Warmest day since December

February 16. 

P. M. —To Walden. 

It has been trying to snow for two days. About one inch fell last night, but it clears up at noon, and sun comes out very warm and bright. 

Wild says it is the warmest day at 12 M. since the 22d of December, when the thermometer stood at 50°. To-day it is at 44. 

I hear the eaves running before I come out, and our thermometer at 2 P. M. is 38°. The sun is most pleasantly warm on my cheek; the melting snow shines in the ruts; the cocks crow more than usual in barns; my greatcoat is an incumbrance. 

There is no down visible on the sallows when I descend the east side of the railroad, unless a scale has come off. 

Where I measured the ice in the middle of Walden on the 6th I now measure again, or close by it, though without cutting out the cake. I find about 11 1/4; (probably about same as the 6th, when called 11 1/2) of snow ice and 21 in all, leaving 10 1/4 clear ice, which would make the ice to have increased beneath through all this thickness and in spite of the thaws 2 3/4 inches. Near the shore in one place it was twenty-two inches.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 16, 1856

Wild says it is the warmest day at 12 M. since the 22d of since the 22d of December, when the thermometer stood at 50°. To-day it is at 44.  See February 16, 1857 ("A wonderfully warm day (the third one); about 2 p.m., thermometer in shade 58."); See also January 25, 1860 ("Above 40° is warm for winter."); February 12, 1856 ("Thawed all day yesterday and rained some what last night; clearing off this morning. Heard the eaves drop all night. The thermometer at 8.30 A. M., 42°");
February 14, 1857 ("It is a fine, somewhat springlike day. . .the thermometer in the shade north of house standing 42°."); And also February 8, 1860 (40° and upward may be called a warm day in the winter."); February 23, 1860 ("We have not had such a warm day since the beginning of December (which was remarkably warm).")

Where I measured the ice in the middle of Walden on the 6th I now measure again, or close by it, though without cutting out the cake. I find about . . . 21 in all, . .  See note to February 6, 1856 ("Cut a cake of ice out of the middle of Walden,. . .On the 18th of January the ice had been about seven inches thick here,. . . It was now 19 inches thick, . . . ")

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