(Pfaff is a generous German
_restaurateur_, silent, stout, jolly, and I should say the best
selecter of champagne in America.)
A DISCOVERY OF OLD AGE
Perhaps the best is always cumulative. One's eating and drinking one
wants fresh, and for the nonce, right off, and have done with it--but
I would not give a straw for that person or poem, or friend, or city,
or work of art, that was not more grateful the second time than the
first--and more still the third. Nay, I do not believe any grandest
eligibility ever comes forth at first. In my own experience, (persons,
poems, places, characters,) I discover the best hardly ever at first,
(no absolute rule about it, however,) sometimes suddenly bursting
forth, or stealthily opening to me, perhaps after years of unwitting
familiarity, unappreciation, usage.
A VISIT, AT THE LAST, TO R. W. EMERSON
_Concord, Mass._--Out here on a visit--elastic, mellow, Indian-summery
weather. Came to-day from Boston, (a pleasant ride of 40 minutes by
steam, through Somerville, Belmont, Waltham, Stony Brook, and other
lively towns,) convoy'd by my friend F. B. Sanborn, and to his ample
house, and the kindness and hospitality of Mrs. S. and their fine
family. Am writing this under the shade of some old hickories and
elms, just after 4 P.M., on the porch, within a stone's throw of
the Concord river. Off against me, across stream, on a meadow and
side-hill, haymakers are gathering and wagoning-in probably their
second or third crop.
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