At the time the following letter was written, Father spent much of his time at Slabsides and his interest in both the celery and lettuce grown there, as well as the grapes at Riverby, was most keen. The black duck referred to was one I had winged and brought home; it was excessively wild until we put it with the tame ducks, whereupon, as Father expressed it, "He took his cue from them and became tamer than the tame ones."
Slabsides, July 13, '97.
MY DEAR JULIAN,
I enclose a circular from Amherst College that came to you yesterday. You would doubtless do as well or better at one of the small colleges as you would at Harvard. The instruction is quite as good. It is not the college that makes the man, but the reverse. Or you might go to Columbia this fall. You would be nearer home and have just as able instructors as at Harvard. Harvard has no first class men now. But if you have set your heart on Harvard, you would of course do just as well as a special student as if admitted to college. You would miss only non-essentials. Their sheep skin you do not want; all you want is what they can teach you.
It has rained here most of the time since you left. The grapes are beginning to rot and if this rain and heat continues we may lose all of them. If the grapes go I shall not have money for you to go away this year.
Another duck was killed Saturday night, one of the last brood. It looked like the work of a coon and I and Hiram watched all Sunday night with the gun, but nothing came and nothing came last night as we know of.
Let me know what you hear from your chum. I shall look for a letter from you to-night. It is still raining and at four o'clock the sky looks as thick and nasty as ever. It threatens to be like eight years ago when you and I were in the old house. Tell me what Mr. Tooker says, etc. I may go to Gilders the last of the week.
Your affectionate father, JOHN BURROUGHS.
Your black duck is getting tame and does not hide at all.
It is hard for the present generation to realize what a shadow, or rather influence, the Civil War cast over the days of Father's generation. War veterans, parades, pensions, stories of the war—it coloured much of the life, civil, social, political, and even the literature of the day. Some have spoken of it, in architecture, as the General Grant Period. The "panoramas"—what has become of them? I remember visiting one with Father—you went into a building and up a flight of stairs and came out on a balcony, a round balcony in the centre, and all around was a picture of one of the battlefields of the war, bursting shells, men charging, falling, and all, always the two flags, smoke enshrouded. It made a great impression on my boyish mind. Father knew many war veterans and together we read the impressions of his friend, Charles Benton, "As Seen from the Ranks," and he kept up the friendships he had made those years he lived in Washington.