His father belonged to a class of men only to be found on
the coast of Maine, who are at once fishermen, farmers and navigators; a
much more intelligent and cultivated class than the agricultural people
of the interior. It is a beautiful sail among the islands from Rockland
to Mount Desert, and the pleasantest part of it, to me at least, is the
sight of the well kept farms with their handsome cattle and clean-shaven
hay-fields, which line the coast. Our best ship-builders have originated
among these people.
Brooksville is a thinly scattered settlement on the westerly side of a
rocky and even mountainous peninsula. A deep and narrow strait separates
it from Castine, which has to be crossed in a ferry-boat. The house of
David Wasson, Senior, is something more than half-a-mile from the ferry
landing; a large, commodious, two-story house, much better than the
average of farm-houses, with two large barns and numerous out-buildings.
Between it and the street is an orchard, and on one side a latticed
porch or piazza. West of it there is a trout-brook and beyond that a
hemlock grove, and the blue hills of Camden in the distance. On the
south side the sea comes up to the edge of the farm, and the road to
Sedgwick winds about the ridge on the East. It was a fitting birthplace
for a poet or a painter.
He has left us a valuable and quite unique sketch of his early boyhood,
[Footnote: Essays, Religious, Social, Political.
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