April 25.
1.30 P. M. — Up railroad, returning through Acton via powder-mills and Second Division.
The frogs peep at midday.
The bees are on the pistillate flowers of the early willows, – the honey-bee, a smaller, fly-like bee with very transparent wings and bright-yellow marks on the abdomen, and also a still smaller bee, more like the honey-bee. They all hum like summer.
The water in the meadow beyond J. Hosmer's is still and transparent, and I hear the more stertorous sound or croak of frogs from it, such as you associate with sunny, warmer, calm, placid spring weather.
The tortoises are out sunning. The painted tortoise on a tussock. A spotted tortoise on the rail road hisses when I touch it with my foot and draws its [head] in.
What is that bird on the willows, size of a vireo, yellow below, with darker lines, chestnut crown, whitish (?) line over eye, two white feathers in tail, yellow - olive back, darker tail?
The year is stretching itself, is waking up. See April 25, 1854 ("I hear the woods filled with the hum of insects, as if my hearing were affected; and thus the summer's quire begins. The silent spaces have begun to be filled with notes of birds and insects and the peep and croak and snore of frogs, even as living green blades are everywhere pushing up amid the sere ones.")
1.30 P. M. — Up railroad, returning through Acton via powder-mills and Second Division.
The frogs peep at midday.
The bees are on the pistillate flowers of the early willows, – the honey-bee, a smaller, fly-like bee with very transparent wings and bright-yellow marks on the abdomen, and also a still smaller bee, more like the honey-bee. They all hum like summer.
The water in the meadow beyond J. Hosmer's is still and transparent, and I hear the more stertorous sound or croak of frogs from it, such as you associate with sunny, warmer, calm, placid spring weather.
The tortoises are out sunning. The painted tortoise on a tussock. A spotted tortoise on the rail road hisses when I touch it with my foot and draws its [head] in.
What is that bird on the willows, size of a vireo, yellow below, with darker lines, chestnut crown, whitish (?) line over eye, two white feathers in tail, yellow - olive back, darker tail?
Yarrow is started.
Saw the first kingfisher, and heard his most unmusical note.
That warmer, placid pool and stertorous sound of frogs must not be forgotten, - beneath the railroad causeway.
The bees hum on the early willows that grow in the sand.
They appear to have nearly stripped the sterile flowers of their pollen, and each has its little yellow parcel.
The year is stretching itself, is waking up.
. . .
What different tints of blue in the same sky! It requires to be parted by white clouds that the delicacy and depth of each part may appear. Beyond a narrow wisp or feather of mist, how different the sky! Sometimes it is full of light, especially toward the horizon.
The sky is never seen to be of so deep and delicate a blue as when it is seen between downy clouds.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 25, 1852
Saw the first kingfisher, and heard his most unmusical note.
That warmer, placid pool and stertorous sound of frogs must not be forgotten, - beneath the railroad causeway.
The bees hum on the early willows that grow in the sand.
They appear to have nearly stripped the sterile flowers of their pollen, and each has its little yellow parcel.
The year is stretching itself, is waking up.
. . .
What different tints of blue in the same sky! It requires to be parted by white clouds that the delicacy and depth of each part may appear. Beyond a narrow wisp or feather of mist, how different the sky! Sometimes it is full of light, especially toward the horizon.
The sky is never seen to be of so deep and delicate a blue as when it is seen between downy clouds.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 25, 1852
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