Morning Fog

July 25.

From Fair Haven Hill, the sun having risen, I see great wreaths of fog far northeast, revealing the course of the river, a noble sight, as it were the river elevated, or rather the ghost of the ample stream that once flowed to ocean between these now distant uplands in another geological period, filling the broad meadows, -the dews saved to the earth by this great Musketaquid condenser, refrigerator.

The fog rises highest over the channel of the river and over the ponds in the woods which are thus revealed. I clearly distinguish where White Pond lies by this sign, and various other ponds, methinks, to which I have walked ten or twelve miles distant, and I distinguish the course of the Assabet far in the west and southwest beyond the woods. 

And now the rising sun makes glow with downiest white the ample wreaths, which rise higher than the highest trees. 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.  A certain thrilling vastness or wasteness it now suggests. This is one of those ambosial, white, ever-memorable fogs presaging fair weather. 

In the meanwhile the wood thrush and the jay and the robin sing around me here, and birds are heard singing from the midst of the fog. And in one short hour this sea will all evaporate and the sun be reflected from farm windows on its green bottom.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 25, 1852


Great wreaths of fog...white, ever-memorable fogs presaging fair weather. See July 22, 1851 ("The season of morning fogs has arrived. A great crescent over the course of the river, the fog retreats, and I do not see how it is dissipated, leaving this slight, thin vapor to curl over the surface of the still, dark water, still as glass. These are our fairest days, which are born in a fog.")