Shoots the last goose bound south on freezing wing."

Hosmer was also one of the farmer friends of Thoreau, who much enjoyed his
society and the vigor of his conversation. He is described in the
fourteenth chapter of "Walden" as among Thoreau's winter visitors at his
hut: "On a Sunday afternoon, if I chanced to be at home, I heard the
cronching of the snow made by the step of a long-headed farmer, who from
far through the woods sought my house, to have a social 'crack'; one of
the few of his vocation who are 'men on their farms'; who donned a frock
instead of a professor's gown, and is as ready to extract the moral out of
church or state as to haul a load of manure from his barn-yard. We talked
of rude and simple things, when men sat about large fires in cold, bracing
weather, with clear heads; and when other dessert failed, we tried our
teeth on many a nut which wise squirrels have long since abandoned, for
those which have the thickest shells are commonly empty." In W.E.
Channing's book about Thoreau as the "Poet-Naturalist," there is a passage
from his journal in which Thoreau speaks of Hosmer as the last of the
farmers worthy of mention. "Human life may be transitory and full of
trouble," he says, "but the perennial mind whose survey extends from that
spring to this--from Columella to Hosmer--is superior to change. I will
identify myself with that which will not die with Columella and will not
die with Hosmer."

At Hosmer's house the two young men lived in a single room, and did their
own cooking and house-keeping. Mrs. Hosmer furnished them with milk, and
they ate crackers, cheese, and fruit largely. They were Grahamites, and
used no meat. They read much, and had with them a large number of books.
It was their custom here, as well as at Captain Barrett's, to spend much
time in the woods. They were enthusiastic students of botany, and came
home from their excursions in the woods with their arms loaded with