Indian Summer

December 7. 

Perhaps the warmest day yet. True Indian summer. The walker perspires. 

The shepherd's-purse is in full bloom; the andromeda not turned red.

Saw a pile of snow-fleas in a rut in the wood-path, six or seven inches long and three quarters of an inch high, to the eye exactly like powder, as if a sportsman had spilled it from his flask; and when a stick was passed through the living and skipping mass, each side of the furrow preserved its edge as in powder.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 7, 1852

The shepherd's-purse is in full bloom. See November 3, 1852 (“Shepherd's-purse abundant still in gardens.”); November 5, 1855 (“I see the shepherd’s-purse, hedge-mustard, and red clover, — November flowers. ”)

The andromeda not turned red. See December 21, 1856 ("How interesting and wholesome their color now! A broad level thick stuff, without a crevice in it, composed of the dull brown-red andromeda. Is it not the most uniform and deepest red that covers a large surface now?")

Saw a pile of snow-fleas in a rut in the wood-path to the eye exactly like powder, as if a sportsman had spilled it from his flask. See December 16, 1850 ("The snow everywhere is covered with snow-fleas like pepper. . . .They look like some powder which the hunter has spilled in the path. ") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Snow-flea