Thursday, November 6, 2014

It is suddenly cold.

November 6

Surveying on Colburn place. 

November 6, 2023

It is suddenly cold. Pools frozen so as to bear, and ground frozen so that it is difficult, if not impossible, to force down a stake in plowed ground. 

Was that a fish hawk I saw flying over the Assabet, or a goshawk? White beneath, with slender wings.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, November 6, 1854


It is suddenly cold. Pools frozen so as to bear. 
See November 19, 1855 ("A cold, gray day, once spitting snow. Water froze in tubs enough to bear last night."); November 25, 1857 ("Pools under the north sides of hills are frozen pretty thick"); November 28, 1853 ("Boys skating in Cambridgeport, — the first ice to bear. ")

Was that a fish hawk I saw . . . white beneath, with slender wings.
 See November 17, 1854 ( I think it must have been a fish hawk which I saw hovering over the meadow and my boat (a raw cloudy afternoon).  . . Its wings were very long, slender, and curved in outline of front edge. I think there was some white on rump.) See also A Book of Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Osprey (Fish Hawk) and April 17, 1852 ("What is that large hawk with a pure white belly and slender long black wings (a goshawk?) [Or fish hawk?] which I see sailing over the Cliffs , – a pair of them looking for prey"); April 29, 1853 ("At Natural History Rooms in Boston . . . . The American goshawk is slate above, gray beneath; the young spotted dark and white beneath, and brown above
. Fish hawk, white beneath."); April 24, 1854 ("Saw a very large hawk, slaty above and white beneath, low over river. Was it not a goshawk?")


November 6. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, November 6

It is suddenly 
cold – pools frozen so as to 
bear – and ground frozen

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau
"A book, each page written in its own season,
out-of-doors, in its own locality."
~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx © 2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-541106

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