The year is but a succession of days,
and I see that I could assign some office to each day
which, summed up, would be the history of the year.
Henry Thoreau, August 24, 1852
The placid waters
seen as a lake but known as
a noble river.
The fair still waters
suggest eternal peace and
beauty whence it flows
tempting beholders
at once to explore it and
their own destiny.
The jay's note resounds
along a raw wood-side with
singular wildness.
The furnace-like heat
produces a thickness in
the near horizon.
July 9, 1852
Now with a clear sky
the distant horizon is
a narrow blue line.
Busy hummingbird
unmindful of the shower
struck by a big drop.
Now, with a clear sky and bright weather, we see many dark streaks and patches where the surface of the ocean is rippled by fishes, mostly menhaden, far and wide, in countless myriads, such the populousness of the sea. July 9, 1855
The distant horizon a narrow blue line from distance like mountains. July 9, 1855
The heat to-day (as yesterday) is furnace-like. It produces a thickness almost amounting to vapor in the near horizon. July 9, 1852
Bathing is an undescribed luxury. July 9, 1852
To feel the wind blow on your body, the water flow on you and lave you, is a rare physical enjoyment this hot day. July 9, 1852
When I got out of the cars at Porter’s, Cambridge, this morning, I was pleased to see the handsome blue flowers of the succory or endive (Cichorium Intybus), which reminded me that within the hour I had been whirled into a new botanical region. July 9, 1851
Saw there also the Cucubalus Behen, or bladder campion, July 9, 1851
Also the autumnal dandelion (Apargia autumnalis). July 9, 1851
These blueberries on Fair Haven have a very innocent, ambrosial taste, as if made of the ether itself, as they plainly are colored with it. July 9, 1852
When I saw that reach of Charles River just above the depot, the fair, still water this cloudy evening suggesting the way to eternal peace and beauty, whence it flows, the placid, lake-like fresh water, so unlike the salt brine, affected me not a little. July 9, 1851
What can be more impressive than to look up a noble river just at evening, – one, perchance, which you have never explored, — and behold its placid waters, reflecting the woods and sky, lapsing inaudibly toward the ocean; to behold as a lake, but know it as a river, tempting the beholder to explore it and his own destiny at once? July 9, 1851
Am surprised to find how much carburetted hydrogen gas there is in the beds of sawdust by the side of this stream, as at the "Narrows." I July 9, 1857
The bubbles, being lighter than atmospheric air, burst at once, and give me no opportunity to see myself in them, as those which the boat makes in sluggish water. July 9, 1857
We are accustomed to refer changes in the shore and the channel to the very gradual influence of the current washing away and depositing matter which was held in suspension, but certainly in many parts of our river the ice which moves these masses of bushes and meadow is a much more important agent. It will alter the map of the river in one year. July 9, 1859
Examine a lanceolate thistle which has been pressed and laid by a year. The papers being taken off, its head springs up more than an inch and the downy seeds begin to fly off. July 9, 1854
I see that the seeds of the Salix nigra gathered on the catkins on the 7th, or two days since, put in tumblers of water in my window, have already germinated ! and show those two little roundish green leaves. July 9, 1857
There is now but little black willow down left on the trees. July 9, 1857
I think I see how this tree is propagated by its seeds. Its countless minute brown seeds, just perceptible to the naked eye in the midst of their cotton, are wafted with the cotton to the water, — most abundantly about a fortnight ago, — and there they drift and form a thick white scum together with other matter, especially against some alder or other fallen or drooping shrub where there is less current than usual. There, within two or three days, a great many germinate and show their two little roundish leaves, more or less tingeing with green the surface of the scum, — somewhat like grass seed in a tumbler of cotton. July 9, 1857
Many of these are drifted in amid the button-bushes, willows, and other shrubs, and the sedge, along the riverside, and the water falling just at this time, when they have put forth little fibres, they are deposited on the mud just left bare in the shade, and thus probably a great many of them have a chance to become perfect plants. July 9, 1857
The mud in many such places is now green with them, though perhaps the seed has often blown directly through the air to such places. July 9, 1857
I am surprised to see dense groves of young maples an inch or more high from seed of this year. July 9, 1857
I see no flowers on the bass trees by this river this year, nor at Conantum. July 9, 1857
Could see no yellow wasps about the nest over my window at 6 a. m., but did just before 6.30. I hear of still a second nest at Mrs. Brown's and one at Julius Smith's. July 9, 1857
Another Attacus Promethea, a male from the same young black birch, was out and on the window this morning. July 9, 1857
Vessels of porcelain of Chinese manufacture have of late been repeatedly found in the catacombs of Thebes, in Egypt,. . and in three instances record the following legend:
"The flower opens, and lo! another year."
There is something sublime in the fact that some of the oldest written sentences should thus celebrate the coming in of spring. July 9, 1852
The birds all unite to make the morning quire; sing rather faintly, not prolonging their strains. The crickets appear to have received a reinforcement during the sultry night. July 9, 1852
I do not often hear the bluebird now except at dawn. July 9, 1852
I hear the chickadee's two wiry notes. July 9, 1852
The jay's note, resounding along a raw wood-side, suggests a singular wildness. July 9, 1852
I hear many scarlet tanagers, the first I have seen this season. July 9, 1852
A bobolink. July 9, 1852
See two handsome rose-breasted grosbeaks on the Corner causeway. . . .. By form, note, and color, both remind me of some of those foreign birds with great bills in cages. July 9, 1860
There is a smart shower at 5 p. m., and in the midst of it a hummingbird is busy about the flowers in the garden, unmindful of it, though you would think that each big drop that struck him would be a serious accident. July 9, 1860
See young kingbirds which have lately flown perched in a family on the willows,
--- the airy bird, lively, twittering. July 9, 1859
One is glad to hear that the naked eye still retains some importance in the estimation of astronomers. July 9, 1851
It is refreshing to see the surface of Fair Haven rippled with wind. July 9, 1852
The waves break here quite as on the seashore. July 9, 1852
Methinks we have had no clear winter skies — no skies the color of a robin's egg, and pure amber around — for some months. July 9, 1852
*****
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau:
Bathing is an undescribed luxury. See July 3, 1854 ("What a luxury to bathe now! It is gloriously hot, — the first of this weather. I cannot get wet enough. I must let the water soak into me. I begin to inhabit the planet, and see how I may be naturalized at last.”)
See young kingbirds which have lately flown perched in a family on the willows, — the airy bird, lively, twittering. See July 5, 1856 ("A kingbird’s nest in fork of a button-bush five feet high on shore (not saddled on); three young just hatched and one egg."); August 6, 1858 ("If our sluggish river, choked with potamogeton, might seem to have the slow-flying bittern for its peculiar genius, it has also the sprightly and aerial kingbird to twitter over and lift our thoughts to clouds as white as its own breast.")
The ice which moves these masses of bushes and meadow is a much more important agent. It will alter the map of the river in one year. See February 28, 1855 ("This is a powerful agent at work.”); June 22, 1859 ("One who is not almost daily on the river will not perceive the revolution constantly going on.”)
Examine a lanceolate thistle -- its head springs up more than an inch and the downy seeds begin to fly off. See September 1, 1852 ("Nothing can stay the thistle-down, but with September winds it unfailingly sets sail. The irresistible revolution of time."); September 29, 1858 ("What astronomer can calculate the orbit of my thistle-down and tell where it will deposit its precious freight at last? It may still be travelling when I am sleeping"); See lso September 4, 1859 ("Three kinds of thistles are commonly out now, — the pasture, lanceolate, and swamp"); August 3, 1856 ("Cirsium lanceolatum at Lee's Cliff, apparently some days. Its leaves are long-pointed and a much darker green than those of the pasture thistle")
See no yellow wasps about the nest over my window. .See June 28, 1857 ("under the peak of our roof, just over my chamber windows.”)
Another Attacus Promethea, a male from the same young black birch, was out and on the window. See July 5, 1857 ("There came out this morning, apparently from one of those hard stem-wound cocoons on a black birch in my window, a moth whose wings are spread four and a quarter inches")
I see no flowers on the bass trees by this river this year. See July 3, 1853 ("There are no flowers on bass trees commonly this year") and note to July 17, 1856 ("Hear at distance the hum of bees from the bass with its drooping flowers at the Island, a few minutes only before sunset. It sounds like the rumbling of a distant train of cars.”)
The beds of sawdust by the side of the stream. See April 12, 1852 ("The lines of sawdust left at different levels on the shore is just hint enough of a sawmill on the stream above. “); April 1, 1854 ("The lines of sawdust from Barrett's mill at different heights on the steep, wet bank under the hemlocks rather enhance the impression of freshness and wild-ness, as if it were a new country.”); April 19, 1854 ("Yesterday, as I was returning down the Assabet, . . . I was surprised to find the river so full of sawdust from the pail-factory and Barrett's mill that I could not easily distinguish if the stone-heaps had been repaired. There was not a square three inches clear. And I saw the sawdust deposited by an eddy in one place on the bottom like a sand-bank a foot or more deep half a mile below the mill.”); October 20, 1856 (“ at Hemlocks, in the eddy there, where the white bits of sawdust keep boiling up and down and whirling round as in a pot.”): April 1, 1858 ("It is remarkable that the river seems rarely to rise or fall gradually, but rather by fits and starts, and hence the water-lines, as indicated now by the sawdust, are very distinct parallel lines four or five or more inches apart.”); April 1, 1859 ("The river being so low, we see lines of sawdust perfectly level and parallel to one another on the side of the steep dark bank at the Hemlocks. . .”); July 7, 1859 ("Bathing at Barrett's Bay, I find it to be composed in good part of sawdust, mixed with sand.”)
The bubbles, being lighter than atmospheric air, burst at once. See July 14, 1857 ("Set fire to the carburetted hydrogen from the sawdust shoal with matches, and heard it flash. “); Compare June 3, 1854 (“On the pond we make bubbles with our paddles on the smooth surface, in which little hemispherical cases we see ourselves and boat, small, black and distinct, with a fainter reflection on the opposite side of the bubble (head to head). These last sometimes a minute before they burst.”); September 14, 1854("Now our oars leave a broad wake of large bubbles, which are slow to burst.”); June 7, 1857 (“Now I notice many bubbles left on the water in my wake, as if it were more sluggish or had more viscidity than earlier. Far behind me they rest without bursting.”)
What can be more impressive than to look up a noble river just at evening, – one, perchance, which you have never explored. See March 31, 1853 (" It is affecting to see a distant mountain-top, like the summits of Uncanoonuc, well seen from this hill, whereon you camped for a night in your youth, which you have never revisited, still as blue and ethereal to your eyes as is your memory of it")
The ice which moves these masses of bushes and meadow is a much more important agent. It will alter the map of the river in one year. See February 28, 1855 ("This is a powerful agent at work.”); June 22, 1859 ("One who is not almost daily on the river will not perceive the revolution constantly going on.”)
Examine a lanceolate thistle -- its head springs up more than an inch and the downy seeds begin to fly off. See September 1, 1852 ("Nothing can stay the thistle-down, but with September winds it unfailingly sets sail. The irresistible revolution of time."); September 29, 1858 ("What astronomer can calculate the orbit of my thistle-down and tell where it will deposit its precious freight at last? It may still be travelling when I am sleeping"); See lso September 4, 1859 ("Three kinds of thistles are commonly out now, — the pasture, lanceolate, and swamp"); August 3, 1856 ("Cirsium lanceolatum at Lee's Cliff, apparently some days. Its leaves are long-pointed and a much darker green than those of the pasture thistle")
See no yellow wasps about the nest over my window. .See June 28, 1857 ("under the peak of our roof, just over my chamber windows.”)
Another Attacus Promethea, a male from the same young black birch, was out and on the window. See July 5, 1857 ("There came out this morning, apparently from one of those hard stem-wound cocoons on a black birch in my window, a moth whose wings are spread four and a quarter inches")
I see no flowers on the bass trees by this river this year. See July 3, 1853 ("There are no flowers on bass trees commonly this year") and note to July 17, 1856 ("Hear at distance the hum of bees from the bass with its drooping flowers at the Island, a few minutes only before sunset. It sounds like the rumbling of a distant train of cars.”)
The beds of sawdust by the side of the stream. See April 12, 1852 ("The lines of sawdust left at different levels on the shore is just hint enough of a sawmill on the stream above. “); April 1, 1854 ("The lines of sawdust from Barrett's mill at different heights on the steep, wet bank under the hemlocks rather enhance the impression of freshness and wild-ness, as if it were a new country.”); April 19, 1854 ("Yesterday, as I was returning down the Assabet, . . . I was surprised to find the river so full of sawdust from the pail-factory and Barrett's mill that I could not easily distinguish if the stone-heaps had been repaired. There was not a square three inches clear. And I saw the sawdust deposited by an eddy in one place on the bottom like a sand-bank a foot or more deep half a mile below the mill.”); October 20, 1856 (“ at Hemlocks, in the eddy there, where the white bits of sawdust keep boiling up and down and whirling round as in a pot.”): April 1, 1858 ("It is remarkable that the river seems rarely to rise or fall gradually, but rather by fits and starts, and hence the water-lines, as indicated now by the sawdust, are very distinct parallel lines four or five or more inches apart.”); April 1, 1859 ("The river being so low, we see lines of sawdust perfectly level and parallel to one another on the side of the steep dark bank at the Hemlocks. . .”); July 7, 1859 ("Bathing at Barrett's Bay, I find it to be composed in good part of sawdust, mixed with sand.”)
The bubbles, being lighter than atmospheric air, burst at once. See July 14, 1857 ("Set fire to the carburetted hydrogen from the sawdust shoal with matches, and heard it flash. “); Compare June 3, 1854 (“On the pond we make bubbles with our paddles on the smooth surface, in which little hemispherical cases we see ourselves and boat, small, black and distinct, with a fainter reflection on the opposite side of the bubble (head to head). These last sometimes a minute before they burst.”); September 14, 1854("Now our oars leave a broad wake of large bubbles, which are slow to burst.”); June 7, 1857 (“Now I notice many bubbles left on the water in my wake, as if it were more sluggish or had more viscidity than earlier. Far behind me they rest without bursting.”)
What can be more impressive than to look up a noble river just at evening, – one, perchance, which you have never explored. See March 31, 1853 (" It is affecting to see a distant mountain-top, like the summits of Uncanoonuc, well seen from this hill, whereon you camped for a night in your youth, which you have never revisited, still as blue and ethereal to your eyes as is your memory of it")
July 9, 2018
If you make the least correctobservation of nature this year,you will have occasion to repeat itwith illustrations the next,and the season and life itself is prolonged.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 9A 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 © 2009-2023
https://tinyurl.com/HDT09JULY
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