Began to rain last evening, and still rains.
The tree sparrows sing sweetly, canary-like, still.
Hear the first toad in the rather cool rain, 10 A. M.
See through the dark rain the first flash of lightning, in the west horizon, doubting if it was not a flash of my eye at first, but after a very long interval I hear the low rumbling of the first thunder, and now the summer is baptized and inaugurated in due form. Is not the first lightning the forerunner or warranty of summer heat? The air now contains such an amount of heat that it emits a flash.
Speaking to J. B. Moore about the partridges being run down, he says that he was told by Lexington people some years ago that they found a duck lying dead under the spire of their old meeting-house (since burned) which stood on the Battle-Ground. The weathercock — and it was a cock in this case —- was considerably bent, and the inference was that the duck had flown against it in the night.
P. M. – To the yew.
Shepherd's-purse already going to seed; in bloom there some time. Also chickweed; how long? I had thought these would be later, on account of the ground having been so bare, and indeed they did suffer much, but early warm weather forwarded them.
That unquestionable staminate Salix humilis beyond yew will not be out for three or four days. Its old leaves on the ground are turned cinder-color, as are those under larger and doubtful forms.
Epigaea abundantly out, maybe four or five days. It was apparently in its winter state March 28th.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 13, 1858
Hear the first toad in the rather cool rain. See April 13, 1853 ("Pewee days and April showers. First hear toads (and take off coat), a loud, ringing sound filling the air, which yet few notice.") See also April 5, 1857 ("Probably single ones ring earlier than I supposed."): April 5, 1860 ("I hear, a very faint distant ring of toads, which, though I walk and walk all the afternoon, I never come nearer to."); April 15, 1856 ("[ 11 P. M., a still and rather warm night, I am surprised to hear the first loud, clear, prolonged ring of a toad, . . .While all the hillside else, perhaps, is asleep, this toad has just awaked to a new year."); April 18, 1855 ("In the evening hear far and wide the ring of toads, and a thunder-shower with its lightning is seen and heard in the west. "): April 25, 1856 ("The toads have begun fairly to ring at noonday in amid the birches to hear them . . . The voice of the toad, the herald of warmer weather. "); April 29, 1856 ("Do not the toads ring most on a windy day like this?") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Ring of Toads
See through the dark rain the first flash of lightning. . . and now the summer is baptized and inaugurated in due form. See April 14, 1858 ("Rains still, with one or two flashes of lightning, but soon over "); April 17, 1856 (" Was awakened in the night by a thunder and lightning shower and hail-storm — the old familiar burst and rumble,. . . a skirmish between the cool rear-guard of winter and the warm and earnest vanguard of summer. Advancing summer strikes on the edge of winter, which does not drift fast enough away, and fire is elicited. Electricity is engendered by the early heats. I love to hear the voice of the first thunder as of the toad .") April 18, 1855 ("In the evening hear far and wide the ring of toads, and a thunder-shower with its lightning is seen and heard in the west. ") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Lightning
Speaking to about the partridges being run down. See April 12, 1858 ("A partridge standing on the track, between the rails over which the cars had just passed. She had evidently been run down. . . It may be many generations before the partridges learn to give the cars a sufficiently wide berth.")
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