Being unusually bright folk,
remarkably intelligent, highly educated and, as may be said, brilliantly
enlightened, they succeeded, almost beyond belief, in making a woefully
bad bargain. I do not know how much they paid for the land but whatever
the price it was too high. The property was picturesque to look at but
its best herbage was sheep-sorrel. Next the brook, which gave the name,
Brook Farm, there was a fair bit of meadow, with a rounded hill called
the Knoll rising sharply on the north. The land rolled unevenly on,
one-eighth of a mile or so, to higher ground and then fell off again to
a level plateau covered with pine woods, beyond which were two or three
fields of plow-land. The soil was thin, sandy where it was not rocky,
and rocky where it was not sandy. It was a poor place, indeed, and had
been poorly farmed until it was as lean as Pharaoh's second herd of
kine. It speaks well for these unsophisticated philosophers that in four
years they made this desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose;
cultivating the finest market gardens and flower-gardens in Roxbury,
planting orchards and vineyards, and growing pasturage for a profitable
dairy.
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