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Thoreau, Henry David, 1817-1862

"Walden"


So I went on for some days cutting and hewing timber, and also
studs and rafters, all with my narrow axe, not having many
communicable or scholar-like thoughts, singing to myself, --
Men say they know many things;
But lo! they have taken wings --
The arts and sciences,
And a thousand appliances;
The wind that blows
Is all that any body knows.
I hewed the main timbers six inches square, most of the studs on
two sides only, and the rafters and floor timbers on one side,
leaving the rest of the bark on, so that they were just as straight
and much stronger than sawed ones. Each stick was carefully
mortised or tenoned by its stump, for I had borrowed other tools by
this time. My days in the woods were not very long ones; yet I
usually carried my dinner of bread and butter, and read the
newspaper in which it was wrapped, at noon, sitting amid the green
pine boughs which I had cut off, and to my bread was imparted some
of their fragrance, for my hands were covered with a thick coat of
pitch.


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