Mr. George Bradford, who taught me history and astronomy, was a Transcendentalist and, I believe, a member of the Brook Farm Colony. I once overheard my mother say that he was “Bourbon faced.” His features certainly did suggest an affectionate sheep. His clothes were unlike any I have ever seen. On reading Thoreau’s account of a conversation between himself and his tailoress, the mystery of Mr. Bradford’s garments was explained; I believe that, like Thoreau, he employed a tailoress. The dear quaint old pedagogue succeeded in interesting me more in my work than most of my teachers. His method of teaching ancient history had one feature that I hope survives in some educational backwater.
“You will find in this,” he said at our first lesson, handing me a long, narrow, green volume, “charts of all the centuries. Each page stands for one century and is subdivided with a space for every year. After each lesson you will make an illustration in water color, with the tints indicated, of the events that have most impressed you, using your own fancy and judgment.”
At our next lesson I submitted the book to Mr. Bradford, who ran over my illustrations encouragingly:
“Here we have the siege of Troy, 1180 B.C., a walled town well indicated. This illustrates the Passage of the Israelites across the Red Sea, quite clear, well colored and striking. This marks the year when Tiglath-Pileser was at the height of his power and suggests Hosea’s bribe of gold and silver talents, happily thought out!”
If I were asked to name the man with whom I had most enjoyed “star-gazing”, I could not hesitate for one moment,—George Bradford, of course!
With great patience he strove to give me some knowledge of astronomy, and, because he so loved his subject, succeeded in imparting a rudimentary understanding of the science. The indoor lessons, with books and plates of the firmament, had a romantic interest; we believed in the Nebular Hypothesis then; it has doubtless long since been superseded. Mr. Bradford was at his best in the lessons in practical star-gazing. At night he wore a curious close-fitting cap. If the weather were cool, he wrapped a green knitted scarf about his neck and buttoned the tailoress’s coat over it. Walking by his side, up and down the garden at Green Peace, I made those lifelong friends, Sagittarius, Corona, Aquila, Cassiopeia, the greater and the lesser Dipper.
In spite of my affection for several of my teachers, I did not love my lessons; life was so tremendously interesting, such great affairs were always going on about me! Much as I regret the wasted hours, I cannot think it strange that I began to live at a period when I ought to have been learning how to live.
Writing of his own childhood, Henry James the elder says:
“I am satisfied that, if there had been the least spiritual Divine leaven discernible within the compass of the family bond; if there had been the least subordination in it to any objective or public and universal ends, I should have been very sensitive to the fact. But there was nothing of the sort. Our family righteousness had as little felt relation to the public life of the world, as little connection with the hopes and fears of mankind, as the number and form of the rooms we inhabited, and we contentedly lived the same life of stagnant isolation from the race which the great mass of modern families live, its surface never dimpled by anything but the duties and courtesies we owed our private friends and acquaintances.”