As she spoke, a little toddlekins, three or four years old, came running to me, exclaiming, “Cedar, can’t I ride on the ’bog-gan?”
That settled it! My Brook Farm name was thenceforth Cedar, and would be Cedar, still, were there any of my companions left to remember it. I never had any other nickname, save that of late years some dear and intimate friends have made syllables of my initials and called me Jay Vee.
At four o’clock my sister and I trudged up to pay our call at the Eyrie. This was a square house of the surburban villa type, two-and-a-half stories high, and the handsomest building on the place, though plain, enough, as compared with villas in the neighborhood to-day. Doctor and Mrs. Ripley received us very kindly and gave us a most cordial welcome to Brook Farm. Mrs. Ripley, born Sophia Dana, was a slender, graceful lady, belonging to what Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes calls the Brahmin class of Boston; charming in manner, animated and blithe, but profoundly serious in her religious devotion to what she regarded as the true Christian life. She had, informally, the general charge of the girls in the school, and she at once made Althea feel at home under her motherly care.
Dr. Ripley gained my confidence by claiming old acquaintance, recalling a former meeting that I had quite forgotten. Several years previous, when I was a very small boy indeed, my father had taken me with him on a flying trip from New York to Boston, deciding to do so, I suppose rather than to leave mother in a strange city with two children on her hands. During that brief visit Dr. Ripley had taken father to call on an illustrious artist, and he now recalled the circumstances to my mind. With his prompting I could remember riding in a carriage; seeing a tall silvery old gentleman wearing a black velvet robe lined with red, and tasting white grapes for the first time; but I could not think of the silvery gentleman’s name.
“Well,” said my mentor, “perhaps you will be glad sometime to know that the gentleman you saw was Washington Alston.”
Leaving Althea with Mrs. Ripley, we presently went over to the cottage, a small house near the Eyrie, occupied by Miss Russell and her two nieces; Mr. Dana, Mr. Hosmer and Mr. Hecker, finding the latter in Mr. Hosmer’s room.
Isaac Thomas Hecker was a religious enthusiast who came to Brook Farm for the same reason that Emerson left the Unitarian Church, namely, for his soul’s peace. He belonged to a well-to-do family in New York, engaged in the manufacture of flour specialties, but the restraints and the questionable practices of business were irksome to him, and he eagerly sought a home among the congenial spirits who were trying to live a higher life on their sterile little property in West Roxbury. Being one of the thoroughgoing kind, he had learned all the uses of flour from beginning to end, and this knowledge he gladly made available as baker-general for the Brook Farm community. He was a faithful and competent baker for several months; usually happy and cheerfully interested in all that was going on, but occasionally taking a day off for fasting and prayer. Early in the spring, Annie Page and I were hunting arbutus, or Mayflower as we called it, on the far side of the pine woods, when we came upon Mr. Hecker walking rapidly up and down in the secluded little dell that served him as a retreat. He was wringing his hands and sobbing so violently that we two scared children stole away, awed and mystified. Intruders on a scene that should not have been witnessed, we said nothing about it at the time, and I have never mentioned it until now.
Not long after this strange happening, Henry D. Thoreau came to the Farm, and Mr. Hecker found in him a sympathetic companion. Presently the two went away together, for the purpose, I think, of determining by experiment the minimum amount of nourishment actually required to sustain life. They never came back. Thoreau took to the solitude of Walden, I suppose, and our baker found himself attracted to the Catholic Church, eventually going abroad to study for the priesthood. On taking orders he returned to New York, and during the rest of his life was an earnest and influential, though somewhat independent toiler in the vineyard of Rome; gaining, unsought, fame as Father Hecker. His monumental work was the founding of the Paulist Fathers, a strong organization, influential in the religious life of New York, though the church and the home of the fraternity are located across the Hudson river, in New Jersey.
On seeing Dr. Ripley and Mr. Hecker and Mr. Hosmer together, it seemed to me they must be the dearest friends in the world. And they were very near friends indeed, having many vital interests in common. Dr. Ripley was a true minister of the Gospel; Mr. Hosmer had studied for the ministry, and Mr. Hecker, as indicated, was a predestined priest. But, as I learned later, sincere and even affectionate cordiality was the distinguishing characteristic of the Brook Farmers in their relations with each other. Their communications were yea, yea, and nay, nay, but they were really glad to meet, glad to exchange greetings, glad to give and to take the good word which was always forthcoming, and glad to frankly manifest pleasure in their walk and conversation together. This was the outward showing of the inward spirit of Brook Farm. It was lovingkindness exemplified; and to appreciative visitors the recognition of this Christian Spirit in the encounters of everyday life was exhilarating as a draught of new wine, wine from the press of Edom and Bozrah.
After a little chat, Dr. Ripley and Mr. Hecker went away together, leaving me alone with Mr. Hosmer, with whom I stayed until supper-time. He questioned me as to all the details of the toboggan slide venture, which I was quite proud to report as eminently successful and, after I had told him everything, even to my gaining a new name, he said, “Well, you have arrived all right. You have been initiated. These young uns don’t take anyone up and give them a name like that unless things go suitably.”