The localness of fogs

August 7.

I am struck by the localness of the fogs.

Every morning  I see more or less solid white fog on the earth, though none on the mountain.  For five mornings they occupy the same place and are about the same in extent. The fog lies several hundred feet thick, on the lower country only, in great spidery lakes and streams answering to the lakes, streams, and meadows beneath. Soon rising, the fog  breaks up, and drifts off, or rather seems to drift away as it evaporates.

If we awake into a fog it does not occur to us that the inhabitants of a neighboring town may have none. Yet, looking down thus on the country every morning, I see that this thick white veil of fog is spread here, and not there. Certain portions of New Hampshire and Massachusetts are at this season commonly invested with fog in the morning, while others are free from it. 

This morning a lifted fog as high as the Peterboro Hills, ever drifting easterly but making no progress, dissipates. Our mountain is above all.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 7, 1860

I am struck by the localness of the fogs. If we awake into a fog it does not occur to us that the inhabitants of a neighboring town may have none. Compare June 3, 1858 ("It was pleasant enough to see one man’s farm in the shadow of a cloud, — which perhaps he thought covered all the Northern States, — while his neighbor’s farm was in sunshine.”); November 30, 1858 ("Thus local is all storm, surrounded by serenity and beauty.”)

The fog lies . . . in great spidery lakes and streams answering to the lakes, streams, and meadows beneath. See June 3, 1853 ("Now I have reached the hill top above the fog at a quarter to five, about sunrise, and all around me is a sea of fog, level and white, reaching nearly to the top of this hill, only the tops of a few high hills appearing as distant islands in the main. It resembles nothing so much as the ocean."); July 25, 1852 ("The farmers that lie slumbering on this their day of rest, how little do they know of this stupendous pageant! Every valley is densely packed with the downy vapor.”); July 22, 1851 ("The season of morning fogs has arrived. A great crescent over the course of the river . . .”); 

For five mornings. Thoreau visited Monadnock on four occasions: a solo overnight on the summit in 1844, a quick day-hike in  September 1852, and more extended stays in 1858 and 1860: June 2, 1858,  June 3, 1858, and June 4, 1858; and  August 4 1860, August 5, 1860. August 6, 1860, August 7, 1860, August 8, 1860, and  August 9, 1860/ Also  Monadnock pencil drawings (1860)