How much life the note of the bobolink imparts to the meadow!

May 12. A glorious day. 

May 12. A glorious day. 

P. M. —Walked round by Dennis’s and Hollowell place with Alcott. 

It is suddenly very warm. A washing day, with a slight haze accompanying the strong, warm wind. 

I see, in the road beyond Luther Hosmer’s, in different places, two bank swallows which were undoubtedly killed by the four days’ northeast rain we have just had. Puffer says he has seen two or three dead sparrows also. 

The sudden heat compels us to sit in the shade at the bars above Puffer's, whence we hear the first bobolink. 

How suddenly the birds arrive after the storm, — even yesterday before it was fairly over, —as if they had foreseen its end! How much life the note of the bobolink imparts to the meadow! 

I see a cultivated cherry in bloom, and Prichard’s Canada plum will probably bloom to-morrow. 

The river is higher than yesterday, about the same as when highest before this spring, and goes no higher. Thus attains its height the day after the rain.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 12, 1856

We hear the first bobolink. . . .See May 6, 1857 ("While at work I hear the bobolink .”); May 13, 1855 ("As we float down the river through the still and hazy air, enjoying the June-like warmth, . . . the sound of the first bobolink floats to us from over the meadows. . .");  May 10, 1853 ("lt at once a strain that sounds like old times and recalls a hundred associations. Not at once do I remember that a year has elapsed since I heard it, and then the idea of the bobolink is formed in my mind. . . It is remarkable that I saw this morning for the first time the bobolink, gold robin, and kingbird, - and have since heard the first two in various parts of the town and am satisfied that they have just come.”); May 16, 1854 ("The earth is all fragrant as one flower. And bobolinks tinkle in the air. Nature now is perfectly genial to man.”).