Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Olde Cambridge

[22]
A tale which grew in wonder, year by year,
As, every time he told it, Joe drew near
To the main fight, till, faded and grown gray,
The original scene to bolder tints gave way:
Then Joe had heard the foe's scared double-quick
Beat on stove-drum with one uncaptured stick,
And, ere death came the lengthening tale to lop,
Himself had fired and seen a redcoat drop.
Had Joe lived long enough, that scrambling fight
Had squared more nearly to his sense of right,
And vanquished Percy, to complete the tale,
Had hammered stone for life in Concord jail.

There were still those in Cambridge who could recall the American Revolution and whose sons enacted the surrender of Cornwallis at every country muster. The houses of Tory Row still stood in isolated dignity, some of them suspected, like the two Vassall Houses, of being connected by secret underground passages which none could find, or else surrounded with quaint walls and fishponds and “topiary work” of carved yew trees, as at the Brattle House, now converted into the Social Union. I myself used to play among these trees with Margaret Fuller's younger brothers. Not far off was the house of the elder Professor Hedge, previously occupied by his father-in-law, Dr.