It is impossible to report in writing even the heads of this discourse,
pervading as it did the atmosphere of Brook Farm as currents of
electricity pervade the air in breaths. In a college-student's ditty is
a strain conveying some hint of such parley:
"We'll sing to-night with hearts as light
And joys as gay and fleeting
As the bubbles that swim on the beaker's brim
And break on the lips at meeting."
The bubbles that break on the lips are past mending. The effervescence
and sparkle of wine can only be known as the glass is filled. The fine
art of conversation can be perfected only by choice spirits whose hearts
are light, whose sprightly wit, gay good humor and alert intelligence
make their utterances almost intoxicating.
Some attempts have been made to chronicle famous Brook Farm
conversations but the best record could hardly be more than a jest book.
The alert sallies and quick retorts, the pat allusions and apt
quotations, the exaggerations, the absurdities, the shrewd witticisms,
the searching satires, the puns and improvised nonsense verses might
possibly have been registered on paper, but the spirit of merriment, of
good fellowship and mutual understanding that made thoughts to live and
words to sing--the spirit of Brook Farm--no snap-shot camera could ever
have caught.
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