Sunday, September 16, 2018

A southeast storm.

September 16

When I awake I hear the sound of steady heavy rain.

A southeast storm. 

Our peach tree limbs are broken off by it. It lasts all day, rains a great deal, and scatters many elm boughs and leaves over the street. This wind does damage out of proportion to its strength. The fact is, the trees are unprepared to resist a wind from this quarter and, being loaded with foliage and fruit, suffer so much the more. There will be many windfalls, and fruit [will] be cheap for awhile.

It rained as hard as I remember to have seen it for about five minutes at six o’clock P. M., when I was out, and then suddenly, as it were in an instant, the Wind whirled round to the westward, and clear sky appeared there and the storm ended, — which had lasted all day and part of the previous night. 

All this occurred while I was coming from the post-office. 

The street is strewn with a great many perfectly green leaves, especially of elms, and branches, large and small, also for the most part quite sound. It is remarkable that these tough and slender limbs can be thus twisted off.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September, 16, 1858

A southeast storm. The trees are unprepared to resist a wind from this quarter. See September 15, 1858 ("There is a southeast wind, with clouds, and I suspect a storm brewing. It is very rare that the wind blows from this quarter.”) See also March 24, 1860 ("During the year the wind [at Cambridge] was southwest 130 days, northwest 87, northeast 59, south 33, west 29, east 14, southeast 10, north 3 days.")

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