A Book of the Seasons: September 11 (How much fresher some flowers, the month of wild-looking berries)

The year is but a succession of days,

and I see that I could assign some office to each day

which, summed up, would be the history of the year.

Henry Thoreau, August 24, 1852 

September 11

This cold white twilight

and bright starlight makes us think

of wood for winter.

September 11, 1854

September 11, 2021

For a week or so the evenings have been sensibly longer, and I am beginning to throw off my summer idleness.  September 11, 1854

Cool weather. Sit with windows shut, and many by fires. A great change since the 6th, when the heat was so oppressive.   September 11, 1853

Cranberries are being raked for fear of frosts.  September 11, 1852

Signs of frost last night in M. Miles's cleared swamp. Potato vines black. September 11, 1853

These fall rains are a peculiarity of the season.  September 11, 1852

This being a cloudy and somewhat rainy day, the autumnal dandelion is open in the afternoon. September 11, 1859

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. September 11, 1852

Bidens cernua, or nodding burr marigold, like a small sunflower (with rays) in Heywood Brook, i. e. beggar- tick. September 11, 1851

Bidens connata (?), without rays, in Hubbard's Meadow. September 11, 1851

Blue-eyed grass still. September 11, 1851

The purple gerardia and blue-curls are interesting for their petals strewn about, beaten down by the rain. September 11, 1852

Many a brook I look into is strewn with the purple petals of the gerardia, whose stalk is not obvious in the bank.  September 11, 1852

Solidago puberula apparently in prime, with the S. stricta, near gerardia oaks. September 11, 1857  

My old S. stricta (early form) must be S. arguta var. juncea. It is now done.  September 11, 1857

To my surprise I find, by the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell, the Solidago rigida, apparently in prime or a little past.  September 11, 1857  

Two-leaved Solomon Seal berries

(Canada mayflower)

September 11, 2023

September is the month when various small, and commonly inedible, berries in cymes and clusters hang over the roadsides and along the walls and fences, or spot the forest floor. September 11, 1859

The prinos berries are now seen, red (or scarlet), clustered along the stems, amid the as yet green leaves. A cool red. September 11, 1859

The Rhus Toxicodendron berries are now ripe and greenish-yellow, and some already shrivelled, over bare rocks. September 11, 1859

By the pool in Hubbard's Grove, I see tall tupelos, all dotted with the now ripe (apparently in prime) small oval purple berries, two or three together on the end of slender peduncles, amid the reddening leaves.  September 11, 1859

The white-red-purple-berried bush in Hubbard's Meadow, whose berries were fairest a fortnight ago, appears to be the Viburnum nudum, or withe-rod. September 11, 1851

Red choke-berry ripe; how long?   September 11, 1857

The clusters of the Viburnum Lentago berries, now in their prime, are exceedingly and peculiarly handsome, and edible withal. These are drooping, like the Cornus sericea cymes. Each berry in the cyme is now a fine, clear red on the exposed side and a distinct and clear green on the opposite side. Many are already purple, and they turn in your hat, but they are handsomest when thus red and green.  September 11, 1859

The wax-like fruit of Cornus paniculata still holds on abundantly.  September 11, 1859

Our cornel (the common) with berries blue one side, whitish the other, appears to be either the Cornus sericea or C. stolonifera of Gray, i. e. the silky, or the red-osier cornel (osier rouge).  September 11, 1851

The large clusters of the Smilacina racemosa berries, four or five inches long, of whitish berries a little smaller than a pea, finely marked and dotted with vermilion or bright red, are very conspicuous. I do not chance to see any ripe. September 11, 1859

No fruit is handsomer than the acorn. I see but few fallen yet, and they are all wormy. Very pretty, especially, are the white oak acorns, three raying from one centre.  September 11, 1859

We have had no rain for a week, and yet the pitcher-plants have water in them . . . Are they not replenished by the dews always, and, being shaded by the grass, saved from evaporation? What wells for the birds!   September 11, 1851

Loudly the mole cricket creaks by mid-afternoon. September 11, 1855 

I see some yellow butterflies and others occasionally and singly only. September 11, 1851

Muskrat-houses begun.  September 11, 1855 

This is a cold evening with a white twilight, and threatens frost, the first in these respects decidedly autumnal evening.  It makes us think of wood for the winter.  September 11, 1854

This twilight is succeeded by a brighter starlight than heretofore.    September 11, 1854

This and the last four or five nights have been perhaps the most sultry in the year thus far. September 11, 1851

*****

August 18, 1854 ("We can walk across the Great Meadows now in any direction. They are quite dry. Even the pitcher-plant leaves are empty.")
August 21, 1854 ("In Hubbard's meadow, between the two woods, I can not find a pitcher-plant with any water in it.")
August 22, 1854 ("I find at length a pitcher-plant with a spoonful of water in it. It must be last night's dew.")
August 25, 1852 ("One of those serious and normal storms ~ not a shower which you can see through, not a transient cloud that drops rain ~ something regular, a fall rain, coincident with a different mood or season of the mind.")

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 air is cleared; the dog-days are over; sun-sparkles are seen on water; crickets sound more distinct")
August 27, 1856 ("There are many wild-looking berries about now.")
August 28, 1853 ("A cool, white, autumnal evening.")
August 30, 1853 ("Viburnum Lentago berries are now common and handsome")
September 1, 1854 ("The Cornus sericea berries are now in prime, of different shades of blue, lighter or darker, and bluish white.")
September 1, 1854 ("The Viburnum Lentago are just fairly begun to have purple cheeks.")
September 1, 1856 ("Cohush berries appear now to be in their prime, and arum berries, and red choke-berries, which last further up in this swamp, with their peculiar glossy red and squarish form, are really very handsome. A few medeola berries ripe.")
September 1, 1856 ("Red choke-berries, which last further up in this swamp, with their peculiar glossy red and squarish form, are really very handsome.")
September 2, 1853 ("The dense oval bunches of arum berries now startle the walker in swamps. They are a brilliant vermilion on a rich ground . . . The medeola berries are now dull glossy and almost blue-black; about three, on slender threads one inch long, arising in the midst of the cup formed by the purple bases of the whorl of three upper leaves.")
September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man.. . .Berries which are as beautiful as flowers, but far less known, the fruit of the flower.")
September 3, 1856 (A singular and pleasing contrast, also, do the different kinds of viburnum and cornel berries present when compared with each other. ")
September 4, 1859 (See a very large mass of spikenard berries fairly ripening, eighteen inches long")
September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man.. . .Berries which are as beautiful as flowers, but far less known, the fruit of the flower.")
September 3, 1856 (“The white berries of the panicled cornel, soon and apparently prematurely dropping from its pretty fingers, are very bitter. So also are those of the C. sericea.”)
September 3, 1856 ("Gather four or five quarts of Viburnum nudum berries, now in their prime, attracted more by the beauty of the cymes than the flavor of the fruit. The berries, which are of various sizes and forms, — elliptical, oblong, or globular, — are in different stages of maturity on the same cyme, and so of different colors, — green or white, rose-colored, and dark purple or black, — i. e. three or four very distinct and marked colors, side by side. If gathered when rose-colored, they soon turn dark purple and are soft and edible, though before bitter. They add a new and variegated wildness to the swampy sprout-lands. Remarkable for passing through so many stages of color before they arrive at maturity.")
September 4, 1857 ("Cornus sericea berries begin to ripen")
September 4, 1859 ("The Cornus sericea and C. paniculata are rather peculiar for turning to a dull purple on the advent of cooler weather and frosts,")

September 6, 1854 ("I think I may say that large Solomon’s-seal berries have begun to be red.")

September 6, 1856 ("Solidago arguta very common, apparently in prime, with sharp-toothed, more or less elliptic leaves and slender terminal drooping racemes; size of S. stricta.")
September 7, 1856 ("Apparently Cornus stolonifera (?) by brook . . . with the sericea.")
September 7, 1857 ("Our first slight frost in some places this morning. Northwest wind to-day and cool weather; such weather as we have not had for a long time, a new experience, which arouses a corresponding breeze in us.")
September 10, 1858 ("A musquash-house begun.")
September 10, 1860 ("There was a frost this morning.")




September 12, 1851 ("Bidens cernua, nodding burr-marigold, with five petals")
September 12, 1859 ("The four kinds of bidens (frondosa, connata, cernua, and chrysanthemoides) abound now . . . the third and fourth are conspicuous and interesting, expressing by their brilliant yellow the ripeness of the low grounds")

September 13, 1852("The great bidens in the sun in brooks affects me as the rose of the fall. They are low suns in the brook.")

September 12, 1853 ("The Smilacina racemosa berries are well red now")

September 13, 1856 ("The Viburnum Lentago, which I left not half turned red when I went up-country a week ago, are now quite black-purple and shrivelled like raisins on my table, and sweet to taste, though chiefly seed.")

September 13, 1858 ("Many yellow butterflies in road and fields all the country over.")

September 14, 1852 ("This morning the first frost")
September 14, 1854 ("The great bidens, the flower and ornament of the riversides at present, and now in its glory,. . . Full of the sun. It needs a name.")
September 15, 1856 ("Early Solidago stricta (that is, arguta) done ")
September 15, 1856 ("What I must call Bidens cernua, like a small chrysanthemoides, is bristly hairy, somewhat connate and apparently regularly toothed")
September 19, 1851 ("Large-flowered bidens, or beggar-ticks,or bur-marigold, now abundant by riverside.")
September 20, 1857 ("This is our first fall rain, and makes a dividing line between the summer and fall.")
September 26, 1857 ("Solidago rigida, just done, within a rod southwest of the oak")
September 27, 1856 ("The creak of the mole cricket sounds late along the shore.")
October 15, 1851 ("The muskrat-houses appear now for the most part to be finished. ")
November 16, 1852 ("At Holden's Spruce Swamp. The water is frozen in the pitcher-plant leaf.")
February 11, 1858 ("The water in the pitcher-plant leaves is frozen.")

*****

See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau:

Yellow Butterflies

The Bidens Beckii

the Great Bidens

Purple Gerardia (Gerardia purpurea)

blue-eyed grass

False Solomon's Seal

the Autumnal Dandelion

The Viburnum lentago (Nannyberry)

The Purple Pitcher Plant

the Musquash

September

September 11, 2022

If you make the least correct 

observation of nature this year,

 you will have occasion to repeat it

 with illustrations the next, 

and the season and life itself is prolonged.

  April 7, 1853 

September 10 <<<<<<<<<   September 11 >>> >>>>>  September 12 

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  September 11 

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 © 2009-2022

tinyurl.com/HDT11SEPT 

Muskrat-houses begun.

September 11.

Loudly the mole cricket creaks by mid-afternoon. 

Muskrat-houses begun.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1855 

The mole cricket creaks by mid-afternoon See August 26, 1859 ("The creak of the mole cricket has a very afternoon sound");September 20, 1855 ("Tried to trace by the sound a mole cricket, —- thinking it a frog, — advancing from two sides and looking where our courses intersected, but in vain."); September 27, 1855 ("I traced the note of what I have falsely thought the Rana palustris, or cricket frog, to its true source [and] I found a mole cricket (Gryllotalpa brevipennis)."); September 27, 1856 ("The creak of the mole cricket sounds late along the shore.") 

Muskrat-houses. See September 10, 1858 ("A musquash-house begun."); September 20, 1855 ("Open a new and pretty sizable muskrat-house with no hollow yet made in it"); September 26, 1857 ("I see musquash-houses"); October 15, 1851 ("The muskrat-houses appear now for the most part to be finished."); October 16, 1859 ("I see the new musquash-houses erected, conspicuous on the now nearly leafless shores. To me this is an important and suggestive sight . . . I remember this phenomenon annually for thirty years. A more constant phenomenon here than the new haystacks in the yard, for they were erected here probably before man dwelt here and may still be erected here when man has departed. For thirty years I have annually observed, about this time or earlier, the freshly erected winter lodges of the musquash along the riverside . . . So surely as the sun appears to be in Libra or Scorpio, I see the conical winter lodges of the musquash") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Musquash

The white-red-purple-berried bush in Hubbard's Meadow.

September 11.

September 11, 2021

2 P. M. - To Hubbard's Meadow Grove.

The skunk-cabbage's checkered fruit (spadix), one three inches long; all parts of the flower but the anthers left and enlarged.

Bidens cernua, or nodding burr marigold, like a small sunflower (with rays) in Heywood Brook, i. e. beggar- tick.

Bidens connata (?), without rays, in Hubbard's Meadow.

Blue-eyed grass still.

Drooping neottia very common.

I see some yellow butterflies and others occasionally and singly only.

The smilax berries are mostly turned dark.

I started a great bittern from the weeds at the swimming-place.

It is very hot and dry weather.

We have had no rain for a week, and yet the pitcher-plants have water in them. Are they ever quite dry? Are they not replenished by the dews always, and, being shaded by the grass, saved from evaporation? What wells for the birds!

The white-red-purple-berried bush in Hubbard's Meadow, whose berries were fairest a fortnight ago, appears to be the Viburnum nudum, or withe-rod.

Our cornel (the common) with berries blue one side, whitish the other, appears to be either the Cornus sericea or C. stolonifera of Gray, i. e. the silky, or the red-osier cornel (osier rouge), though its leaves are neither silky nor downy nor rough.

This and the last four or five nights have been perhaps the most sultry in the year thus far.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1851

Bidens cernua and Bidens connata. See September 11, 1852 ("How much fresher some flowers look in rainy weather!. . .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."); September 12, 1851 ("the Bidens cernua, nodding burr-marigold, with five petals"); September 12, 1859 ("The four kinds of bidens (frondosa, connata, cernua, and chrysanthemoides) abound now, . . . the third and fourth are conspicuous and interesting, expressing by their brilliant yellow the ripeness of the low grounds"); September 13, 1852("The great bidens in the sun in brooks affects me as the rose of the fall. They are low suns in the brook."); September 14, 1854 ("The great bidens, the flower and ornament of the riversides at present, and now in its glory,. . . Full of the sun. It needs a name."); September 15, 1856 ("What I must call Bidens cernua, like a small chrysanthemoides, is bristly hairy, somewhat connate and apparently regularly toothed"); September 19, 1851 ("Large-flowered bidens,or beggar-ticks,or bur-marigold, now abundant by riverside.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Bidens Beckii and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Great Bidens

Blue-eyed grass still. See August 25, 1851 and August 30, 1854 ("Blue-eyed grass still"). See also June 17. 1853 ("The dense fields of blue-eyed grass now blue the meadows, as if, in this fair season of the year, the clouds that envelop the earth were dispersing, and blue patches began to appear, answering to the blue sky. The eyes pass from these blue patches into the surrounding green as from the patches of clear sky into the clouds. "); September 23, 1859 ("So live that only the most beautiful wild-flowers will spring up where you have dwelt,") and note to May 29, 1853 ("That exceedingly neat and interesting little flower blue-eyed grass now claims our attention.') See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, blue-eyed grass

We have had no rain for a week, and yet the pitcher-plants have water in them. See August 18, 1854 ("We can walk across the Great Meadows now in any direction. They are quite dry. Even the pitcher-plant leaves are empty."); August 21, 1854 ("In Hubbard's meadow, between the two woods, I can not find a pitcher-plant with any water in it."); August 22, 1854 ("I find at length a pitcher-plant with a spoonful of water in it. It must be last night's dew."); November 16, 1852 ("At Holden's Spruce Swamp. The water is frozen in the pitcher-plant leaf."); February 11, 1858 ("The water in the pitcher-plant leaves is frozen, but I see none burst. They are very tightly filled and smooth, apparently stretched.")

The white-red-purple-berried bush in Hubbard's Meadow, whose berries were fairest a fortnight ago, appears to be the Viburnum nudum, or withe-rod. See August 24, 1851 ("Is that the naked viburnum, so common, with its white, red, then purple berries, in Hubbard's meadow?"); August 24, 1852 ("The Viburnum nudum shows now rich, variegated clusters amid its handsome, firm leaves, bright rosy-cheeked ones mingled with dark-purple.  All do not appear to turn purple."); August 29, 1858 ("[J. Farmer] calls the Viburnum nudum 'withe-wood' and  makes a withe by treading on one end and twisting by the other till he cracks it and makes it flexible so that it will bend without breaking.") See also  August 28, 1852 ("The viburnums, dentatum and nudum, are in their prime. The sweet viburnum not yet purple, and the maple-leaved still yellowish."); August 28, 1856 ("The panicled cornel berries are whitening, but already mostly fallen."); August 28, 1852 ("The berries of the alternate leaved cornel have dropped off mostly."); August 31, 1856 ("The Viburnum nudum berries are now in prime, a handsome rose-purple."); September 3, 1856 ("Gather four or five quarts of Viburnum nudum berries, now in their prime, attracted more by the beauty of the cymes than the flavor of the fruit. The berries, which are of various sizes and forms, — elliptical, oblong, or globular, — are in different stages of maturity on the same cyme, and so of different colors, — green or white, rose-colored, and dark purple or black, — i. e. three or four very distinct and marked colors, side by side. If gathered when rose-colored, they soon turn dark purple and are soft and edible, though before bitter. They add a new and variegated wildness to the swampy sprout-lands. Remarkable for passing through so many stages of color before they arrive at maturity. A singular and pleasing contrast, also, do the different kinds of viburnum and cornel berries present when compared with each other.") 

Our cornel (the common) with berries blue one side, whitish the other, appears to be either the Cornus sericea or C. stolonifera of Gray, i. e. the silky, or the red-osier cornel. See June 13, 1852 ("I think I know four kinds of cornel beside the dogwood and bunchberry: . . . (Cornus alternifolia? or sericea?); . . . (C. circinata?); . . . (C. paniculata); and the red osier by the river (C. stolonifera), which I have not seen this year."); August 28, 1852 ("Now the red osier berries are very handsome along the river, overhanging the water, for the most part pale blue mixed with whitish, -- part of the pendant jewelry of the season. . . . The white-berried and red osier are in their prime. The other three kinds I have not seen.); August 28, 1856 ("The bright china-colored blue berries of the Cornus sericea begin to show themselves along the river."); August 31, 1856 (“The Cornus sericea, with its berries just turning,"); September 1, 1854 ("The Cornus sericea berries are now in prime, of different shades of blue, lighter or darker, and bluish white. . . .a great ornament to our causeways and riverside.”); September 3, 1856 (“The white berries of the panicled cornel, soon and apparently prematurely dropping from its pretty fingers, are very bitter. So also are those of the C. sericea. ”); September 4, 1857 ("Cornus sericea berries begin to ripen") September 4, 1859 ("The Cornus sericea and C. paniculata are rather peculiar for turning to a dull purple on the advent of cooler weather and frosts,"); September 7, 1856 ("Apparently Cornus stolonifera (?) by brook . . . with the sericea. ")   See also August 27, 1856 ("There are many wild-looking berries about now."); September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man.. . .Berries which are as beautiful as flowers, but far less known, the fruit of the flower."); September 11, 1859 ("September is the month when various small, and commonly inedible, berries in cymes and clusters hang over the roadsides and along the walls and fences, or spot the forest floor. ")

These fall rains are a peculiarity of the season.

September 11. 

September 11, 2022

Genius is like the snapping-turtle born with a great developed head. 

They say our brain at birth is one sixth the weight of the body. 

Cranberries are being raked for fear of frosts. 

These fall rains are a peculiarity of the season. 

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 purple gerardia and blue-curls are interesting for their petals strewn about, beaten down by the rain.

Many a brook I look into is strewn with the purple petals of the gerardia, whose stalk is not obvious in the bank. 

Again the Potentilla Canadensis var. pumila, and dandelions occasionally.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1852

Genius is like the snapping-turtle born with a great developed head. See September 11, 1854 ("It does not so much impress me as an infantile beginning of life as an epitome of all the past of turtledom and of the earth. I think of it as the result of all the turtles that have been. ")

These fall rains are a peculiarity of the season. See August 25, 1852 ("One of those serious and normal storms ~ not a shower which you can see through, not a transient cloud that drops rain ~ something regular, a fall rain, coincident with a different mood or season of the mind."); 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 air is cleared; the dog-days are over; sun-sparkles are seen on water; crickets sound more distinctt"); September 20, 1856 ("Rain in afternoon. Rain again in the night, hard."); September 20, 1857 ("This is our first fall rain, and makes a dividing line between the summer and fall."); September 20, 1860 ("Rainy in forenoon.");

The Bidens cernua. See September 11, 1851 ("Bidens cernua, or nodding burr marigold, like a small sunflower (with rays) in Heywood Brook, i. e. beggar- tick."); September 12, 1851 ("the Bidens cernua, nodding burr-marigold, with five petals"); September 12, 1859 ("The four kinds of bidens (frondosa, connata, cernua, and chrysanthemoides) abound now, . . . the third and fourth are conspicuous and interesting, expressing by their brilliant yellow the ripeness of the low grounds"); September 13, 1852 ("The great bidens in the sun in brooks affects me as the rose of the fall. They are low suns in the brook."); September 14, 1854 ("The great bidens, the flower and ornament of the riversides at present, and now in its glory,. . . Full of the sun. It needs a name."); September 15, 1856 ("What I must call Bidens cernua, like a small chrysanthemoides, is bristly hairy, somewhat connate and apparently regularly toothed"); September 19, 1851 ("Large-flowered bidens,or beggar-ticks,or bur-marigold, now abundant by riverside.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Bidens Beckii and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Great Bidens

September is the month when various small, and commonly inedible, berries in cymes and clusters hang over the roadsides and along the walls and fences, or spot the forest floor

September 11. 

P.M. — To Conantum-end. 

The prinos berries are now seen, red (or scarlet), clustered along the stems, amid the as yet green leaves. A cool red.

By the pool in Hubbard's Grove, I see tall tupelos, all dotted with the now ripe (apparently in prime) small oval purple berries, two or three together on the end of slender peduncles, amid the reddening leaves. This fruit is very acid and has a large stone, but I see several robins on the trees, which appear to have been attracted by it. Neither tree nor fruit is generally known, and many liken the former when small to a pear. The trees are quite full of fruit. 

The wax-like fruit of Cornus paniculata still holds on abundantly. 

This being a cloudy and somewhat rainy day, the autumnal dandelion is open in the afternoon.

The Rhus Toxicodendron berries are now ripe and greenish-yellow, and some already shrivelled, over bare rocks. 

September is the month when various small, and commonly inedible, berries in cymes and clusters hang over the roadsides and along the walls and fences, or spot the forest floor. 

The clusters of the Viburnum Lentago berries, now in their prime, are exceedingly and peculiarly handsome, and edible withal. These are drooping, like the Cornus sericea cymes. Each berry in the cyme is now a fine, clear red on the exposed side and a distinct and clear green on the opposite side. Many are already purple, and they turn in your hat, but they are handsomest when thus red and green. 

The large clusters of the Smilacina racemosa berries, four or five inches long, of whitish berries a little smaller than a pea, finely marked and dotted with vermilion or bright red, are very conspicuous. I do not chance to see any ripe. 

No fruit is handsomer than the acorn. I see but few fallen yet, and they are all wormy. Very pretty, especially, are the white oak acorns, three raying from one centre. 

I see dill and saffron still, commonly out at R. W. E.'s.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1859



September is the month when various small, and commonly inedible, berries in cymes and clusters hang over the roadsides and along the walls and fences, or spot the forest floor. See September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man.. . .Berries which are as beautiful as flowers, but far less known, the fruit of the flower.") See also August 27, 1856 ("There are many wild-looking berries about now.");  September 1, 1854 ("The Cornus sericea berries are now in prime, of different shades of blue, lighter or darker, and bluish white."); September 1, 1856 ("Cohush berries appear now to be in their prime, and arum berries, and red choke-berries, which last further up in this swamp, with their peculiar glossy red and squarish form, are really very handsome. A few medeola berries ripe."); September 2, 1853 ("The dense oval bunches of arum berries now startle the walker in swamps. They are a brilliant vermilion on a rich ground . . . The medeola berries are now dull glossy and almost blue-black; about three, on slender threads one inch long, arising in the midst of the cup formed by the purple bases of the whorl of three upper leaves."); ); September 3, 1856 (A singular and pleasing contrast, also, do the different kinds of viburnum and cornel berries present when compared with each other. "); September 4, 1859 (See a very large mass of spikenard berries fairly ripening, eighteen inches long").

The clusters of the Viburnum Lentago berries, now in their prime, are exceedingly and peculiarly handsome, and edible withal. See August 21, 1853 ("The Viburnum Lentago berries are but just beginning to redden on one cheek.”); August 23, 1853 (".How handsome now the cymes of Viburnum Lentago berries, flattish with red cheeks!”); August 25, 1852 ("The fruit of the Viburnum Lentago is now very handsome, with its sessile cymes of large elliptical berries, green on one side and red with a purple bloom on the other or exposed side, not yet purple, blushing on one cheek.”);    August 27, 1854 (Some Viburnum Lentago berries, turned blue before fairly reddening."); . August 27, 1856 ("The Viburnum Lentago begin to show their handsome red cheeks, rather elliptic-shaped and mucronated, one cheek clear red with a purplish bloom, the other pale green, now. Among the handsomest of berries, one half inch long by three eighths by two eighths, being somewhat flattish"); August 30, 1853 ("Viburnum Lentago berries are now common and handsome");September 1, 1854 ("The Viburnum Lentago are just fairly begun to have purple cheeks."); September 13, 1856 ("The Viburnum Lentago, which I left not half turned red when I went up-country a week ago, are now quite black-purple and shrivelled like raisins on my table, and sweet to taste, though chiefly seed."); Also see A Book of the Seasons,by Henry Thoreau, The Viburnum lentago (Nannyberry)

September  – the month 

when various berries  hang

in cymes and clusters.

By the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell.

September 11. 

Friday. Up railroad and to Clamshell. 

Solidago puberula apparently in prime, with the S. stricta, near gerardia oaks. 

Red choke-berry ripe; how long? On the east edge of Dennis Swamp, where I saw the strange warbler once. 

To my surprise I find, by the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell, the Solidago rigida, apparently in prime or a little past. The heads and rays were so large I thought at first it must be a hieracium. The rays are from ten to fourteen, and three to three and a half fortieths of an inch wide. The middle leaves are clasping by a heart-shaped base. The heads are seven fortieths of an inch wide and seventeen fortieths long, in recurved panicles, – these. Eaton says truly, “Scales of the calyx round-obtuse, nerved, membranous at the edges.” 

My old S. stricta (early form) must be S. arguta var. juncea. It is now done.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1857

Red choke-berry ripe; how long? See September 1, 1856 ("red choke-berries, which last further up in this swamp, with their peculiar glossy red and squarish form, are really very handsome.")

Dennis Swamp... See May 30, 1855 ("Hear a familiar warbler not recognized for some years, in the thick copse in Dennis’s Swamp,")

by the black oaks at the sand hole east of Clamshell, the Solidago rigida, apparently in prime. See September 26, 1857 ("Solidago rigida, just done, within a rod southwest of the oak"). See also September 15, 1854 (“Solidago speciosa at Clamshell out several days”); . September 27, 1856 (“To Clamshell by boat. Solidago speciosa not quite out!!”)

Solidago puberula apparently in prime, with the S. stricta . . .My old S. stricta (early form) must be S. Arguta var. juncea. See  August 21, 1856 ("the prevailing solidagos now are, lst, stricta (the upland and also meadow one which I seem to have called puberula), 2d, the three-ribbed, of apparently several varieties, which I have called arguta or gigantea (apparently truly the last)");  September 6, 1856 ("Solidago arguta very common, apparently in prime, with sharp-toothed, more or less elliptic leaves and slender terminal drooping racemes; size of S. stricta."): September 15, 1856 ("Early Solidago stricta (that is, arguta) done . . .").

A fine view of the Connecticut valley from the hilltop

September 11

P. M. — Walked over what Alcott calls Farm Hill, east of his house. 

Erigeron annuus, four feet high, by roadside; also Ranunculus Pennsylvanicus, or bristly crowfoot, still in bloom. Vide press. 

A fine view of the Connecticut valley from the hilltop, and of Ascutney Mountain, but not of Monadnock. Descended a steep side of the hill by a cow-path, made with great judgment regularly zigzag, well worn and deep. 

Visited the graveyard and Colonel Benjamin Bellows, the founder's, gravestone and more recent monument. 

In the evening read an interesting pamphlet account of the Bellows family of Walpole, prepared by Dr. Bellows of New York, on occasion of the family gathering and erection of the monument. A large part of the inhabitants of Walpole are descendants of Colonel B. Bellows. The writer quotes from a paper in "the Cheshire Gazette of April 28, 1826," "understood to be prepared by our respected townsman, Dr. Morse," Dr. B. saying first, "A Mrs. Watson of Germantown, Pennsylvania, was alive in 1826, who resided in Walpole in 1762, then only 8 years old," but she had a remarkable memory. 

He then quotes Morse, who states that her father came and built a house in Walpole in 1762. "The roof of the house was covered with bark, and the gable ends remained open some time, which enabled them to hear the barking of foxes, the howling of wolves, and the cries of the panther, while sitting before the fire. The latter resembled the voice of a woman in distress, and [seemed] intended to decoy people into the woods, where the salutations of these roving gentry were apt to prove troublesome, unless prevented by the presence of fire-arms." According to this woman (and Morse), "a shad was taken near the falls which had a rattlesnake's head in its stomach." Dr. B. states that there is a tradition that the founder, Colonel B., once killed, on Fall Mountain, two bears and a very large panther, which last alarmed him considerably. According to Morse and the woman, "a large portion of pin money was derived from the sale of golden thread, ginseng, and snakeroot, which were procured from their [the ladies'] own hands." This should probably be "lands," or the preposition, "by.”

In Alcott's yard, sprung up from his bird's seed, hemp, like common except fragrant. These are the plants I obtained on this excursion . . .

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1856

A fine view of the Connecticut valley from the hilltop, and of Ascutney Mountain. See September 13, 1856 ("No view I have had of the Connecticut Valley, at Brattleboro or Walpole, is equal to that of the Concord from Nawshawtuct.")

The barking of foxes, the howling of wolves, and the cries of the panther. See note to September 9, 1856 ("The most interesting sight I saw in Brattleboro was the skin and skull of a panther.")

From Alcott’s Journal:

Thoreau is persistency manly and independent as of old. His criticisms on men and the times as characteristic, individual, and urged with all the honest pertinacity befitting a descent of the Scandinavian Thor. A man of a genealogy like his — Franko-Norman-Scottish-American — may well be forgiven for a little foolhardiness, if not pugnacity, amidst his great common sense and faithfulness to the core of natural things.  ... 

In the evening Thoreau reads Dr. Bellow’s Historical Sketch of the Founder’s Family, and takes all there is known of Walpole to bed with him, to be used for such ornaments of his jaunt this day as our traveller’s humour shall dictate.

Bronson Alcott's Journals
Selected Thoreau entries, from 1848 to 1862

September 11. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,  September 11 

A fine view of the 

Connecticut valley and

Ascutney Mountain.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Connecticut Valley 

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-560911

THE ALLEGORY OF THE STONEMASON..

THE ALLEGORY OF THE STONEMASON.

The wise man is restful, never restless or impatient.

 He each moment abides there where he is,

as some walkers actually rest the whole body at each step. 

Henry Thoreau  September 17, 1839 

 

September 11

Every artisan learns positively something by his trade. Each craft is familiar with a few simple, well-known, well-established facts, not requiring any genius to discover, but mere use and familiarity. You may go by the man at his work in the street every day of your life, and though he is there before you, carrying into practice certain essential information, you shall never be the wiser. Each trade is in fact a craft, a cunning, a covering an ability; and its methods are the result of a long experience.

There sits a stone-mason, splitting Westford granite for fence-posts . . . His hammer, his chisels, his wedges, his shims or half-rounds, his iron spoon, I suspect that these tools are hoary with age as with granite dust.

He learns as easily where the best granite comes from as he learns how to erect that screen to keep off the sun.  He knows that he can drill faster into a large stone than a small one, because there is less jar and yielding.

He deals in stone as the carpenter in lumber. In many of his operations only the materials are different.

• His work is slow and expensive.
• Nature is here hard to be overcome.
• He wears up one or two drills in splitting a single stone.
• He must sharpen his tools oftener than the carpenter.
• He fights with granite.
• He knows the temper of the rocks.
• He grows stony himself.
• His tread is ponderous and steady like the fall of a rock.

And yet by patience and art he splits a stone as surely as the carpenter or woodcutter a log.

So much time and perseverance will accomplish. See how surely he proceeds. He does not hesitate to drill a dozen holes, each one the labor of a day or two for a savage; he carefully takes out the dust with his iron spoon; he inserts his wedges, one in each hole, and protects the sides of the holes and gives resistance to his wedges by thin pieces of half-round iron (or shims); he marks the red line which he has drawn, with his chisel, carefully cutting it straight; and then how carefully he drives each wedge in succession, fearful lest he should not have a good split!

The habit of looking at men in the gross makes their lives have less of human interest for us. But though there are crowds of laborers before us, yet each one leads his little epic life each day. 

There is the stone mason . . . 

who, methought, was simply a stony man that hammered stone from breakfast to dinner, and dinner to supper, and then went to his slumbers.  But he, I find, is even a man like myself, for he feels the heat of the sun and has raised some boards on a frame to protect him. And now, at mid-forenoon, I see his wife and child have come and brought him drink and meat for his lunch and to assuage the stoniness of his labor, and sit to chat with him.

. . . There are many rocks lying there for him to split from end to end, and he will surely do it . . . But how many moral blocks are lying there in every man's yard, which he surely will not split nor earnestly endeavor to split. There lie the blocks which will surely get split, but here lie the blocks which will surely not get split.

Do we say it is too hard for human faculties? But does not the mason dull a basketful of steel chisels in a day, and yet, by sharpening them again and tempering them aright, succeed?

One would say that mankind had much less moral than physical energy, that any day you see men following the trade of splitting rocks, who yet shrink from undertaking apparently less arduous moral labors, the solving of moral problems.

Moral effort! Difficulty to be overcome!!! Why, men work in stone, and sharpen their drills when they go home to dinner!

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, September 11, 1851

 Each trade is in fact a craft, a cunning, a covering an ability; and its methods are the result of a long experience. See March 11, 1859 ("What we do best or most perfectly is what we have most thoroughly learned by the longest practice, and at length it falls from us without our notice."); January 12, 1852 ("Go not so far out of your way for a truer life; keep strictly onward in that path alone which your genius points out. Do the things which lie nearest to you, but which are difficult to do.") 

So much time and perseverance will accomplish. See November 8, 1860 ("How persevering Nature is, and how much time she has to work in, though she works slowly."); August 2, 1859 ("There is a certain moral and physical sluggishness and standstill at midsummer.")

Each trade is a craft –

its methods the result of

long experience.

 

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 © 2009-2015