September 14.
September 14, 2022
A great change in the weather from sultry to cold, from one thin coat to a thick coat or two thin ones.
2 P. M. To Cliffs.
The dry grass yields a crisped sound to my feet.
The white oak which appears to have made part of a hedge fence once, now standing in Hubbard's fence near the Corner road, where it stretches along horizontally, is (one of its arms, for it has one running each way) two and a half feet thick, with a sprout growing perpendicularly out of it eighteen inches in diameter.
The corn-stalks standing in stacks, in long rows along the edges of the corn-fields, remind me of stacks of muskets.
As soon as berries are gone, grapes come.
The chalices of the Rhexia Virginica, deer-grass or meadow beauty, are literally little reddish chalices now, though many still have petals, little cream pitchers.
Rhexia Virginica, deer-grass or meadow beauty,
See October 2, 1856
(“Its seed-vessels are perfect little cream-pitchers of graceful form.”)
The caducous polygala in cool places is faded almost white.
See August 17, 1851
("The Polygala sanguinea, caducous polygala,
in damp ground, with red or purple heads.")
I see the river at the foot of Fair Haven Hill running up-stream before the strong cool wind, which here strikes it from the north.
The cold wind makes me shudder after my bath, before I get dressed.
Polygonum aviculare — knot-grass, goose-grass, or door-grass still in bloom.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 14, 1851
The corn-stalks standing in stacks, in long rows along the edges of the corn-fields. See July 12, 1851 ("The earliest corn is beginning to show its tassels now, and I scent it as I walk, — its peculiar dry scent."); September 2, 1851 ("A writer, a man writing, is the scribe of all nature; he is the corn and the grass and the atmosphere writing."); September 5, 1851 ("A field of ripening corn, now at night, that has been topped, with the stalks stacked up to dry, – an inexpressibly dry, rich, sweet ripening scent. I feel as if I were an ear of ripening corn myself.")
The chalices of the Rhexia Virginica, deer-grass or meadow beauty, are literally little reddish chalices now. See July 18, 1852 ("The petals of the rhexia have a beautiful clear purple with a violet tinge."); July 23, 1853 (" The rhexia is seen afar on the islets, — its brilliant red like a rose. It is fitly called meadow-beauty. Is it not the handsomest and most striking and brilliant flower since roses and lilies began? "); July 29, 1856 ("Rhexia. Probably would be earlier if not mowed down."); August 1, 1856 ("They make a splendid show, these brilliant rose-colored patches . . Yet few ever see them in this perfection, unless the haymaker who levels them, or the birds that fly over the meadow. Far in the broad wet meadows, on the hummocks and ridges, these bright beds of rhexia turn their faces to the heavens, seen only by the bitterns and other meadow birds that fly over. We, dwelling and walking on the dry upland, do not suspect their existence.."); August 5, 1858 ("I cannot sufficiently admire the rhexia, one of the highest-colored purple flowers, but difficult to bring home in its perfection, with its fugacious petals.") ;August 20, 1851("The Rhexia Virginica is a showy flower at present."); August 21, 1851 ("The prevailing conspicuous flowers at present are: . . . Rhexia Virginica, . . . Polygala sanguinea,"); August 23, 1858 ("The rhexia in the field west of Clintonia Swamp makes a great show now, though a little past prime"); August 27, 1856 (“The rhexia greets me in bright patches on meadow banks.”); August 28, 1859 ("The rhexia in Ebby Hubbard's field is considerably past prime, and it is its reddish chalices which show most at a distance now. I should have looked ten days ago. Still it is handsome with its large yellow anthers against clear purple petals. It grows there in large patches with hardhack."): September 28, 1858 ("Acalypha is killed by frost, and rhexia."); October 2, 1856 (“The scarlet leaves and stem of the rhexia, some time out of flower, makes almost as bright a patch in the meadow now as the flowers did, with its bristly leaves. Its seed-vessels are perfect little cream-pitchers of graceful form.”)
I see the river at the foot of Fair Haven Hill running up-stream See April 16, 1852 ("A succession of bays it is, a chain of lakes, . . .There is just stream enough for a flow of thought; that is all. Many a foreigner who has come to this town has worked for years on its banks without discovering which way the river runs. "); July 30, 1859 ("Trying the current there, there being a very faint . . . wind, commonly not enough to be felt on the cheek or to ripple the water, . . .my boat is altogether blown up-stream, even by this imperceptible breath. . . .It is a mere string of lakes which have not made up their minds to be rivers. As near as possible to a standstill.")
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