May 29

Very pleasant & warm.

EDK, May 29, 1860

Canada Warbler

May 28.

Along the edge of Warren's wood east of the Deep Cut, see not only the chestnut-sided warbler but the splendid Sylvia pardalina. It is a bright yellow beneath, with a broad black stripe along each side of the throat, becoming longish black marks crescent-wise on the fore part of the breast, leaving a distinct clear bright-yellow throat, and all the rest beneath bright-yellow; a distinct bright-yellow ring around eye; a dark bluish brown apparently all above; yellowish legs.

Not shy; on the birches.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 28, 1860

The splendid Sylvia pardalina. See June 4, 1855 ("It is all bright yellow or ochreous orange (?) below except vent, and a dark or black crescent on breast, with a white line about eye. Above it appears a nearly uniform dark blue slate, legs light, bill dark (?), tail long and forked. I think it must be the Canada warbler, seen in ’37.”)

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

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 ©  2009-2021

May 27

[Sunday] Went to Henry Ward Beechers in the morning. In the P.M at Tremont Temple. J.S. Kelleck's Farewell.

Wash 2 pieces.

EDK, May 27, 1860

At Botrychium Swamp.

May 26

Overcast, rain-threatening; wind northeast

and cool.

Melons have peeped out. 

Our pink azalea. 

River five eighths of an inch below summer level.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 26, 1860

Our pink azalea. See May 26, 1857 ("Pink azalea in garden.") See also May 25, 1856 ("Azalea nudiflora in garden."); May 29, 1855 ("Azalea nudiflora in garden".)

May 26. See  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 26

May 26

Paid one quarter postage on Paper.

EDK, May 26, 1860

May 25

Paid for a key which is to be refunded when I return the same. .10

EDK, May 25, 1860

The earth wears a new and greener vest

May 25.

Frost last night in low ground. 

The yards are now full of little spires of June-grass, with a brownish tinge but not quite in flower, trembling in the breeze. You see a myriad of fine parallel perpendicular stems about a foot high against the lighter green ground. It has shot up erect suddenly, and gives a new aspect to our yards.

The earth wears a new and greener vest. 

The trees I notice which look late now are not only locusts and Holbrook Hollow aspens but tupelos, white ash, swamp white oaks, buttonwoods, and some elms, and even some red maples. 

P. M. — To Gowing's Swamp and Copan. 

Quite warm, and I see in the east the first summer shower cloud, a distinct cloud above, and all beneath to the horizon the general slate-color of falling rain, though distant, deepest in the middle. 

The scheuchzeria out some days apparently, but only in the open pool in the midst of the swamp. 

I see half a dozen heads of tortoises above the sphagnum there in the pool, and they have vermilion spots on the neck or hindhead, — a sort of orange vermilion. Are they the yellow-spot or wood tortoise ? 

The European cranberry budded to bloom and grown one inch. 

Comandra out, not long. 

Red and white oak leafets handsome now. 

Pe-pe heard, and probably considerably earlier. 

It is remarkable that the aspen on Holbrook's road, though in most places it is the earliest indigenous tree to leaf, is the very latest, and the buds are hardly yet swollen at all. Can it be a distinct variety?

See the effect of frost on the sweet-fern either this morning or the 21st.

It evidently rains around us, and a little falls here, and the air is accordingly cooled by it, and at 5 p. m. the toads ring loud and numerously, as if invigorated by this little moisture and coolness.

Euphorbia cyparissias. 

Cherry-birds. 

7 p.m. — River one inch below summer level.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 25, 1860

The earth wears a new and greener vest. See May 25, 1853 ("If we had leaped from last Wednesday to this, we should have been startled by the change.")

The first summer shower cloud, . . .all beneath to the horizon the general slate-color of falling rain. See note to May 11, 1854 ("There is a low, dark, blue-black arch, crescent-like, in the horizon, sweeping the distant earth there with a dusky, rainy brush.”)

It is remarkable that the aspen on Holbrook's road, though in most places it is the earliest indigenous tree to leaf, is the very latest, and the buds are hardly yet swollen at all. See June 7, 1860(" These poplars, and I think the oaks ... are retarded in their development, just as if they grew in a colder latitude. . .This hollow seems to be peculiar, — a dry depression between Beck Stow’s and the Great Meadows, — to be steadily cold and late")

A myriad sparkles

May 24. 

How perfectly new and fresh the world is seen to be, when we behold a myriad sparkles of brilliant white sunlight on a rippled stream!

Looking into the northwest horizon, I see that Wachusett is partially concealed by a haze. This is one of the values of mountains in the horizon, that they indicate the state of the atmosphere. I should not have noticed this haze if I had not looked toward the mountains .

I notice the first shadows of hickories, - not dense and dark shade, but open-latticed, a network of sun and shadow on the north sides of the trees.

As I sit just above the northwest end of the Cliff, I see a tanager perched on one of the topmost twigs of a hickory, evidently come to spy after me, peeping behind a leafet . He is between me and the sun, and his plumage is incredibly brilliant, all aglow. It a deep scarlet (with a yellower reflection when the sun strikes him), in the midst of which his pure-black wings look high-colored also. You can hardly believe that a living creature can wear such colors. 

A hickory, too, is the fittest perch for him.

Hear a wood pewee.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 24, 1860

How perfectly new and fresh the world is seen to be, when we behold a myriad sparkles of brilliant white sunlight on a rippled stream. See May 17, 1852 ("Now the sun has come out after the May storm, how bright, how full of freshness and tender promise and fragrance is the new world!")

I notice  the first shadows of hickories , — not dense and dark shade, but open-latticed, a network of sun and shadow on the north sides of the trees. See May 17, 1852 ("The birch leaves are so small that you see the landscape through the tree,”); May 21, 1860 ("Noticed the shadows of apple trees yesterday”); May 26, 1857 ("The very sudden expansion of the great hickory buds, umbrella-wise."); May 29, 1857 (“Those great hickory buds, how much they contained! You see now the large reddish scales turned back at the base of the new twigs. Suddenly the buds burst, and those large pinnate leaves stretched forth in various directions.”)

He is between me and the sun, and his plumage is incredibly brilliant, all aglow. It a deep scarlet (with a yellower reflection when the sun strikes him). . . You can hardly believe that a living creature can wear such colors. See May 23, 1853 ("How he enhances the wildness and wealth of the woods! That contrast of a red bird with the green pines and the blue sky! Even when I have heard his note and look for him and find the fellow sitting on a dead twig of a pine, I am always startled. . . . That incredible red, with the green and blue.I am transported; these are not the woods I ordinarily walk in.”)

Hear a wood pewee. See:
May 17. I hear the wood pewee, — pe-a-wai. The heat of yesterday has brought him on. May 17, 1853
May 17. Hear the wood pewee, the warm weather sound. May 17, 1854
May 19. Wood pewee. May 19, 1856
May 24. Hear the wood pewee. May 24, 1859
May 25. Wood pewee. May 25, 1855.
May 26. I hear the pea-wai, the tender note. May 26, 1852
May 26. Wood pewee. May 26, 1857
May 28. Hear the wood pewee. May 28, 1858

See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Eastern Wood-Pewee

***

May 24 . 6 A . M . — Water fallen about one inch . 

P . M . – To Cliffs . 

I see in a ditch a painted turtle nibbling the edge of a frost - bitten yellow lily pad ( in the water ) , which has turned white . Other pads have evidently been nibbled by him , having many scallops or notches in their edges , just the form of his jaws . 

That earliest little slender - leaved panic grass will bloom , say in a day ( if not now ) .

 About a rod from the west spring on Fair Haven Hill , by the wall , stands an English cherry tree three feet high . I think that this was planted there by a bird which came to the spring for water after feeding on cherries in the town ( ? ) , for I frequently find the stones dropped in the springs . 

Those red cedars now ten feet high or more on Fair Haven Hill have all the regular form of the leaf , except a small bunch or two in their midst , yet I remember that when four or five feet high they had only the ace tate [ sic ; = acicular ? ] form . It seems , then , that you will see small trees which have only leaves of the acetate [ sic ] form , but when they get larger they have leaves of the usual form . 

Looking into the northwest horizon , I see that Wachusett is partially concealed by a haze . It is suddenly quite a cool southeast wind . ( When I started , at two , it was also southeast , and thermometer 69 . ) This is one of the values of mountains in the horizon , that they in dicate the state of the atmosphere . I should not have noticed this haze if I had not looked toward the mountains . 

How perfectly new and fresh the world is seen to be , when we behold a myriad sparkles of brilliant white sunlight on a rippled stream ! So remote from dust and decay , more bright than the flash of an eye . 

I noticed the first shadows of hickories , — not dense and dark shade , but open - latticed , a network of sun and shadow . Just begun to describe their semicircles on the north sides of the trees . The first demonstrations that it will shade the ground , unobserved as yet by the cows in the pasture . 

I saw yesterday a herd of cows standing in the water of the river , though it was rather cold water . They begin their bathing about the same time that we do . They splash about till they get into a convenient place , about up to their bellies , and chew the cud there .

As I sit just above the northwest end of the Cliff , I see a tanager perched on one of the topmost twigs of a hickory , holding by the tender leafets , now five inches long , and evidently come to spy after me , peeping behind a leafet . He is between me and the sun , and his plumage is incredibly brilliant , all aglow . It is our highest - colored bird , — a deep scarlet ( with a yellower reflection when the sun strikes him ) , in the midst of which his pure - black wings look high - colored also . You can hardly believe that a living creature can wear such colors . A hickory , too , is the fittest perch for him .

 Hear a wood pewee .

 A pincushion gall on a black shrub oak ( not yet crimson - spotted ) . Yesterday saw oak - apples ( now yel low ) on a black shrub oak , two - thirds grown .

May 24. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 24 

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 © 2009-2021

May 24

Commenced boarding with J. Adams for three dollars per week.

EDK, May 24, 1860

The quarter-grown red oak leaves between you and the sun, how yellow-green!

May 23.

Canada Warbler

(Audubon)

Now on the sunny side of the woods, the sun just bursting forth in the morning after the rain, I get sight for a moment of a large warbler on a young oak, - only the under side, which is a clear bright lemon-yellow, all beneath, with a sort of crescent of black spots on the breast.

Critchicrotches some two or three days; now tender to eat.

How agreeable and surprising the peculiar fragrance of the sweet flag when bruised! That this plant alone should have extracted this odor surely for so many ages each summer from the moist earth!

The quarter-grown red oak leaves between you and the sun, how yellow-green!

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 23, 1860

The under side . . . a clear bright lemon-yellow, all beneath, with a sort of crescent of black spots on the breast. See June 4, 1855 ("It is all bright yellow or ochreous orange (?) below except vent, and a dark or black crescent on breast, with a white line about eye. Above it appears a nearly uniform dark blue slate, legs light, bill dark (?), tail long and forked. I think it must be the Canada warbler, seen in ’37.”); May 28, 1860 ("Sylvia pardalina. It is a bright yellow beneath, with a broad black stripe along each side of the throat, becoming longish black marks crescent-wise on the fore part of the breast, leaving a distinct clear bright-yellow throat, and all the rest beneath bright-yellow; a distinct bright-yellow ring around eye; a dark bluish brown apparently all above; yellowish legs. ")

Critchicrotches now tender to eat. See May 27, 1852 ("The fruit of the sweet flag is now just fit to eat, and reminds me of childhood, — the critchicrotches. They would help sustain a famished traveller. The inmost tender leaf, also, near the base, is quite palatable, as children know. I love it as well as muskrats (?)."); May 29 1854 (Critchicrotches have been edible some time in some places."); and note to June 12, 1852 ("The critchicrotches are going to seed. I love the sweet-flag as well as the muskrat (?). Its tender inmost leaf is very palatable below.")

The quarter-grown red oak leaves between you and the sun, how yellow-green! See May 11, 1859 ("Young, or fresh-expanding, oak leaves are very handsome now, showing their colors. It is a leafy mist throughout the forest."); See May 15, 1854 ("The aspect of oak and other woods at a distance is somewhat like that of a very thick and reddish or yellowish mist about the evergreens. . . . Oak leaves are as big as a mouse's ear.”); May 15, 1860 ("Looking from the Cliffs through the haze, the deciduous trees are a mist of leaflets.”); May 18, 1851 ("The oak leaves of all colors are just expanding, and are more beautiful than most flowers");   May 25, 1860 ("Red and white oak leafets handsome now"); May 26, 1857 ("Very interesting now are the red tents of expanding- oak leaves, as you go through sprout-lands, — the crimson velvet of the black oak and the more pinkish white oak. The salmon and pinkish-red canopies or umbrellas of the white oak") 

See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau May 23

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 © 2009-2021

May 23

Paid CD Bond in full for board up to this date. ..... ..6.17

Removed my trunk to 510 Washington Street.

EDK, May 23, 1860

May 22

Rained very hard in the forenoon. Received from James Bliss twenty dollars 20.00 in part for my work by the year.

EDK, May 22, 1860

Cold and wet

May 22.

Another cold and wet day, requiring fire. The principal rain was during last night, and was quite considerable. Ceases to rain at midday, but continues foul.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 22, 1860

Another cold and wet day, requiring fire. See May 21, 1860 (“Cold, at 11 A.M. 50°; and sit by a fire”); May 27, 1860 ("Fire in house again"); also May 12, 1855 ("Cold enough for a fire this many a day. “); May 21, 1855 (“[C]old weather, indeed, from the 20th to 23d inclusive. Sit by fires, and sometimes wear a greatcoat and expect frosts.”).

All vegetation is refreshed by the rain.

May 21. 

Wintergreen had started the 18th at least. 

Noticed the shadows of apple trees yesterday.

Cold,  at 11 A.M. 50°; and sit by a fire. At 12 it begins to rain.

All vegetation is refreshed by the rain. The grass appears to stand perfectly erect and on tiptoe, several inches higher all at once, the fresh green in every field. The color of the new leaves is surprising.

The birches by the railroad, as I am whirled by them in the cars, flash upon me yellow as gamboge, their leaves more like flowers than foliage.

H.D. Thoreau, Journal, May 21, 1860

Noticed the shadows of apple trees yesterday. See May 24, 1860  (“I notice the first shadows of hickories, - not dense and dark shade, but open-latticed, a network of sun and shadow on the north sides of the trees.”)

May 21 . Cold , — at 11 A . M . 50° ; and sit by a fire . At 12 it begins to rain . P . M . – To Cambridge . All vegetation is refreshed by the rain . The grass appears to stand perfectly erect and on tiptoe , several inches higher , all [ at ] once in every field , the fresh green prevailing over the brown ground in every field . The color of the new leaves is surprising . The birches by the railroad , as I am whirled by them in the cars , flash upon me yellow as gamboge , their leaves more like flowers than foliage . Wintergreen had started the 18th at least . Noticed the shadows of apple trees yesterday .

May 21

Rained nearly all day. Wrote to Father and mother.

EDK May 21, 1860

May 20

Attended FB Thayer's church in the morning. Went down to Wallace's in the P.M. Marvin & wife were there.

Went with Helen to Mercantile (Hall) in the eve. Paid the washer woman in full up to this date.         .18

EDK, May 20, 1860

May 19

The long desired rain has commenced. This first shower fell about 7 o'clock this morn. 
Received a letter from Mother and Laura.
Bot a neck tie for which I paid .37
Incidentals                        .10
                                              .47


EDK, May 19, 1860

Shadows of bright clouds sweep over the meadow-grass waving in the wind.

May 19

This has been the longest drought that I remember.  The last rain was April 16th.

A gentle intermittent warm rain at last begins, but to our disappointment it clears up at noon, and very little rain has fallen.

There is a stong southwest wind after the rain, rather novel and agreeable, blowing off some apple blossoms.

May 19, 2014

The grass, especially the meadow-grasses, are seen to wave distinctly, and the shadows of the bright fair-weather cumuli are sweeping over them like the shades of a watered or changeable stuff — June like.

The grass and the tender leaves, refreshed and expanded by the rain, are peculiarly bright and yellowish-green when seen in a favorable light. 

This occurrence of pretty strong southwest winds near the end of May, three weeks after the colder and stronger winds of March and April have died away, after the first heats and perhaps warm rain, when the apple trees and upland buttercups are in bloom, is an annual phenomenon. 

Not being too cold, they are an agreeable novelty and excitement now, and give life to the landscape.

Sorrel just begins to redden some fields. 

I have seen for a week a smaller and redder butterfly than the early red or reddish one. Its hind wings are chiefly dark or blackish. It is quite small. The forward wings, a pretty bright scarlet red with black spots.

See a green snake, a very vivid yellow green, of the same color with the tender foliage at present, and as if his colors had been heightened by the rain. 

This is the season when the meadow-grass is seen waving in the wind at the same time that the shadows of clouds are passing over it. 

At the Ministerial Swamp I see a white lady's-slipper almost out, fully grown, with red ones. 

By the path-side near there, what I should call a veery's nest with four light-blue eggs, but I have not heard the veery note this year, only the yorrick. It is under the projecting edge or bank of the path, — a large mass of fine grass-stubble, pine-needles, etc., but not leaves, and lined with pine-needles.

H.D. Thoreau, Journal, May 19, 1860

There is a stong southwest wind after the rain, rather novel and agreeable, blowing off some apple blossoms. See May 20, 1854 ("Methinks we always have at this time those washing winds as now, when the choke-berry is in bloom, — bright and breezy days blowing off some apple blossoms.”); May 27 1852 ("The road is white with the apple blossoms fallen off, as with snowflakes.”); June 1, 1855 ("A very windy day,  . . . scattering the remaining apple blossoms.”)

Shadows of the bright fair-weather cumuli.  See May 30, 1852 (“A breezy, washing day. A day for shadows, even of moving clouds, over fields in which the grass is beginning to wave.”)

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

Shadows of  bright clouds 

sweep over the meadow-grass

waving in the wind.

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

Dry as Summer

May 18.

The creak of the cricket has been common on all warm, dry hills, banks,  etc. , for a week, - inaugurating the summer.  

MAY 18, 2019

The remarkably dry weather has been both very favorable and agreeable weather to walkers.  We have the bracing air of the seashore with the warmth and dryness of June in the country.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 18, 1860


The creak of the cricket inaugurating the summer. See May 22, 1854 ("At Lee's Cliff. --First observe the creak of crickets. It is quite general amid these rocks. "); May 26, 1852 ("To-night I hear many crickets. They have commenced their song. They bring in the summer.”); May 30, 1855 ("Is it not summer now when the creak of the crickets begins to be general?"); See also May 18, 1851 ("The turning-point between winter and summer is reached.”)

May 18

Wrote to Amsden.

It has been very dry during the six past weeks.

EDK, May 18, 1860

May 17

Marvin and wife came to Boston.

EDK, May 17, 1860

A soft rippling sound.

May 17.

By Sam Barrett's meadow-side I see a female Maryland yellow-throat busily seeking its food amid the dangling fruit of the early aspen, in the top of the tree. 

Also a chestnut-sided warbler, - the handsome bird, with a bright-yellow crown and yellow and black striped back and bright-chestnut sides, not shy, busily picking about the expanding leaves of a white birch.

Standing in the meadow near the early aspen at the island, I hear the first fluttering of leaves, - a peculiar sound, at first unaccountable to me.

The breeze causes the now fully expanded aspen leaves to rustle with a pattering sound. It is much like a gentle surge breaking on a shore, or the rippling of waves.

This is the first softer music which the wind draws from the forest.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 17, 1860

Equilibrium

May 16. 

2 P. M. — 56° , with a cold east wind. Many people have fires again.

Near Peter's I see a small creeper hopping along the branches of the oaks and pines, ever turning this way and that as it hops, making various angles with the bough; then flies across to another bough, or to the base of another tree, and traces that up, zigzag and prying into the crevices.

Think how thoroughly the trees are thus explored by various birds. You can hardly sit near one for five minutes now, but either a woodpecker or creeper comes and examines its bark rapidly, or a warbler makes a pretty thorough exploration about all its expanding leaflets, even to the topmost twig.

The whole North American forest is being thus explored for insect food. Each is visited by many kinds and thus the equilibrium of the insect and vegetable kingdom is preserved.

Perhaps I may say that each opening bud is thus visited before it has fully expanded.

The golden robin utters from time to time a hoarse or grating cr-r-ack.

The creepers are very common now.

Now that the warblers are here in such numbers is the very time on another account to study them, for the leaf buds are generally but just expanding, and if you look toward the light you can see every bird that flits through a small grove, but a few weeks hence the leaves will conceal them.

The deciduous trees are just beginning to invest the evergreens, and this, methinks, is the very midst of the leafing season, when the oaks are getting into the gray.

A lupine will open to-day.

One wild pink out.

Red cherry apparently in prime.

A golden-crowned thrush keeps the trunks of the young trees between me and it as it hops away.

Are those poplars the tremuliformis which look so dead south of Holbrook ' s land, not having leafed out?

Menyanthes, apparently a day or two.

Andromeda Polifolia, how long

Andromeda calyculata much past prime.

Nemopanthes, maybe a day or two out.

The swamps are exceedingly dry. On the 13th I walked wherever I wanted to in thin shoes in Kalmia Swamp, and to-day I walk through the middle of Beck Stow ' s. The river meadows are more wet, comparatively.

I pass a young red maple whose keys hang down three inches or more and appear to be nearly ripe. This, being in a favorable light (on one side from the sun) and being of a high color, — a pink scarlet, — is a very beautiful object, more so than when in flower. Masses of double samaræ unequally disposed along the branches, trembling in the wind. Like the flower of the shad-bush, so this handsome fruit is seen for the most part now against bare twigs, it is so much in advance of its own and of other leaves. The peduncles gracefully rise a little before they curve downward. They are only a little darker shade than the samaræ. There are sometimes three samaræ together.

Sun goes down red.

H.D. Thoreau, Journal, May 16, 1860

I see a small creeper. See November 16, 1859 ("It begins at the base, and creeps rapidly upward by starts, adhering close to the bark and shifting a little from side to side often till near the top, then suddenly darts off downward to the base of another tree, where it repeats the same course."

May 15

In the eve went down to help Wallace.

EDK, May 15, 1860

Dry weather

May 15

Yesterday afternoon and today the east wind has been quite cool, if not cold, but the haze thicker than ever.

Deciduous woods now swarm with migrating warblers, especially about swamps.

Looking from the Cliffs through the haze, the deciduous trees are a mist of leaflets, against which the pines are already darkened. At this season there is thus a mist in the air and a mist on the earth.

The springing sorrel, the expanding leafets, the already waving rye tell of June.

Sun goes down red, and did last night. A hot day does not succeed, but the very dry weather continues.

H.D. Thoreau,  Journal, May 15, 1860

Deciduous woods now swarm with migrating warblers, especially about swamps. See May 15, 1859 (“Now, when the warblers begin to come in numbers with the leafing of the trees, the woods are so open that you can easily see them. They are scarce and silent in a cool and windy day, or found only in sheltered places.”) See also  April 19, 1854 ("Within a few days the warblers have begun to come. They are of every hue. Nature made them to show her colors with. There are as many as there are colors and shades. "); May 7, 1852 ("For now, before the leaves, they begin to people the trees in this warm weather. The first wave of summer from the south."); May 18, 1857("The swamp is all alive with warblers . . . They fill the air with their little tshree tshree sprayey notes")

Looking from the Cliffs through the haze, the deciduous trees are a mist of leaflets, against which the pines are already darkened. . . . See May 15, 1854 ("Looking off from hilltop . . .  The aspect of oak and other woods at a distance is somewhat like that of a very thick and reddish or yellowish mist about the evergreens.“); May 26, 1857 ("At the same season with this haze of buds comes also the kindred haziness of the air.”);  May 11, 1859 ("Young, or fresh-expanding, oak leaves are very handsome now, showing their colors. It is a leafy mist throughout the forest.”)

The springing sorrel, the expanding leafets, the already waving rye tell of June. See  May 22, 1853 ("This is the first truly lively summer Sunday, what with lilacs, warm weather, waving rye, . . . falling apple blossoms, . . .and the wood pewee."); May 26, 1854 ("At sight of this deep and dense field all vibrating with motion and light, winter recedes many degrees in my memory"); June 1, 1855 ("A very windy day, . . .scattering the remaining apple blossoms. Rye, to my surprise, three or four feet high and glaucous."); June 5, 1856 (" Everywhere now . . stand the red lady’s-slippers over the red pine leaves on the forest floor, rejoicing in June. . . This while rye begins to wave richly in the fields "); June 9, 1852 ("The weather is very clear, and the sky bright. The river shines like silver. . . . The locust in bloom. The waving, undulating rye.")

Sun goes down red, and did last night. See June 5, 1854 ("The sun goes down red and shorn of his beams, a sign of hot weather,"); June 17, 1854 ("The sun goes down red again, like a high-colored flower of summer. As the white and yellow flowers of spring are giving place to the rose, and will soon to the red lily, etc., so the yellow sun of spring has become a red sun of June drought, round and red like a midsummer flower, production of torrid heats."); May 5, 1859 ("The sun sets red (first time), followed by a very hot and hazy day."); May 4, 1860 (“The sun sets red, shorn of its beams.”); May 5, 1860 (Sun goes down red")

The heat continues.

May 14.

It is remarkably hazy; wind still northeast. You can hardly see the horizon at all a mile off. The mornings for some time past have been misty rather than foggy, and now it lasts through the day and becomes a haze.

The sunlight is yellow through it.

C. sees the chestnut-sided warbler and the tanager to-day, and heard a whip-poor-will last night. 

The early sedges, even in the meadows, have blossomed before you are aware of it, while their tufts and bases are still mainly brown.

H. D. Thoreau , Journal, May 14, 1860

The early sedges, even in the meadows, have blossomed before you are aware of it. See May 10, 1858 ("That early glaucous, sharp-pointed, erect sedge, grass like, by the riverside is now apparently in prime. Is it the Carex aquatilis?’)

May 14

Paid for collars and other things.              .40

EDK, May 14, 1860

May 13

Went to Cambridge to see Merritt. In the eve went to the Mercantile Hall with Miss Hunt and Miss H.E. Robinson.

Gave the wash two pieces.

EDK, May 13, 1860

A Dewdrop World --Warmest day yet.

May 13.

I observe this morning the dew on the grass in our yard. Each dewdrop is a delicate crystalline sphere trembling at the tip of a fresh green grass-blade. 

Each dewdrop takes the form of the planet itself. The surface of the globe is thus tremblingly alive.

2 P.M. – 82°; this and the last two days remarkably warm. 

At Holden Swamp, hear plenty of parti-colored warblers (tweezer-birds) and redstarts. 

The swamp is so dry that I walk about it in my shoes.

It is a remarkable day for this season. You have the heat of summer before the leaves have expanded. The sky is full of glowing summer cumuli. There is no haze; the mountains are seen with perfect distinctness.

It is so warm that I hear the peculiar sprayey note of the toad generally at night. 

The third sultry evening in my chamber. A faint lightning is seen in the north horizon.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 13, 1860

I observe this morning the dew on the grass in our yard. See May 13, 1852 ("A May storm, yesterday and to-day . . . The fields are green now, and all the expanding leaves and flower-buds are much more beautiful in the rain, - covered with clear drops.")  See also  May 11, 1852 ("I find on examining, a small, clear drop at the end of each blade, quite at the top on one side.“)

Each dewdrop takes the form of the planet itself. See January 6, 1858 ("I may say that the maker of the world exhausts his skill with each snowflake and dewdrop that he sends down."); Dogen ("The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water.. . .. Each reflection, however long or short its duration, manifests the vastness of the dewdrop, and realizes the limitlessness of the moonlight in the sky.") and Issa:

This dewdrop world

Is but a dewdrop world

And yet, and yet 

At Holden Swamp, hear plenty of parti-colored warblers (tweezer-birds) and redstarts. See note to May 13, 1856 (“At the swamp, hear the yorrick of Wilson’s thrush; the tweezer-bird or Sylvia Americana. Also the oven-bird sings.”)

May 13. I observe this morning the dew on the grass in our yard. — literally sparkling drops. which thickly stud it. Each dewdrop is a beautiful crystalline sphere just below (within an eighth of an inch more or less) the tip of the blade. Sometimes there are two or three. one beneath the other. the lowest the largest. Each dewdrop takes the form of the planet itself. What an advance is this from the sere. withered. and flattened grass. at most whitened with frost. which we have lately known. to this delicate crystalline drop trembling at the tip of a fresh green grass-blade. The surface of the globe is thus tremblingly alive.

A great many apple trees out. and probably some for two days.

2 P. M. — 82° ; warmest day yet. This and the last two days remarkably warm. Need a half-thick coat ; sit and sleep with open window. the 13th.

Row to Bittern Cliff. The celtis is not yet in bloom. The river is now six and fifteen sixteenths inches below summer level.

At Clamshell. one cerastium flower quite done and dry.

Ranunculus bulbosus abundant. spotting the bank ; maybe a week. Tall buttercup.

Horsemint seen springing up for a week. and refreshing scent.

Hear several bobolinks distinctly to-day.

 Hear the pebbly notes of the frog.

See the coarse green rank canary grass' springing up amid the bare brown button-bushes and willows.

Red wings are evidently busy building their nests. They are sly and anxious, the females. about the button-bushes.

See two crows pursuing and diving at a hen-hawk very high in the air over the river. He is steadily circling and rising. While they, getting above, dive down toward him. passing within a foot or two. making a feint. he merely winks, as it were, bends or jerks his wings slightly as if a little startled. but never ceases soaring. nor once turns to pursue or shake them off. It seemed as if he was getting uncomfortably high for them. 

At Holden Swamp. hear plenty of parti-colored warblers (tweezer-birds) and redstarts. 

Uvularia sessili folia abundant. how long? 

The swamp is so dry that I walk about it in my shoes. and the Kalmia glauca is apparently quite backward accordingly. — can scarcely detect any buds of it. — while the rhodora on shore will apparently bloom to-morrow.

Hear the yorrick.

The intetmediate ferns and cinnamon, a foot and a half high, have just leafeted out. The sensitive fern is only six inches high. — apparently the latest of all.

Sorrel.

It is a remarkable day for this season. You have the heat of summer before the leaves have expanded. The sky is full of glowing summer cumuli. There is no haze; the mountains are seen with perfect distinctness. It is so warm that you can  lie on the still brownish grass in a thin coat. and will seek the shade for this purpose.

 What is that fern so common at Lee's Cliff, now sprung up a foot high with a very chaffy stem? Marginal shield? Is that Polypodium Dryopteris in the bank behind the slippery elm? Now six or seven inches high. There is no mouse-ear down even there. Those heads which have looked most expanded and downy are invariably cut off by some creature (probably insect) and withered. 

The crickets creak steadily among the rocks.

The Carex varia (?) at Lee's all gone to seed. Barberry in bloom. Myosotis stricta. Arum triphyllum. how long? Cardamine rhomboidea. apparently to-morrow. just above Bittern Cliff.

It is so warm that I hear the peculiar sprayey note of the toad generally at night. The third sultry evening in my chamber. A faint lightning is seen in the north horizon.

The tender yellow green of birches is now the most noticeable of any foliages in our landscape. as looking across the pond from Lee's Cliff. The poplars are not common enough. The white birches are now distinguished simply by being clothed with a tender and yellow green. while the trees generally are bare and brown. — upright columns of green dashing the brown hillsides.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 13, 1860

Red wings are evidently busy building their nests. See  May 11, 1860 ("Red-wings do not fly in flocks for ten days past, I think.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Red-wing in  Early Spring

See two crows pursuing and diving at a hen-hawk very high in the air over the river. See May 4, 1858 ("As I sit there by the swamp-side this warm summery afternoon, I hear the crows cawing hoarsely, and from time to time see one flying toward the top of a tall white pine. At length I distinguish a hen-hawk perched on the top. The crow repeatedly stoops toward him, now from this side, now from that, passing near his head each time, but he pays not the least attention to it.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow

The tender yellow green of birches is now the most noticeable of any foliages in our landscape. May 17, 1852 ("After a storm at this season, the sun comes out and lights up the tender expanding leaves, and all nature is full of light and fragrance, and the birds sing without ceasing, and the earth is a fairyland. The birch leaves are so small that you see the landscape through the tree, and they are like silvery and green spangles in the sun, fluttering about the tree.") See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Birches in Season

First bathe in the river.

May 12. 

Celandine . Very hot. 2.30 P. M. — 81°.

We seek the shade to sit in for a day or two. The neck-cloth and single coat is too thick; wear a half-thick coat at last. 

The sugar maple blossoms on the Common resound with bees. 

Ostrya flower commonly out on Island, how long? Maybe a day or two. 

First bathe in the river. Quite warm enough. River five and one half plus inches below summer level. 

Very heavy dew and mist this morning; plowed ground black and moist with it. The earth is so dry it drinks like a sponge.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 12, 1860

First bathe in the river. Quite warm enough. See May 8, 1857 (“Summer has suddenly come upon us, and the birds all together. Some boys have bathed in the river. ”); September 27, 1856 ("Bathed at Hubbard's Bath, but found the water very cold. Bathing about over”)

May 12

Commenced paying my Wash by the Doz. Rcd. two pieces today which did not pay for.

EDK, May 12, 1860

May 9

May 6

Drove to Wallace's all day

Went to Franklin Mission church in forenoon with Helena .

Heard H.C Wright at the melodies in the eve.   .10

May 7

Paid 80 cents for cigars for which sold for 1.00

May 8

Wrote to James Emery

May 9

Paid D.D. Bond for board (5.00) five dollars

EDK, May 6-9, 1860

We sit by the shore of Goose Pond counting the noses of frogs.

May 9.

May 9, 2015

River five and three fourths inches below summer level. 

I think I heard a bobolink this forenoon. 

A boy brought me what I take to be a very red Rana sylvatica, caught on the leaves the 6th. 

Have had no fire for more than a fortnight, and no greatcoat since April 19th. 

Fir balsam bloom. 

Sugar maple blossoms are now a tender yellow; in prime, say 11th. 

Thousands of dandelions along the meadow by the Mill Brook, behind R. W. E.’s, in prime, say 10th.

P. M. – To Flint’s Pond. 

It is a still, cloudy, thoughtful day. 

Oven-bird, how long? 

In Ebby Hubbard’s wood, I climb to a hole in a dead white pine, a dozen feet up, and see by the gray fur about the edge of the hole that it probably has been used by the gray squirrel. 

Maryland yellow-throat. 

We sit by the shore of Goose Pond. The tapping of a woodpecker sounds distinct and hollow this still cloudy day, as not before for a long time, and so do the notes of birds, as if heard against a background for a relief, e. g. the cackle of the pigeon woodpecker, the note of the jay, the scratching in the dry leaves of three or four chewinks near us (for they are not shy), about the pond, under the blueberry bushes. The water is smooth. 

After sitting there a little while, I count the noses of twenty frogs within a couple of rods, which have ventured to come to the surface again, — so quietly that I did not see one come up. 

At the fox-hole by Britton’s Hollow there are some three cart-buck-loads of sand cast out. 

That large pine-tree moss that makes beds on the ground, now fruiting, when I brush my hand over its fruit is surprisingly stiff and elastic like wires. 

Yellow lily pads begun to spread out on some pools, but hardly yet on the river; say 10th on river. 

Golden robin. 

The wall by the road at the bars north of Cyrus Smith’s chestnut grove is very firmly bound together by the Rhus Toxicodendron which has overrun it, for twenty feet in length. Would it not be worth the while to encourage its growth for this purpose, if you are not afraid of being poisoned? It runs up by small root-like stems, which cling close and flat to the wall, and which intertwine and seem to take a new start from the top of the wall (as from the ground), where the stems are generally larger than below, so that it is in fact a row of this rhus growing on the top of the wall to some three or four feet above it, and by its rooty stems binding the stones very firmly together. How much better this than sods on a wall! 

Of that early sedge in Everett’s meadow, the top most spikes are already effete; say a week, then. 

I see a second amelanchier with a distinct pink or rosaceous tinge like an apple blossom. 

Elm seed has begun. 

Cattle going up country for ten days past. You must keep your gate shut.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 9, 1860

The tapping of a woodpecker sounds distinct and hollow this still cloudy day. . . . See March 11, 1859 (“But methinks the sound of the woodpecker tapping is as much a spring note as any these mornings; it echoes peculiarly in the air of a spring morning.”); April 27, 1856 ("The tapping of a woodpecker is made a more remarkable and emphatic sound by the hollowness of the trunk, the expanse of water which conducts the sound, and the morning hour at which I commonly hear it.”); April 14, 1856 ("Hear the flicker’s cackle on the old aspen, and his tapping sounds afar over the water. Their tapping resounds thus far, with this peculiar ring and distinctness, because it is a hollow tree they select to play on, as a drum or tambour. It is a hollow sound which rings distinct to a great distance, especially over water."); March 13, 1855 ("I hear the rapid tapping of the woodpecker from over the water."); March 30, 1854 ("At the Island I see and hear this morning the cackle of a pigeon woodpecker at the hollow poplar; had heard him tapping distinctly from my boat's place."); March 15, 1854 ("I hear that peculiar, interesting loud hollow tapping of a woodpecker from over the water.")' March 18, 1853 ("The tapping of the woodpecker about this time.”). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Pigeon Woodpecker (flicker) and See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Signs of the Spring, woodpeckers tapping

I count noses of twenty frogs. . . . See March 27, 1853 (Half an hour standing perfectly still to hear the frogs croak.)

Maryland yellow-throat. See May 9, 1853 ("New days, then, have come, ushered in by the warbling vireo, yellowbird, Maryland yellow-throat, and small pewee")

Cattle going up country for ten days past. You must keep your gate shut. See April 30, 1860 ("Cattle begin to go up-country, and every weekday, especially Mondays, to this time [sic] May 7th, at least, the greatest droves to-day. Methinks they will find slender picking up there for a while."). See also May 6, 1855 ("Road full of cattle going up country.”); May 7, 1856 ("For a week the road has been full of cattle going up country. "); May 8, 1854 ("I hear the voices of farmers driving their cows past to their up-country pastures now."); May 10, 1852 ("This Monday the streets are full of cattle being driven up-country, — cows and calves and colts.")