launched our boat on the ever-wakeful river, and so shaking the clay from our feet we pushed into the fog. Buonaparte exaggerates the three o'clock in the morning courage; fear does not awake so early. Few men are so degenerate as to baulk Nature by not beginning the day well. In the morning we do not believe in expediency, but will start afresh without botching. By afternoon man has an interest in the past, and sees indifferently well either way. The morning dew breeds no cold. Disease is a sluggard that overtakes, never encounters us: we have the start each day, and may fairly distance him before the dew is off; but if we recline in the bowers of noon, he will come up with us after all. I have found an early morning walk to be a blessing for the whole day.

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