A Book of the Seasons: September 27.

September 27.

Now the sun lights up 

the river so that it shines

like a silver mirror.  

September 27, 1851

From our native hills 

we look out easily to 

the far blue mountains.

September 27, 1852

I look across the 

globe in an instant to the 

dim Monadnock peak. 

September 27, 1852

The same we looked up

at near at hand from the midst 

of primitive woods.

September 27, 1852

See a blaze of red
reflected in troubled water –

single red maple.

September 27, 1855

Single red maple –

a blaze of red reflected 

from troubled water.

September 27, 1855

This fine afternoon the creak of the cricket sounds late along the shore. September 27, 1856

Digging potatoes

the farmers pause to watch my 

sail and bending mast.
September 27, 1858

A little dipper
in middle of the river – 
I sit down and watch.
September 27, 1860

September 27, 2014

Yesterday I traced the note of what I have falsely thought the Rana palustris, or cricket frog, to its true source . . .  a mole cricket (Gryllotalpa brevipennis). September 27, 1855

I see the colors of trees and shrubs beginning to put on their October dress, and the creak of the mole cricket sounds late along the shore. September 27, 1856

The maples by the riverside look very green yet, have not begun to blush, nor are the leaves touched by frost. September 27, 1851

Some single red maples now fairly make a show along the meadow. I see a blaze of red reflected from the troubled water. September 27, 1855 

At last, its labors for the year being consummated and every leaf ripened to its full, it flashes out conspicuous to the eye of the most casual observer, with all the virtue and beauty of a maple, – Acer rubrum.  September 27, 1857 

Red maples now fairly glow along the shore. . . .It is the first blush which is the purest.   September 27, 1858

It is a day for fishermen. September 27, 1851

The farmers are gathering in their corn. September 27, 1851

The farmers digging potatoes on shore pause a moment to watch my sail and bending mast. September 27, 1858

See men raking cranberries now, or far away squatting in the meadows, where they are picking them.  September 27, 1858

Rambled over the hills toward Tarbell's. The huckleberry bushes appear to be unusually red this fall, reddening these hills.  September 27, 1851

Huckleberries are still abundant and quite plump on Conantum, though they have a somewhat dried taste.  September 27, 1857

At Saw Mill Brook many finely cut and flat ferns are faded whitish and very handsome, as if pressed, — very delicate.  September 27, 1852

The large common ferns (either cinnamon or interrupted) are yellowish, and also many as rich a deep brown now as ever. September 27, 1857

The Aster multiflorus may easily be confounded with the A. Tradescanti. Like it, it whitens the roadside in some places. It has purplish disks, but a less straggling top than the Tradescanti. September 27, 1856

Some tall, many-flowered, bluish-white asters are still abundant by the brook-sides. September 27, 1851

Solidago nemoralis nearly done. September 27, 1857

Solidago speciosa not quite out!!   September 27, 1856

Green lice are still on the birches. September 27, 1852

White birches have fairly begun to yellow, and blackberry vines here and there in sunny places look like a streak of blood on the grass.  September 27, 1857

From the mountains we do not discern our native hills; but from our native hills we look out easily to the far blue mountains.  September 27, 1852

What is it but a faint blue cloud, a mist that may vanish? September 27, 1852

But now that I look across the globe in an instant to the dim Monadnock peak . . . I cannot realize that on the tops of those cool blue ridges are in abundance berries still, bluer than themselves, as if they borrowed their blueness from their locality. September 27, 1852

Who can believe that the mountain peak which he beholds fifty miles off in the horizon, rising far and faintly blue above an intermediate range, while he stands on his trivial native hills . . . can be the same with that which he looked up at once near at hand from a gorge in the midst of primitive woods? September 27, 1852

As I sit there I see the shadow of a hawk flying above and behind me. I think I see more hawks nowadays. September 27, 1857

It is a very fine afternoon to be on the water, some what Indian-summer-like. I do not know what constitutes the peculiarity and charm of this weather; the broad water so smooth, notwithstanding the slight wind . . . There is a slight coolness in the air, yet the sun is occasionally very warm. September 27, 1857

The flashing clearness of the atmosphere. More light appears to be reflected from the earth, less absorbed. September 27, 1852

Now the sun in the west is coming out and lights up the river a mile off, so that it shines with a white light like a burnished silver mirror.  September 27, 1851

I see some black circling mote beating along, circling along the meadow's edge, now lost for a moment as it turns edgewise in a peculiar light, now reappearing further or nearer. September 27, 1857

Looking up, I see a little dipper in the middle of the river . . . I sit down and watch. September 27, 1860

*****

September 27, 2020

March 28, 1858 ("turning my glass toward the mountains, I can see the sun reflected from the rocks on Monadnock, and I know that it would be pleasant to be there too to-day as well as here")

March 31, 1853 ("It is affecting to see a distant mountain-top,. . . still as blue and ethereal to your eyes as is your memory of it.')

August 2, 1852 ("In many moods it is cheering to look across hence to that blue rim of the earth,  . . . These hills extend our plot of earth; they make our native valley or indentation in the earth so much the larger.")

August 5, 1852 (" From Smith's Hill beyond, there is as good a view of the mountains as from any place in our neighbor hood, because you look across the broad valley in which Concord lies first of all. The foreground is on a larger scale and more proportionate. The Peterboro Hills are to us as good as mountains. Hence, too, I see that fair river-reach, in the north."):

May 17, 1858 ("I doubt if in the landscape there can be anything finer than a distant mountain-range. They are a constant elevating influence.")

September 12, 1851 ("It is worth the while to see the mountains in the horizon once a day");  

September 25, 1857 ("The red maple has fairly begun to blush in some places by the river. I see one, by the canal behind Barrett’s mill, all aglow against the sun.. . .A single tree becomes the crowning beauty of some meadowy vale and attracts the attention of the traveller from afar. . . .The whole tree, thus ripening in advance of its fellows, attains a singular preéminence and attracts the attention of the traveller from afar. ")
September 26, 1854 ("Some single red maples are very splendid now, the whole tree bright-scarlet against the cold green pines; now, when very few trees are changed, a most remarkable object in the landscape; seen a mile off")
October 3, 1858 ("Some particular maple among a hundred will be of a peculiarly bright and pure scarlet, and, by its difference of tint and intenser color, attract our eyes even at a distance in the midst of the crowd")

November 1, 1858 ("A man dwells in his native valley like a corolla in its calyx, like an acorn in its cup. Here, of course, is all that you love, all that you expect, all that you are.")

November 11, 1851 ("The horizon has one kind of beauty and attraction to him who has never explored the hills and mountains in it, and another ... to him who has.")

December 8, 1854 ("Why do the mountains never look so fair as from my native fields?")

September 17, 2019

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 © 2009-2015