The purple finch still sings over the street.

July 7. 

I see a difference now between the alder leaves near Island and edge of meadow westward, on Hill; the former slightly downy beneath, the latter (apparently Alnus serrulata) green and smooth but yet not pointed at base. 

Do I not see a taller kind of wool grass in that birch meadow east of Hill? 

P. M. — To Gowing’s Swamp. 

The purple finch still sings over the street. 

The sagittaria, large form, is out, roadside, Moore’s Swamp. 

The Vaccinium Oxycoccus is almost entirely out of bloom, and the berries are as big as small huckleberries (while the V. macrocarpon is in full bloom, and no berries appear on it). It must therefore have begun about the 1st of June. 

Saw the Kalmia glauca by the small cranberry, betrayed by its two-edged twig. 

Portsmouth Public Library

The snake-head arethusa is now abundant amid the cranberries there.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 7, 1856


. . .the latter (apparently Alnus serrulata) green and smooth but yet not pointed at base. See April 13, 1856 ("There were alders out at Well Meadow Head, as large bushes as any. Can they be A. serrulata?"): April 15, 1856 ("What I think the Alnus serrulata (?) will shed pollen to-day on the edge of Catbird Meadow.")


The purple finch still sings over the street. See  June 25, 1853 ("I think it must be the purple finch. . .which I see and hear singing so sweetly and variedly in the gardens, — one or two to-day. . . .It has a little of the martin warble and of the canary bird.") See also April 15, 1854 ("The arrival of the purple finches appears to be coincident with the blossoming of the elm, on whose blossom it feeds."; April 15, 1856 ("The purple finch is singing on the elms "); )

The sagittaria, large form, is out, roadside, Moore’s Swamp See July 28, 1852 ("The large shaped sagittaria out, a large crystalline-white three-petalled flower.")

Saw the Kalmia glauca by the small cranberry, betrayed by its two-edged twig. See January 9, 1855 ("Make a splendid discovery this afternoon. Walking through Holden’s white spruce swamp, I see peeping above the snow-crust some slender delicate evergreen shoots . . . the Kalmia glauca var.rosmarinifolia.")

The snake-head arethusa. (Pogonia ophioglossoides.) Snake-mouthed Arethusa, from which genus it was taken; stem nearly a foot high, with a single flower, nodding and pale-purple, and one oval-lanceolate leaf, and a leafy bract near the flower; lip fimbriate; swamps; July. The flower resembles a snake's head, whence its specific name. Reports on the herbaceous plants and on the quadrupeds of Massachusetts 199 (1840).  See July 7, 1852 ("The Arethusa bulbosa, "crystalline purple;" Pogonia ophioglossoides, snake-mouthed arethusa, "pale purple;" and the Calopogon pulchellus, grass pink, "pink purple," make one family in my mind, — next to the purple orchis, or with it, — being flowers par excellence, all flower, all color, with inconspicuous leaves, naked flowers, . . .the pogonia has a strong snaky odor."); See also June 21, 1852  ("The adder's-tongue arethusa smells exactly like a snake."); July 2, 1857 (“Pogonia ophioglossoides apparently in a day or two.”); July 8, 1857 (“Find a Pogonia ophioglossoides with a third leaf and second flower an inch above the first flower.”); August 1, 1856 ("Snake-head arethusa still in the meadow”)

Now abundant there

the snake-head arethusa

amid cranberries