A very large hawk

April 3,  2015

April 3

It is somewhat warmer, but still windy, and I go to sail down to the Island and up to Hubbard’s Causeway.



Most would call it cold to-day. I paddle without gloves. It is a coolness like that of March 29th and 30th, pleasant to breathe, and, perhaps, like that, presaging decidedly warmer weather. It is an amelioration, as nature does nothing suddenly.

The shores are lined with frozen spray-like foam, with an abrupt edge, a foot high often on the waterside. Occasionally where there are twigs there is a nest of those short, thick bulls’-horn icicles, pointing in every direction.

I see many hens feeding close to the river’s edge, like the crows, - and robins and blackbirds later, - and I have no doubt they are attracted by a like cause. The ground being first thawed there, not only worms but other insect and vegetable life is accessible there sooner than elsewhere.

See several pairs of ducks, mostly black.

Returning, when off the hill am attracted by the noise of crows, which betray to me a very large hawk, large enough for an eagle, sitting on a maple beneath them. Now and then they dive at him, and at last he sails away low round the hill, as if hunting.

The hillside is alive with sparrows, red-wings, and the first grackles 
[rusty grackles, or rusty blackbirds.] I have seen.  I detected them first by their more rasping note . . . after a short stuttering, then a fine, clear whistle. 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 3, 1855

Most would call it cold to-day. I paddle without gloves. Compare April 3, 1852 ("It is very cold and windy, and I miss my gloves, left at home. Colder than the last moon"); See March 20, 1855 (“It is remarkable by what a gradation of days which we call pleasant and warm . . . At first a sunny, calm, serene winter day is pronounced spring, or reminds us of it; and then the first pleasant spring day perhaps we walk with our greatcoat buttoned up and gloves on.”);  April 26, 1860 ("To-day it is 53° at 2 P. M., yet cold, such a difference is there in our feelings. What we should have called a warm day in March is a cold one at this date in April. It is the northwest wind makes it cold.")

A coolness like that of March 29th and 30th. See March 29, 1855 ("I inhale with pleasure the cold but wholesome air . . . This, which is a chilling wind to my fellow, is decidedly refreshing to me."); March 30, 1855 ("To-day and yesterday have been bright, windy days. —west wind, cool, yet, compared with the previous colder ones, pleasantly, gratefully cool to me on my cheek.")

Nature does nothing suddenly. See September 17, 1839 ("Nature never makes haste; her systems revolve at an even pace."); June 14, 1851 ("How moderate, deliberate, is Nature! "); January 26, 1858 ("Nature loves gradation.");  November 17, 1858 ("Nature is moderate and loves degrees.");  January 14, 1861 ("Nature is slow but sure; she works no faster than need be.")

Those short, thick bulls’-horn icicles, pointing in every direction. See April 2, 1855 ("The wind is still very strong and cold from the north west . . . blowing the water . . . over the rocks and bushes along the shore, where it freezes in the shape of bulls’ horns.")

See several pairs of ducks, mostly black. See April 7, 1853 ("We cross the Great Meadows, scaring up many ducks at a great distance, some partly white, some apparently black, some brownish (?).  It is Fast-Day, and many gunners are about the shore, which makes them shy. I never cross the meadow at this season without seeing ducks. "); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Black Duck

The noise of crows . . . betray to me a very large hawk, large enough for an eagle. See April 6, 1856 ("The crows had betrayed to me some large bird of the hawk kind which they were buffeting.); April 8, 1854 ("It sailed and circled along over the low cliff, and the crows dived at it in the field of my glass . . . It was undoubtedly a white-headed eagle.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow

Rusty grackles, or rusty blackbirds . . . after a short stuttering, then a fine, clear whistle. See April 9, 1855 ("Wilson says that the only note of the rusty grackle is a chuck, though he is told that at Hudson’s Bay, at the breeding-time, they sing with a fine note. Here they utter not only a chuck, but a fine shrill whistle."); April 11, 1856 (" See a male and female rusty grackle alight on an oak near me, the latter apparently a flaxen brown, with a black tail. She looks like a different species of bird. Wilson had heard only a tchuck from the grackle, but this male, who was courting his mate, broke into incipient warbles, like a bubble burst.");  March 29, 1853 ("It would be worth the while to attend more to the different notes of the blackbirds.");March 29, 1858 ("I see what I suppose is the female rusty grackle; black body with green reflections and purplish-brown head and neck, but I notice no light iris. ") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Signs of the Spring: The grackle arrives.

April 3. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, April 3

A very large hawk

large enough for an eagle

mobbed by noisy crows.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  A very large hawk

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 © 2009-2025

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