The Maine Woods

What Hacker News says

1. mikestewJun 2021
   Thoreau says this, in The Maine Woods[0]. (EDIT: Thoreau says that he lived in a tent in Maine, not at Walden Pond.) The author of TFA got it a little wrong. Note to those wanting to replicate this: I'm pretty sure Thoreau's tent catches fire at some point. I'd have to re-read to confirm or deny if it had anything to do with setting the tent in front of the fire, as the author of TFA does.

   [0] https://www.thoreau-online.org/the-maine-woods.html

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2. robocatJun 2021
   “A shed-shaped tent will catch and reflect the heat like a Yankee-baker, and you may be drying while you are sleeping.” Page 124: http://www.thoreau-online.org/the-maine-woods-page124.html

   “ We had no sooner pitched our tent than the thunder-shower burst on us, and we hastily crept under it, drawing our bags after us, curious to see how much of a shelter our thin cotton roof was going to be in this excursion. Though the violence of the rain forced a fine shower through the cloth before it was fairly wetted and shrunk, with which we were well bedewed, we managed to keep pretty dry”. Page 99: http://www.thoreau-online.org/the-maine-woods-page99.html

   “Our bed was made with as much care and skill as a roof is shingled; beginning at the foot, and laying the twig end of the cedar upward, we advanced to the head, a course at a time, thus successively covering the stub-ends, and producing a soft and level bed. For us six it was about ten feet long by six in breadth. This time we lay under our tent, having pitched it more prudently with reference to the wind and the flame, and the usual huge fire blazed in front.” Page 27: http://www.thoreau-online.org/the-maine-woods-page27.html

   I didn’t find anything about a tent catching fire, but I only skim searched.

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3. shawnee_Aug 2019
   > The Kennebec hadn’t run free here since 1837.

   Interestingly enough, it was Thoreau's inventory of species in these very streams and tributaries as documented in _The Maine Woods_, which can tell us how we're doing with the restoration of the waterways today. Thoreau's book was comprised of notes from three visits in 1846, 1853, and 1857, and he had a pretty early and close insight as to how bad the damage was from the get-go.

   At the end of the book, in the appendix, he noted several introduced species. Since he often used "Indian" guides to help him navigate upstream, he also had the opportunity to learn a bit about what species were native and what were brought in by the newcomers. (Disclaimer: my mother was one-quarter indigenous to one of the tribes Thoreau mentions, so I've studied these texts pretty thoroughly).

   Several interesting musings on the encroachment of the white man into these lands; this one especially:

   > Tahmunt said that he traded at Quebec, my companion inquired the meaning of the word Quebec, about which there has been so much question. He did not know, but began to conjecture. He asked what those great ships were called . that carried soldiers. " Men-of-war," we answered. " Well," he said, " when the English ships came up the river, they could not go any farther, it was so narrow there ; they must go back, go-back, that 's Que-bec." I mention this to show the value of his authority in the other cases.

   [146 THE MAINE WOODS: https://archive.org/stream/mainewoods00thorrich/mainewoods00...]

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