Chapter 72 Baker Grange - 2

Before I lived in Walden, I thought of living there.I've hooked apples, jumped that stream, frightened muskrats and trout.In the middle of one of those seemingly long afternoons where many things could happen, I was halfway through when I thought I should spend most of my time in the life of nature.While still on the way, it rained, and I had to hide under a pine tree for half an hour. I put some branches above my head, and used a handkerchief as my cover; Waist up, I cast my line on the pike grass, and suddenly found myself under a dark cloud, the thunder had begun to pound heavily, and there was nothing I could do but listen to him.I thought, how majestic the gods in the sky are to use these forked flashes to persecute me, a poor unarmed fisherman, and I hastened to hide in the nearest hut, which was halfway from any road. miles, it's closer to the lake, and no one has lived there for a long time:

"Here is built by poets, In his dying years, Look at this little cabin, There is also the danger of destruction. " The muse is such an allegory.But I see an Irishman living there now, named John Field, with his wife and several children, the older one having a broad face, who was already helping his father, and now he too Running home from the swamp to shelter from the rain, the little baby was wrinkled and prophetic, with a conical head, sitting on his father's lap as in a noble court, from his wet and hungry It is a child's right to look curiously at strangers in his home, but he does not know that he is the last generation of a noble family, he is the hope of the world, the center of the world's attention, and not some poor John Field yes, hungry boy.We sat together under the least leaky part of the roof while it was raining and thundering outside, how many times have I sat here before, when I took their family across the ocean to America That boat hasn't been built yet.This John Field was evidently an honest, industrious, but helpless person; and his wife, too, was persevering, cooking continuously at the high stove; with her round, greasy face, She showed her breasts, and still dreamed of a better life one day. She never put down the mop in her hand, but nowhere did she see it working.The chicks also hid in the house from the rain, and walked around the house like a family member. They are too similar to humans. I don't think they will taste good even if they are roasted.They stood, looked into my eyes, and deliberately came to peck at my shoes.Meanwhile my master told me of his life, how he paid a neighboring farmer ten dollars an acre for toiling hard on the swamp, turning a meadow with a shovel or a swamp-hoe, and using the land and Fertilizer for a year, and his little big boy with the broad face was happily working beside his father, unaware of what a nasty deal his father was getting into.I want to help him with my experience, tell him that we are close neighbors, and I, who come here to fish, look like a homeless person, but like him, I am a self-sufficient person; and tell him that I live here. In a small, bright, clean house, it would cost no more than what he would pay for a year's rent on such a shabby house; Build myself a palace; I drink no tea, I drink no coffee, I eat no butter, I drink no milk, I eat no fresh meat, so I don't have to work to get them; I also don't have to eat as hard as I can, so my food expenses are small; but since he wants tea, coffee, butter, milk, and beef to begin with, he has to work like hell to meet this expense, and the harder he works, Working harder and harder, he eats more and more to make up for his physical consumption--the result is greater and greater expenditure, and the expenditure is indeed greater than the length of time, because he cannot be satisfied, and his life will be exhausted. This is consumed in it, but he also thinks that it is a great thing to come to the United States, where you can eat tea, coffee and meat every day.But the only true America should be a country where you are free to live a life and do well without these foods, a land where you are not forced to support slavery, you don't need to come To support a war, you don't need to pay an indirect or direct extra cost for such things.I deliberately told him this way, treating him as a philosopher, or as someone who wishes to be a philosopher.I am very willing to let this piece of grassland go barren, if it is because human beings began to atone for their sins, and then there is such an ending.One does not have to read history to understand what is best for one's own culture.But alas!An Irishman's culture is a business developed with a swamp hoe in mind.I told him that since he was doing hard work on the swamp he must have thick boots and strong clothes, which quickly wore out, but I had only thin shoes and thin clothes, which were worth less than half his value. It seems that I dress well and like a gentleman (which, in fact, I am not), and I can spend an hour or two as a pastime with little effort, catching enough to eat for a day or two, if I like. fish, or make enough money to spend me for a week.If he and his family could live simply, they could all pick huckleberries in the summer for fun.John let out a long sigh at this, and his wife stared at me with her arms akimbo, as if they were both wondering if they had enough money to start a life like this, or if they had learned enough arithmetic to put it together. Live to the end.In their view, it is relying on distance measurement and reckoning, and it is not clear how to reach their port; so I guess, they will still bravely live in their own way, face life, and strive hard , but could not drive with any sharp wedge into the great pillar of life, and crack it, and carve finely;—they thought of dealing with life as one dealt with the prickly thistle.But they fought under very bad conditions--ah, John Field!Live without arithmetic, and you're already screwed.

"Have you ever fished?" I asked. "Ah, I've fished, I've fished a little by the lake sometimes when I'm resting, and I've caught good bass." "What bait do you use!" Bait for bass." "You may go now, John," said his wife, bright and hopeful; but John hesitated.