The voice of a bear was like that of a woman in distress.

July 14

Wednesday. 

This forenoon we rode on through Whitefield to Bethlehem, clouds for the most part concealing the higher mountains. 

Found the Geum strictum in bloom in Whitefield; also common flax by a house. 

Got another fine view of the mountains — the higher ones much more distant than before— from a hill just south of the public house in Bethlehem, but might have got a better view from a higher hill a little more east, which one said was the highest land between the Green and the White Mountains, of course on that line. 

Saw the Stratford Peaks, thirty or forty miles north, and many mountains east of them. Climbed the long hill from Franconia to the Notch, passed the Profile House, and camped half a mile up the side of Lafayette. 

***

Willey says of Jackson, “The great number of sheep scattered upon the mountains make it the principal place of resort for what bears and wolves are yet left among these hills.” 

Wentworth said that he had trapped and killed a number of them. They killed many of his sheep and calves, and destroyed much of his corn when in the milk, close to his house. A sheep could run faster than a bear, but was not so long winded, especially going up a mountainside. 

The bear, when pursued, would take directly to some distant and impenetrable thicket, as these dark fir thickets on the mountainside. He once found some young bears on a nest made-of small dry sticks collected under a ledge, and raising them five or six inches from the ground. He carried home the young and reared them. 

The voice of a bear was like that of a woman in distress. 

It was in Gilead, the first town (in Maine) northeast from Jackson, that Bean killed his bear, thrusting his arm down her throat.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 14, 1858

The voice of a bear was like that of a woman in distress. See July 8, 1858 (“In the course of the afternoon we heard, as we thought, a faint shout, and . . . soon Wentworth decided that it must be a bear, for they make a noise like a woman in distress. ”)

Bean killed his bear, thrusting his arm down her throat. Benjamin G. Willey's Incidents in White Mountain History (1856) ("A Mr. Bean was at work in his field, accompanied by a boy twelve years of age. The bear approached him, and having his gun with him, charged for partridges, he fired, but with little effect. The bear bore down upon him; he walked backwards, loading his gun at the same time, when his foot caught by a twig, which tripped him up, and the bear leaped upon him. He immediately fired again, but with no visible effect. The bear at once went to work,—seizing his left arm, biting through it, and lacerating it severely. While thus amusing himself, he was tearing with his fore paws the clothes, and scratching the flesh on the young man's breast. Having dropped his arm, he opened his huge mouth to make a pounce at his face. Then it was that the young man made the dash that saved his life. As the bear opened his jaws, Bean thrust his lacerated arm down the brute's throat, as far as desperation would enable him. There he had him! The bear could neither retreat nor advance, though the position of the besieged was anything but agreeable. Bean now called upon the lad to come and take from his pocket a jack-knife and open it. The boy marched up to the work boldly. Having got the knife, Bean with his untrammeled hand cut the bear's throat from ear to ear, killing him stone dead, while he lay on his body! It was judged the bear weighed nearly four hundred pounds. One of his paws weighed two pounds eleven ounces.”)

The second still, misty, mizzling and rainy day. On Lake Champlain, the pilots of steam boats could hardly see their course.

September 2.

The second still, misty, mizzling and rainy day. We all lie abed late.

September 2, 2014

P. M. — By boat to Purple Utricularia Shore. Still and cloudy, all shut in, but no rain. 

The flags are turned yellow along the river, quite an autumnal scene, with commonly a strip of green left in their centres.  The button-bushes are generally yellowing, i. e., are of an autumnal yellowish green. The black willows are decidedly crisped and yellowish. The interrupted fern begins to yellow. The autumnal dandelion is conspicuous on the shore.

Bathe at Hubbard’s. The water is surprisingly cold on account of the cool weather and rain, but especially since the rain of yesterday morning. It is a very important and remarkable autumnal change. It will not be warm again probably.

The moderate mizzling rain of yesterday and to-day is the first since that moderate one of August 4th. Yet this brings down leaves, cools the rivers and ponds, and brings back ducks and other migratory birds.

The fires in woods and meadows have been remarkably numerous and extensive all over the country, the earth and vegetation have been so dry, especially along railroads and on mountains and pine plains. Some meadows are said to have been burned three feet deep! On some mountains it burns all the soil down to the rock. In all villages they smell smoke, especially at night. On Lake Champlain, the pilots of steam boats could hardly see their course, and many complained that the smoke made their eyes smart and affected their throats. Bears, it is said, have in some instances been compelled to migrate.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 2, 1854


The second still, misty, mizzling and rainy day. See September 10, 1854 ("The still, cloudy, mizzling days, September 1st and 2d, the thunder-shower of evening of September 6th, and this regular storm are the first fall rains after the long drought."). See also August 26, 1859 ("The first fall rain is a memorable occasion, when the river is raised and cooled, and the first crop of sere and yellow leaves falls.")

The interrupted fern begins to yellow. See September 27, 1857 ("The large common ferns (either cinnamon or interrupted) are yellowish, and also many as rich a deep brown now as ever.")

The autumnal dandelion is conspicuous on the shore. See September 1, 1859 ("The autumnal dandelion is a prevailing flower now, but since it shuts up in the afternoon it might not be known as common unless you were out in the morning or in a dark afternoon"); September 21, 1854 ("With this bright, clear, but rather cool air the bright yellow of the autumnal dandelion is in harmony and the heads of the dilapidated goldenrods")

The fires in woods and meadows have been remarkably numerous . . .  See  August  26, 1854 (“I hear of a great many fires around us, far and near, both meadows and woods; in Maine and New York also.”); September 25, 1854 (“I see several smokes in the distance, of burning brush. . . . I now smell strongly the smoke of this burning half a mile off, though it is scarcely perceptible in the air.”)

September 2.  See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, September 2.

Smoke. On Lake Champlain 

the pilots of steam boats can 

hardly see their course. 

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The second still, misty, mizzling 

and rainy day. 

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau

 "A book, each page written in its own season,

out-of-doors, in its own locality."

 ~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx ©  2009-2024

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