Describe the few pleasant social contacts in Walden which Thoreau experienced, while living at Walden and explain why Thoreau valued them.

In the
"Visitors" chapter in , Thoreau talks about a Canadian woodcutter
and post-maker. "A more simple and natural man it would be hard to find" (131).
Thoreau admires the man for living a simple life in nature and this woodcutter has also heard of
Homer but did not have the mind to "write thoughts." When Thoreau would approach the
woodcutter, he would cease his work and his "mirth was without alloy" (132). Thoreau
admired this man's youthful exuberance but found him intellectually lacking. 

Thoreau also found some from the almshouse (poorhouse) who were "wiser than the
so-called overseers" (137). In this...