He was sometimes given to music and song, and now and then, in moments of great hilarity, would dance gayly,—as he did once at Brooklawn, in the presence of his host, Mr. Ricketson, and Mr. Alcott, who was also visiting there. On the same occasion he sung his unique song of "Tom Bowline," which none who heard would ever forget, and finished the evening with his dance.
Hearing Mr. Ricketson speak of this dance, Miss Thoreau said:—
"I have so often witnessed the like, that I can easily imagine how it was; and I remember that Henry gave me some account of it. I recollect he said he did not scruple to tread on Mr. Alcott's toes."
Mr. Ricketson's own account is this:—
"One afternoon, when my wife was playing an air upon the piano,—'Highland Laddie,' perhaps,—Thoreau became very hilarious, sang 'Tom Bowline,' and finally entered upon an improvised dance. Not being able to stand what appeared to me at the time the somewhat ludicrous appearance of our Walden hermit, I retreated to my 'shanty,' a short distance from my house; while my older and more humor-loving friend Alcott remained and saw it through, much to his amusement. It left a pleasant memory, which I recorded in some humble lines that afterwards appeared in my 'Autumn Sheaf.'"
After Thoreau's return home from this visit, his New Bedford friend seems to have sent him a copy of the words and music of "Tom Bowline," which was duly acknowledged and handed over to the musical people of Concord for them to play and sing. It is a fine old pathetic sailor-song of Dibdin's, which pleased Thoreau (whose imagination delighted in the sea), and perhaps reminded him of his brother John. As Thoreau sang it, the verses ran thus:—
"Here a sheer hulk lies poor Tom Bowline,
The darling of our crew;
No more he'll hear the tempest howling,
For death has broached him to.
His form was of the manliest beauty;
His heart was kind and soft;
Faithful, below, he did his duty,
But now he's gone aloft.
"Tom never from his word departed,
His virtues were so rare;
His friends were many and true-hearted,
His Poll was kind and fair.
And then he'd sing so blithe and jolly;
Ah, many's the time and oft!
But mirth is changed to melancholy,
For Tom is gone aloft.
"Yet shall poor Tom find pleasant weather
When He who all commands
Shall give, to call life's crew together,
The word to pipe all hands.
Thus death, who kings and tars dispatches,
In vain Tom's life has doffed;
For though his body's under hatches,
His soul is gone aloft!"
Another of his songs was Moore's "Canadian Boat Song," with its chorus,—