High water on the Concord

June 22.

One who is not almost daily on the river will not perceive the revolution constantly going on.

It is hard to tell what is a fresh deposit and what an old growth. I notice a black willow top a foot above water, a dozen rods from shore, near the outlet of Fair Haven Pond, or just off the point of the Island, where the water is ten feet deep by my measure, and it is alive and green. There is a very large mass of bushes moved on the right shore, some way above Sherman's Bridge, and a large mass above Heard's Bridge some distance, on the east side (having drifted across). I should say that the largest masses, or islands, of button-bushes standing in the meadows had drifted there.

Many seeing the green willow-tops rising above the surface in deep water think that there is a rock there on which they grow. Even the owner of the meadow and the haymakers may not always detect what was imported the previous spring, these transplanted plants look so at home there.

So the revolution is almost an imperceptible one.

H.D. Thoreau, Journal, June 22, 1859

One who is not almost daily on the river will not perceive the revolution constantly going on. See February 25, 1851 ("The crust of the meadow afloat, . . . another agent employed in the distribution of plants."); February 27, 1851("Blue-joint was introduced into the first meadow where it did not grow before."); February 28, 1855 ("This is a powerful agent at work.”)