himself, and many an hour did the dreamy writer spend with them, apparently listening to their rude stories, but really making keen studies of the men themselves.
He discharged his duties faithfully in the Boston Custom-House, performing each with an exactness thoroughly characteristic of him, until 1841, when the accession of President Harrison to power obliged him to withdraw to make way for a Whig.
From the Custom-house he went to live at Brook Farm as one of that singular community of dreamers and enthusiasts which was to inaugurate a new era of men and things in the world, but which came at last to a most inglorious termination. He was thrown into intimate association here with many who have since become prominent in our literary history, and for some of them conceived a warm attachment. He took his share of the farm labors, to which he was very partial, but remained at the community less than a year, and then returned to Boston. In his "Blithedale Romance" he has given us a picture of the life at Brook Farm, though he denies having sketched his characters from his old associates at that place.