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Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 1809-1894

"The Poet at the Breakfast-Table"


And I am inclined to believe that the best answer to many of those
questions which have haunted him and found expression in his verse will
be reached by a very different channel from that of lonely contemplation,
the duties, the cares, the responsible realities of a life drawn out of
itself by the power of newly awakened instincts and affections. The
double star was prophetic,--I thought it would be.
The Register of Deeds is understood to have been very handsomely treated
by the boarder who owes her good fortune to his sagacity and activity.
He has engaged apartments at a very genteel boarding-house not far from
the one where we have all been living. The Salesman found it a simple
matter to transfer himself to an establishment over the way; he had very
little to move, and required very small accommodations.
The Capitalist, however, seems to have felt it impossible to move without
ridding himself of a part at--least of his encumbrances. The community
was startled by the announcement that a citizen who did not wish his name
to be known had made a free gift of a large sum of money--it was in tens
of thousands--to an institution of long standing and high character in
the city of which he was a quiet resident. The source of such a gift
could not long be kept secret. It, was our economical, not to say
parsimonious Capitalist who had done this noble act, and the poor man had
to skulk through back streets and keep out of sight, as if he were a show
character in a travelling caravan, to avoid the acknowledgments of his
liberality, which met him on every hand and put him fairly out of
countenance.


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