Sleepy Hollow Cemetery...

...in historic Concord, Massachusetts. A perfect place to visit on a crisp October afternoon.

(click any photos to enlarge)

(Am I the only one who sees irony in the "One Way" stone marker above?)


Come along as we head up to Authors Ridge ....


Here we are at the top of Authors Ridge, facing the Alcott family plot...


...where Amanda stopped at Louisa May Alcott's grave.


The monument marking the Alcott family plot is intricately carved...


...but the individual markers are very simple.

"Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead."

(Louisa May Alcott)

Here is the Thoreau family plot...


...where Henry David Thoreau's simple headstone is adorned with gifts left by visitors...

"An early-morning walk is a blessing for the whole day."

Henry David Thoreau

The Emerson family plot....


Ralph Waldo Emerson spoke at the dedication ceremony for Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in 1855.

"Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Hawthorne family plot...

...where, again, visitors have left gifts for Nathaniel Hawthorne.

"Our Creator would never have made such lovely days, and have given us the deep hearts to enjoy them, above and beyond all thought, unless we were meant to be immortal."

Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Miles family plot...

And a beautiful marker for Lucy R. Davis...

SLEEPY HOLLOW by William Ellery Channing

(which he read at the Sleepy Hollow dedication ceremony in 1855)

No abbey's gloom, nor dark cathedral stoops,

No winding torches paint the midnight air;

Here the green pines delight, the aspen droops

Along the modest pathways, and those fair

Pale asters of the season spread their plumes

Around this field, fit garden for our tombs.

And shalt thou pause to hear some funeral bell

Slow stealing o'er thy heart in this calm place,

Not with a throb of pain, a feverish knell,

But in its kind and supplicating grace,

It says, Go, pilgrim, on thy march, be more

Friend to the friendless than thou wast before;

Learn from the loved one's rest serenity;

To-morrow that soft bell for thee shall sound,

And thou repose beneath the whispering tree,

One tribute more to this submissive ground;—

Prison thy soul from malice, bar out pride,

Nor these pale flowers nor this still field deride:

Rather to those ascents of being turn,

Where a ne'er-setting sun illumes the year

Eternal, and the incessant watchfires burn

Of unspent holiness and goodness clear,—

Forget man's littleness, deserve the best,

God's mercy in thy thought and life confest.

I highly recommend a visit to Sleepy Hollow Cemetery if you find yourself in the Concord area. In my next post I'll share some other photos from our little day trip to Concord, including The Colonial Inn (haunted?) and Orchard House, where Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women...




Donna