Saffron wrote:What if HDT was just reporting the actually dates he purchased the shanty and the ax . . .
Saffron, Thoreau did not purchase an axe (he spells it with an
e). He borrowed it:
1.60 Near the end of March, 1845, I borrowed an axe and went down to the woods by Walden Pond, nearest to where I intended to build my house, and began to cut down some tall, arrowy white pines, still in their youth, for timber.
And just as Thoreau does not tell
who loaned him the axe, he does not tell the date he purchased the Collins shanty.
Saffron wrote:What if [the purchace of the shanty was] merely a coincidence that happened to be near Easter?
Thoreau did not celebrate religion holidays, but the rest of his family did, and I suppose his mother and sisters would have dressed for the occasion, as is traditional, so he would have known about it. If the Collinses were Irish Catholic, as was likely, then it may be that the date to renew their lives was chosen to correspond to the date of religious renewal. The date of the sale may have been no coincidence. Further, when Thoreau made the purchase, he also was committed to a new life, since he paid $4.25 for it, a considerable sum for a man who worked for a dollar a day. My belief, however, is that the Easter context of the event influenced Thoreau's interpretation of the event, whether or not the concurrence is called a
coincidence.
Two additional points: Easter in 1845 occurred on March 23, and it just so happens that Easter in 2008 occurred on March 23 too. Second, the concurrence of events was (or became) extreme important to Thoreau. Much of his later life was devoted to phenological research.
Phenology is the study of the times of recurring natural phenomena. The word is derived from the Greek phainomai (φαινομαι)- to appear, come into view, and indicates that phenology has been principally concerned with the dates of first occurrence of natural events in their annual cycle. Examples include the date of emergence of leaves and flowers, the first flight of butterflies and the first appearance of migratory birds, the date of leaf colouring and fall in deciduous trees, the dates of egg-laying of birds and amphibia, or the timing of the developmental cycles of temperate-zone honey bee colonies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenology
Sometimes a cigar is chocolate.
Tom