Blue haze

August 14, 2015

August 14.

Viburnum dentatum berries blue. 

Saw a rose still. 

There is such a haze that I cannot see the mountains.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 14, 1852

Viburnum dentatum berries blue. See August 11, 1853 ("The small, dull, lead-colored berries of the Viburnum dentatum now hang over the water."); August 13, 1858 ("The dullish-blue or lead-colored Viburnum dentatum berries are now seen, not long, overhanging the side of the river.");August 17, 1851 ("The lead-colored berries of the Viburnum dentatum now.")

Saw a rose still. See July 14, 1853 ("I see a rose, now in its prime, by the river, in the water amid the willows and button-bushes, while others, lower on shore, are nearly out of bloom."); July 23, 1860 ("The late rose is now in prime along the river, a pale rose-color but very delicate, keeping up the memory of roses"); August 4, 1854 ("See a late rose still in flower."); August 5, 1858 ("The late rose is still conspicuous, in clumps advanced into the meadow here and there.")

There is such a haze that I cannot see the mountains. See August 18. 1852 ("No mountains can be seen.") See also  August 13, 1854 ("Now the mountains are concealed by the dog-day haze. ");  August 19, 1854 ("There is such a haze we see not further than our Annursnack, which is blue as a mountain.”); August 22, 1854 (“The haze is so thick that we can hardly see more than a mile.”); August 30, 1854 ("The valleys are emptied of haze, and I see with new pleasure to distant hillsides and farmhouses and a river-reach shining in the sun, and to the mountains in the horizon.")