And in the distance a maple by the water beginning to blush.

September 19

And in the distance a maple by the water beginning to blush

September 19, 2014

P. M. - To Great Meadows.

The red capsules of the sarothra.

Many large crickets about on the sand.

Observe the effects of frost in particular places.

Some blackberry vines are very red.

I see the oxalis and the tree primrose and the Norway cinquefoil and the prenanthes and the Epilobium coloratum and the cardinal-flower and the small hypericum and yarrow, and I think it is the Ranunculus repens, between Ripley Hill and river, with spotted leaves lingering still.

The soapwort gentian cheers and surprises, - solid bulbs of blue from the shade, the stale grown purplish. It abounds along the river, after so much has been mown.

The polygala and the purple gerardia are still common and attract by their high color.

The small-flowering Bidens cernua (?) and the fall dandelion and the fragrant everlasting abound.

The Viola lanceolata has blossomed again, and the lambkill.

What pretty six-fingered leaves the three oxalis leafets make! 

I see the effects of frost on the Salix Purshiana, imbrowning their masses; and in the distance is a maple or two by the water, beginning to blush.

That small, slender-leaved, rose-tinted (white petals, red calyx) polygonum by the river is perhaps in its prime now; slender spikes and slender lanceolate sessile leaves, with rent hairy and ciliate sheaths, eight stamens, and three styles united in middle. Not biting. I cannot find it described.

Cicuta maculata

And what is that white flower which I should call Cicuta maculata, except that the veins do not terminate in the sinuses?

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 19, 1852

The soapwort gentian cheers and surprises,  September 19, 1851 ("The soapwort gentian now."); See also September 8, 1852 ("Gentiana saponaria out."); September 19, 1851 ("The soapwort gentian now."); .("September 22, 1852 ("The soapwort gentian the flower of the river-banks now.") September 25, 1857 ("You notice now the dark-blue dome of the soapwort gentian in cool and shady places under the bank.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Soapwort Gentian (Gentiana saponaria)

The red capsules of the sarothra. See August 3, 1852 ("The Hypericum Sarothra appears to be out.."); August 3, 1856 ("Sarothra apparently now in prime."); August 12, 1856 (“The sarothra — as well as small hypericums generally — has a lemon scent.”); August 19, 1856 ("The small hypericums have a peculiar smart, somewhat lemon-like fragrance, but bee-like. ); August 30, 1856 ("The sarothra is now apparently in prime on the Great Fields, and comes near being open now, at 3 p. m. Bruised, it has the fragrance of sorrel and lemon, rather pungent or stinging, like a bee.”); September 2, 1859 ("The sarothra grows thickly, and is now abundantly in bloom, on denuded places, i.e., where the sod and more or less soil has been removed, by sandy roadsides. "); September 23, 1852 ("The sarothra in bloom");   See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, St. Johns-wort (Hypericum)

The Norway cinquefoil. See August 30, 1851 ("I perceive in the Norway cinquefoil (Potentilla Norvegica), now nearly out of blossom, that the alternate five leaves of the calyx are closing over the seeds to protect them. There is one door closed, of the closing year.")

The purple gerardia are still common and attract by their high color. See August 12, 1856 ("Gerardia purpurea, two or three days."); August 20, 1852 ("The purple gerardia is very beautiful now in green grass."); August 21, 1851 ("The purple gerardia now."); September 11, 1852 ("How much fresher some flowers look in rainy weather! When I thought they were about done, they appear to revive, and moreover their beauty is enhanced, as if by the contrast of the louring atmosphere with their bright colors. Such are the purple gerardia and the Bidens cernua.")

The small-flowering Bidens cernua (?) and the fall dandelion and the fragrant everlasting abound. See September 19, 1851 ("Large-flowered bidens, or beggar-ticks, or bur-marigold, now abundant by riverside."); . September 13, 1856 ("Surprised at the profusion of autumnal dandelions in their prime on the top of the hill, about the oaks. Never saw them thicker in a meadow. A cool, spring-suggesting yellow. They reserve their force till this season, though they begin so early. Cool to the eye, as the creak of the cricket to the ear. "); August 29, 1856 ("Fragrant everlasting in prime and very abundant")

The Viola lanceolata has blossomed again. See September 28, 1852 ("I have now seen all but the blanda, palmata, and pubescens blooming again .. . This is the commencement, then, of the second spring"). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Violets

And in the distance is a maple or two by the water, beginning to blush. See  September 12, 1858 ("Some small red maples by water begun to redden."); September 18, 1858 ("Many red maples are now partly turned dark crimson along the meadow-edge."); September 18, 1860 ("The first autumnal tints (of red maples) are now generally noticed"); September 20, 1857 ("A great many small red maples in Beck Stow's Swamp are turned quite crimson, when all the trees around are still perfectly green. It looks like a gala day there."); September 21, 1854 ("The red maples, especially at a distance, begin to light their fires, some turning yellow, "); September 24, 1851 ("I notice one red tree, a red maple, against the green woodside in Conant's meadow. It is a far brighter red than the blossoms of any tree in summer and more conspicuous."); September 24, 1855 ("the maples are but just beginning to blush"); September 25, 1857 ("The whole tree, thus ripening in advance of its fellows, attains a singular preéminence"); September 25, 1857 ("The red maple has fairly begun to blush in some places by the river. I see one, by the canal behind Barrett’s mill, all aglow against the sun."); September 25, 1857 ("A single tree becomes the crowning beauty of some meadowy vale and attracts the attention of the traveller from afar."); September 26, 1854 ("Some single red maples are very splendid now, the whole tree bright-scarlet against the cold green pines; now, when very few trees are changed, a most remarkable object in the landscape; seen a mile off."); September 27, 1855 ("Some single red maples now fairly make a show along the meadow. I see a blaze of red reflected from the troubled water."); September 27, 1857 ("At last, its labors for the year being consummated and every leaf ripened to its full, it flashes out conspicuous to the eye of the most casual observer, with all the virtue and beauty of a maple, – Acer rubrum."); September 29, 1851 ("The intense brilliancy of the red-ripe maples scattered here and there in the midst of the green oaks and hickories on its hilly shore is quite charming. They are unexpectedly and incredibly brilliant, especially on the western shore and close to the water's edge, where, alternating with yellow birches and poplars and green oaks, they remind me of a line of soldiers, redcoats and riflemen in green mixed together."); September 30, 1854 ("I am surprised to see that some red maples, which were so brilliant a day or two ago, have already shed their leaves, and they cover the land and the water quite thickly."); October 3, 1858 ("Some particular maple among a hundred will be of a peculiarly bright and pure scarlet, and, by its difference of tint and intenser color, attract our eyes even at a distance in the midst of the crowd"); October 8, 1852 (“Nothing can exceed the brilliancy of some of the maples which stand by the shore and extend their red banners over the water.”)

And what is that white flower which I should call Cicuta maculata? See June 6, 1851 ("Gathered to-night the Cicuta maculata, American hemlock, the veins of the leaflets ending in the notches and the root fasciculated."); August 20, 1851 ("Sium lineare, a kind of water-parsnip, whose blossom resembles the Cicuta maculata.") August 29, 1858 ("Cicuta maculata, apparently generally done."); August 30, 1857 ("The flower of Cicuta maculata smells like the leaves of the golden senecio.."); October 2, 1859 ("The Cicuta maculata, for instance, the concave umbel is so well spaced, the different um-bellets (?) like so many constellations or separate systems in the firmament.") Note. Cicuta maculata is a highly poisonous species of flowering plant in the carrot family known by several common names, including spotted water hemlock, spotted parsley, spotted cowbane, and suicide root. It is considered to be North America's most toxic plant.~ Wikipedia

September 19. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, September 19

And in the distance

a maple by the water

beginning to blush.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau. A maple by the water

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-520919 

Gathered last night the strong, rank, penetrating-scented angelica.

June 6. 

Friday. 

Gathered last night the strong, rank, penetrating-scented angelica. 

Under the head of the Cicuta maculata, or American hemlock, — “It is a rule sanctioned by the observations of medical botanists , that umbelliferous plants, which grow in or about the water, are of a poisonous nature.” He [Bigelow] does not say that the angelica is poisonous, but I suppose that it is. 

It has such a rank, offensive, and killing odor as makes me think of the ingredients of the witches' cauldron. It did not leave my hands, which had carried it, long after I had washed them. A strong, penetrating, lasting, and sickening odor. 

Gathered to-night the Cicuta maculata, American hemlock, the veins of the leaflets ending in the notches and the root fasciculated.

Bigelow says, “The leaves of the Solidago odora have a delightfully fragrant odor, partaking of that of anise and sassafras, but different from either.”

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 6, 1851

Gathered last night the strong, rank, penetrating-scented angelica. See July 16, 1851 ("The angelica,with its large umbels, is gone to seed.")

Gathered to-night the Cicuta maculata. See August 30, 1857 ("The flower of Cicuta maculata smells like the leaves of the golden senecio..")

The sour scent of cinnamon ferns decaying.

a fragrance

from the past

almost forgotten

~ Buson

October 2

Rain in the night and cloudy this forenoon. We had all our dog-days in September this year. It was too dry before, even for fungi. Only the last three weeks have we had any fungi to speak of. 

Nowadays I see most of the election-cake fungi, with crickets and slugs eating them. 

I see a cricket feeding on an apple, into which he has eaten so deep that only his posteriors project, but he does not desist a moment though I shake the apple and finally drop it on the ground. 

P. M. — To lygodium. 

One of the large black birches on Tarbell's land is turned completely brownish-yellow and has lost half its leaves; the other is green still. 

I see in the cornfield above this birch, collected about the trunk of an oak, on the ground, fifty to a hundred ears of corn which have been stripped to the cob, evidently by the squirrels. Apparently a great part of the kernels remain on the ground, but in every case the germ has been eaten out. It is apparent that the squirrel prefers this part, for he has not carried off the rest. 

I perceive in various places, in low ground, this afternoon, the sour scent of cinnamon ferns decaying. It is an agreeable phenomenon, reminding me of the season and of past years. 

So many maple and pine and other leaves have now fallen that in the woods, at least, you walk over a carpet of fallen leaves. 

As I sat on an old pigeon-stand, not used this year, on the hill south of the swamp, at the foot of a tree, set up with perches nailed on it, a pigeon hawk, as I take it, came and perched on the tree. As if it had been wont to catch pigeons at such places. 

That large lechea, now so freshly green and some times scarlet, looks as if it would make a pretty edging like box, as has been suggested. 

The Aster undulatus and Solidago coesia and often puberula are particularly prominent now, looking late and bright, attracting bees, etc. 

I see the S. coesia so covered with the little fuzzy gnats as to be whitened by them. 

How bright the S. puberula in sprout-lands, — its yellow wand, — perhaps in the midst of a clump of little scarlet or dark-purple black oaks! 

The A. undulatus looks fairer than ever, now that flowers are more scarce. 

The climbing fern is perfectly fresh, — and apparently therefore an evergreen, — the more easily found amid the withered cinnamon and flowering ferns. 

Acorns generally, as I notice, — swamp white, shrub, black, and white, — are turned brown; but few are still green. Yet few, except of shrub oaks, have fallen. I hear them fall, however, as I stand under the trees. This would be the time to notice them. 

How much pleasanter to go along the edge of the woods, through the field in the rear of the farmhouse, whence you see only its gray roof and its haystacks, than to keep the road by its door! This we think as we return behind Martial Miles's. 

I observed that many pignuts had fallen yesterday, though quite green. 

Some of the Umbelliferoe, now gone to seed, are very pretty to examine. The Cicuta maculata, for instance, the concave umbel is so well spaced, the different um-bellets (?) like so many constellations or separate systems in the firmament. 

Hear a hylodes in the swamp.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, October 2, 1859

Nowadays I see most of the election-cake fungi, with crickets and slugs eating them. See note to September 21, 1859 ("And now at last I see a few toadstools, — the election-cake (the yellowish, glazed over) and the taller, brighter-yellow above. Those shell-less slugs which eat apples eat these also."); October 15, 1857 ("I saw the other day a cricket standing on his head in a chocolate-colored (inside) fungus")

I see a cricket feeding on an apple. See October 2, 1857 ("Since the cooler weather many crickets are seen clustered on warm banks and by sunny wall-sides."); See also October 11, 1857 ("These are cricket days.")

The sour scent of cinnamon ferns decaying, an agreeable phenomenon, reminding me of the season and of past years. See October 2, 1857 ("In the more open swamp beyond, these ferns, recently killed by the frost and exposed to the sun, fill the air with a very strong sour scent") See also  October 1, 1858 ("The cinnamon ferns are crisp and sour in open grounds");  and note to September 24, 1859 (" Stedman Buttrick's handsome maple and pine swamp is full of cinnamon ferns.") See also May 7, 1852 ("How full of reminiscence is any fragrance!"): July 31, 1856 ("Thoughts of autumn occupy my mind, and the memory of past years."); August 18, 1856 (" The alder cricket, clear, loud, and autumnal . . . reminds me of past autumns and the lapse of time . . . a pleasing, thoughtful melancholy, like the sound of the flail.") and A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Cinnamon Fern 

 The climbing fern is perfectly fresh, — and apparently therefore an evergreen. See May 1, 1859 ("The climbing fern is persistent, i. e. retains its greenness still, though now partly brown and withered.")

The Cicuta maculata like so many constellations or separate systems in the firmament. See August 30, 1857 ("The flower of Cicuta maculata smells like the leaves of the golden senecio. ")

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

The sour scent of 

cinnamon ferns decaying –

the season, past years.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, 

The sour scent of cinnamon ferns decaying. 

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-591002

Botanizing Conantum

August 30. 

Sunday. P. M. – To Conantum. 

Small botrychium, not long. 

The flower of Cicuta maculata smells like the leaves of the golden senecio. 

Collinsonia has been out apparently three or four days. 

Polygonum tenue at Bittern Cliff, how long?

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 30, 1857


The flower of Cicuta maculata smells like the leaves of the golden senecio. See June 6, 1851 ("Gathered to-night the Cicuta maculata, American hemlock, the veins of the leaflets ending in the notches and the root fasciculated.");  October 2, 1859 ("The Cicuta maculata, for instance, the concave umbel is so well spaced, the different um-bellets (?) like so many constellations or separate systems in the firmament.") See also June 3, 1851 ("It was the golden senecio (Senecio aureus) which I plucked a week ago in a meadow in Wayland. . . . Its bruised stems enchanted me with their indescribable sweet odor, like I cannot think what.")

Collinsonia has been out . . .See August 11, 1852 ("The Collinsonia Canadensis just begun.");  August 23, 1857 ("To Conantum. . . .Collinsonia (very little left) not out")

Polygonum tenue at Bittern Cliff . . . See August 24, 1856 ("Polygonum tenue abundant and in bloom, on side of Money-Diggers' Hill, especially at south base, near apple tree. "); August 3, 1856 ("At Bittern Cliff again lucky enough to find Polygonum tenue, apparently out but a short time, say one week at most. Have marked the spot . . .")

Ripe sand cherry.

July 28

At 1.30 a thunder-shower, which was much needed, the corn having rolled and trees suffered. 

3.30 p. m. — To Climbing Fern.

Virgin's-bower, apparently two or three days.

Nabalus albus, a day or two. 

Sand cherry ripe. The fruit droops in umble-like clusters, two to four peduncles together, on each side the axil of a branchlet or a leaf. Emerson and Gray call it dark-red. It is black when ripe. 

Emerson, Gray, and Bigelow speak of it as rare in this State! It is common enough here. I have seen it as abundant as anywhere on Weir (or Ware) Hill in Sudbury, Bigelow's own town. 

Cherry three eighths of an inch diameter, peduncle seven sixteenths long. Emerson calls it eatable! 

On Linnaea Hill. By factory road clearing, the small rough sunflower, two or three days. 

Gerardia flava, apparently several days.

Cicuta bulbosa, several days. 

Richweed at Brown's oak, several days (since 16th; say 22d).

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 28, 1856

To Climbing Fern. See November 24, 1851 ("Found on the south side of the [Ministerial] swamp the Lygodium palmatum, which Bigelow calls the only climbing fern in our latitude, an evergreen."); November 30, 1851 (“The Lygodium palmatum is quite abundant on that side of the swamp, twining round the goldenrods”); August 14, 1854 ("3 P.M. To climbing fern with E. Hoar. It takes a good deal of care and patience to unwind this fern without injuring it"); October 2, 1859 (“The climbing fern is perfectly fresh, — and apparently therefore an evergreen, — the more easily found amid the withered cinnamon and flowering ferns.”); May 1, 1859 ("The climbing fern is persistent, i. e. retains its greenness still, though now partly brown and withered.")

Nabalus albus, a day or two. See September 6, 1851 ("Gray calls Nabalus albus, white lettuce or rattlesnake-root.");  August 27, 1858 ("The Nabalus albus has been out some ten days,"); September 13, 1857 ("The nabalus family generally, apparently now in prime"); September 17, 1857 (“I go to Fair Haven Hill, looking at the varieties of nabalus, which have a singular prominence now in all woods and roadsides. ”); September 23, 1857 ("Varieties of nabalus grow along the Walden road in the woods; also, still more abundant, by the Flint's Pond road in the woods.”)

Sand cherry ripe. See August 10, 1860 ("Sand cherry is well ripe — some of it — and tolerable, better than the red cherry or choke-cherry.")

By factory road clearing, the small rough sunflower, two or three days. See July 29, 1853 (“The sight of the small rough sunflower about a dry ditch bank and hedge advances me at once further toward autumn.”); August 1, 1852 ("The small rough sunflower (Helianthus divaricatus) tells of August heats”); August 1, 1855 ("Small rough sunflower a day or two.”)

Gerardia flava, apparently several days. See July 28, 1853 ("The Gerardia flava in the hickory grove behind Lee's Cliff.") See also July 22, 1854 ("Gerardia flava, apparently two or three days, Lupine Hillside up railroad, near fence") [Gerardia flava now know as Aureolaria flava (smooth false foxglove)]

July 28. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 28

Sand cherry. Ripe fruit

droops from peduncles in

umble-like clusters.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Ripe sand cherry. 

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 ©  2009-2026

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560728