Railroad geology

December 31.

I observe that in the cut by Walden Pond the sand and stones fall from the overhanging bank and rest on the snow below; and thus, perchance, the stratum deposited by the side of the road in the winter can permanently be distinguished from the summer one by some faint seam, to be referred to the peculiar conditions under which it was deposited. 

The pond has been frozen over since I was there last. 

Certain meadows, as Heywood's, contain warmer water than others and are slow to freeze. I do not remember to have crossed this with impunity in all places. The brook that issues from it is still open completely, though the thermometer was down to eight below zero this morning. 

The blue jays evidently notify each other of the presence of an intruder, and will sometimes make a great chattering about it, and so communicate the alarm to other birds and to beasts.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 31, 1850

The thermometer was down to eight below zero this morning. See December 31, 1859 ("Thermometer at 7.45 a. m., -1°. ") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The weather, New Year's Eve

Walden pond has frozen over since I was there last. See  December 26, 1850 ("Walden not yet more than half frozen over.”).  See also December 31, 1853 ("Walden froze completely over last night.”) and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Annual ice-in at Walden

The blue jays evidently notify each other of the presence of an intruder. See. January 7, 1851 ("January thaw . . . The birds acknowledge the difference in the air; the jays are more noisy, and the chickadees are oftener heard");  January 8. 1860 ("We discover a new world every time that we see the earth again after it has been covered for a season with snow. I see the jay and hear his scream oftener for the thaw."); February 2, 1854 ("The scream of the jay is a true winter sound."); February 12, 1854 ("To make a perfect winter day like this, you must have a clear, sparkling air, with a sheen from the snow, sufficient cold, little or no wind; and . . . you hear the lisping tinkle of chickadees from time to time and the unrelenting steel-cold scream of a jay, unmelted, that never flows into a song, a sort of wintry trumpet, screaming cold; hard, tense, frozen music, like the winter sky itself") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Blue Jay

Crows foraging

December 30.

The crows now and of late frequent the large trees by the river, especially swamp white oak, and the snow beneath is strewn with bits of bark and moss and with acorns. They are foraging.

Under the first swamp white oak in Hubbard's great meadow I see a little snap-turtle on its back on the ice -- shell, legs, and tail perfect, but head pulled off, and most of the inwards with it by the same hole (where the neck was). What is left smells quite fresh, and this head must have been torn off to-day -- or within a day or two.

I see two crows on the next swamp white oak westward, and I can scarcely doubt that they did it.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 30, 1860

Crows foraging.  See December 27, 1853 ("The crows come nearer to the houses, alight on trees by the roadside, apparently being put to it for food"); December 28, 1859 ("Crows come near the houses. These are among the signs of cold weather");January 11, 1861(" Horace Mann brings me the contents of a crow's stomach in alcohol. It was killed in the village within a day or two.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow

Dec. 30. Sunday.


I saw the crows a week ago perched on the swamp white oaks over the road just beyond Wood's Bridge, and many acorns and bits of bark and moss, evidently dropped or knocked off by them, lay on the snow beneath. 

One sat within twenty feet over my head with what looked like a piece of acorn in his bill.

To-day I see that they have carried these same white oak acoms, cups and all, to the ash tree by the river side, some thirty rods southeast, and dropped them there.

Perhaps they find some grubs in the acorns, when they do not find meat.

The crows now and of late frequent thus the large trees by the river, especially swamp white oak, and the snow beneath is strewn with bits of bark and moss and with acorns (commonly worthless).

They are foraging.

Under the first swamp white oak in Hubbard's great meadow ( Cyanean ) I see a little snap-turtle ( shell some one and a quarter inches in diameter — on his second year, then ) on its back on the ice — shell, legs, and tail perfect, but head pulled off, and most of the inwards with it by the same hole ( where the neck was ).

What is left smells quite fresh, and this head must have been torn off to-day or within a day or two.

I see two crows on the next swamp white oak westward, and I can scarcely doubt that they did it.

Probably one found the young turtle at an open and springy place in the meadow, or by the river, where they are constantly preying, and flew with it to this tree.

Yet it is possible ( ? ) that it was frozen to death when they found it.

I also saw under the oak where the crows were one of those large brown cocoons of the Attacus Cecropia, which no doubt they had torn off.

Eben Conant's sons tell me that there has been a turtle dove associating with their tame doves and feeding in the yard from time to time for a fortnight past. They saw it to-day.

The traveller Burton says that the word Doab, “ which two streams, has no English equivalent. ” ( “ Lake Regions of Central Africa, ” page 72. ) 

[The Wortleberry Family]

December 27

Downers Bridge spanning the Black River in Weathersfield, built in 1840

Cavendish people had their annual ride to Downers today. Went down to see them in the eve.

Had good time.

E. 70


EDK, December 27, 1860

December 26

 Weather similar to yesterday. Bot of LC Fayston
1 Portmonie     .27
       Ink          .05
                      32


EDK, December 26, 1860

Seen from the hilltops

December 26.

Now that the ground is covered with snow, the pine woods seen from the hilltops are not green but a dark brown, greenish-brown perhaps. You see dark patches of wood.

There are still half a dozen fresh ripe red and glossy oak leaves left on the bush under the Cliffs.

Walden not yet more than half frozen over.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 26, 1850

Now that the ground is covered with snow, the pine woods seen from the hilltops are not green but a dark brown. . . See December 5, 1850 ("Seen from the Cliffs, the evergreens are greener than ever. There is a peculiar bright light on the pines and on their stems. . . .”). Compare December 26, 1855 ("The whole top of the pine forest, as seen miles off in the horizon, is of sharp points.”).

Walden not yet more than half frozen over.  See December 26, 1853 (“Walden still open. . . .the only pond hereabouts that is open.”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Annual ice-in at Walden

December 25.

 Very cold and windy,


EDK, December 25, 1860

It is never so cold but it melts somewhere.

December 24.

Walking to-day across the Great Meadows on the snow-crust looking toward the sun, I notice that the fine, dry snow blown over the surface of the frozen fields looks like steam curling up, as from a wet roof when the sun comes out after a rain.

The snow catches only in the hollows and against the reeds and grass, and never rests there, but when it has formed a broad and shallow drift or a long and narrow one like a winrow on the ice, it blows away again from one extremity, and leaves often a thin, tongue-like projection at one end, some inches above the firm crust. 

I observe that there are many dead pine-needles sprinkled over the snow, which had not fallen before.

December 24, 2023

It is never so cold but it melts somewhere.  

It is always melting and freezing

at the same time

when icicles

form.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 24, 1850

Dec. 24. In walking across the Great Meadows to-day on the snow-crust, I noticed that the fine, dry snow which was blown over the surface of the frozen field, when I looked westward over it or toward the sun, looked precisely like steam curling up from its surface, as sometimes from a wet roof when the sun comes out after a rain.

The snow catches only in the hollows and against the reeds and grass, and never rests there, but when it has formed a broad and shallow drift or a long and narrow one like a winrow on the ice , it blows away again from one extremity, and leaves often a thin, tongue-like projection at one end, some inches above the firm crust .

I observe that there are many dead pine-needles sprinkled over the snow, which had not fallen before.

Saw a shrike pecking to pieces a small bird, apparently a snowbird At length he took him up in his bill, almost half as big as himself, and flew slowly off with his prey dangling from his beak .

I find that I had not associated such actions with my idea of birds . It was not birdlike .

It is never so cold but it melts somewhere. Our mason well remarked that he had sometimes known it to be melting and freezing at the same time on a particular side of a house; while it was melting on the roof the icicles [were] forming under the eaves. It is always melting and freezing at the same time when icicles are formed.

Our thoughts are with those among the dead into whose sphere we are rising, or who are now rising into our own. Others we inevitably forget, though they be brothers and sisters. Thus the departed may be nearer to us than when they were present. At death our friends and relations either draw nearer to us and are found out, or depart further from us and are forgotten. Friends are as often brought nearer together as separated by death.

 

The fine, dry snow blown over the surface of the frozen fields looks like steam curling up, as from a wet roof when the sun comes out after a rain. See  December 24, 1851 ("like steam when seen in the sun.");January 19, 1852 ("like the mist that rises from rivers in the morning”); February 16, 1852 ("like the spray on a beach before the northwest wind”);February 23, 1854 (“like steam curling from a roof”); February 5, 1855(“like the steam curling along the surface of a river.”).

Saw a shrike pecking to pieces a small bird. See note to  December 24, 1858 ("Another shrike this afternoon, — the fourth this winter!")

December 24. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, December 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 © 2009-2023

tinyurl.com/hdt12241850

December 24

Moses Colburn Dr.


EDK, December 24, 1860

Dec. 23

--there is seven or eight inches of snow at least.

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

December 23

Went up to Mr. Colburn's in the A. M. Over to Hammondsville in the eve to see Mr. Whittmore.



EDK, December 23, 1860

the second important snow

December 22.

This evening and night, 

the second important snow, 

there having been sleighing

since the 4th, and now, --

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

The second important snow. See December 4, 1860 ("The first snow, four or five inches, this evening.") See also December 22, 1853 (“A slight whitening of snow last evening, the second whitening of the winter,”); January 22, 1854 ("No second snow-storm in the winter can be so fair and interesting as the first") Compare  January 13, 1853 ("A drifting snow-storm last night and to day, the first of consequence; and the first sleighing this winter.")

December 22

Very snowy today. George Whitten came home from Malden. Went home in the eve.

EDK, December 22, 1860

December 21

A symbol of yesterday.

EDK, December 21, 1860

December 20

No better today. One of  the worst days in the schoolroom that I ever experienced.

EDK,  December 20, 1860

December 19

 Re-commenced my school this morning. Taken with a severe head-ache which continued through the day.



EDK, December 19, 1860

December 18

Mother's funeral today. Rev. W.S. Balch preached the sermon at the church. A large attendance was present.

No school today.


EDK, December 18, 1860

December 17

Came from home this morning. Kept school and returned at night.



EDK, December 17, 1860

Snow fleas

December 16.

Walden is open still. The river is probably open again.

There are wild men living along the shores of the Frozen Ocean. Who shall say that there is not as great an interval between the civilized man and the savage as between the savage and the brute? The undiscovered polar regions are the home of men.

I am struck with the difference between my feet and my hands. My feet are much nearer to foreign or inanimate matter or nature than my hands; they are more brute, they are more like the earth they tread on, they are more clod-like and lumpish, and I scarcely animate them.

 
The snow everywhere is covered with snow-fleas like pepper.

When you hold a mass in your hand, they skip and are gone before you know it. They are so small that they go through and through the new snow.

They look like some powder which the hunter has spilled in the path.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 16, 1850

The snow everywhere is covered with snow-fleas like pepper. . . . like some powder which the hunter has spilled in the path. See November 25, 1859 ("I notice the snow-fleas skipping on the surface the shore. . . . These are rather a cool-weather phenomenon.”); December 7, 1852 ("Saw a pile of snow-fleas in a rut in the wood-path, six or seven inches long and three quarters of an inch high, to the eye exactly like powder, as if a sportsman had spilled it from his flask."); December 10, 1854 ("Snow-fleas in paths; first I have seen.”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Snow-flea

December 16. See A Book of the Seasons, By Henry Thoreau, December 16 

December 16

Carried Eva home today. Called at Mr. B[] and Mr. Spaulding in the P.M.

EDK, December 16. 1860

Precipice

Ineffable woman
ripples with anticipation
         the unexpected splash 
         the interesting man
         the edge of hope
a pool of regret.

ZPHX 20101216
with apologies to white and thurber:

The ineffability of woman
The complexity of the male
The importance of what he is thinking
And what he intends to do. 

December 15

Kept school as usual and went home at night.

EDK,  December 15, 1860

Myrica Island.

December 14.

I walk on Loring's Pond to three or four islands there which I have never visited, not having a boat in the summer.

On one containing an acre or two, I find a low, branching shrub frozen into the edge of the ice, with a fine spicy scent somewhat like sweet-fern and a handsome imbricate bud. When I rub the dry-looking fruit in my hands, it feels greasy and stains them a permanent yellow, which I cannot wash out.

It lasts several days, and my fingers smell medicinal. I conclude that it is sweetgale, and we name the island Myrica Island.

On those unfrequented islands, too, I notice the red osier or willow, that common hard-berried plant with small red buds, apparently two kinds of swamp-pink buds, some yellow, some reddish, a brittle , rough yellow ish bush with handsome pinkish shoots; in one place in the meadow the greatest quantity of wild rose hips of various forms that I ever saw, now slightly withered; they are as thick as winterberries .

I notice a bush covered with cocoons which are artfully concealed by two leaves wrapped round them, one still hanging by its stem, so that they look like a few withered leaves left dangling.

The worm, having first encased itself in another leaf for greater protection, folded more loosely around itself one of the leaves of the plant, taking care, however, to encase the leaf-stalk and the twig with a thick and strong web of silk, so far from depending on the strength of the stalk, which is now quite brittle. The strongest fingers cannot break it, and the cocoon can only be got off by slipping it up and off the twig.

There they hang themselves secure for the winter, proof against cold and the birds, ready to become butterflies when new leaves push forth.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 14, 1850

I walk on Loring's Pond to three or four islands there which I have never visited, not having a boat in the summer. See December 14. 1851 ("I have had no time to skate for surveying. I have hardly realized that there was ice, though I have walked over it about this business."); December 18, 1852 ("Loring's Pond beautifully frozen. So polished a surface, I mistook many parts of it for water.");May 17, 1852 ("This pond is the more interesting for the islands in it. ") See also December 6, 1854 ("I see thick ice and boys skating all the way to Providence, but know not when it froze, I have been so busy writing my lecture."); December 7, 1856 ("Take my first skate to Fair Haven Pond. ") December 13, 1859 ("My first true winter walk is perhaps that which I take on the river, or where I cannot go in the summer. . . . Now that the river is frozen we have a sky under our feet also."); December 15, 1855 ("The boys have skated. a little within two or three days, but it has not been thick enough to bear a man yet."); December 19, 1854 (" Last night was so cold that the river closed up almost everywhere, and made good skating where there had been no ice to catch the snow of the night before. . . ."); December 20, 1854 ( P. M. — Skate to Fair Haven.”)

I find a low, branching shrub frozen into the edge of the ice, with a fine spicy scent. See April 13, 1860 (“It distinctly occurred to me that, perhaps, if I came against my will, as it were, to look at the sweet-gale as a matter of business, I might discover something else interesting.”)

December 14

Went to Cavendish and telegraphed to Mr. Balch to come Tuesday. Mr. Keyes is quite sick to-day.

  Expenses 1.34

EDK, December 14, 1860

December 13

Mother was no better in the morning.  At twenty minutes past eleven she breathed her last.

Went after Mr. Balch in the P.M. No school today.


EDK, December 13, 1860

December 12

Kept school as usual.  Went home at night and Mother very sick.  Did not expect she would live thru the night.



EDK, December 12, 1860

December 11

Nothing worth of note.  Very cold.


EDK, December 11, 1860

December 10

Snowed nearly all day.  Martha & I rode to Felchville with Dr. Osborn this morn.

L. S. Carlisle Dr.
   to Mchds as per bill         21.57

EDK, December 10, 1860

December 9

Sunday. Rode all day to find a hired girl. Went to Plymouth five corners. Brought Eva Kendall home with me.

EDK, December 9, 1860

The dear privacy and retirement and solitude which winter makes possible!

December 8.

It snowed in the night of the 6th, and the ground is now covered, - our first snow, two inches deep. 

From Fair Haven I see the hills and fields, and the icy woods in the corner shine, gleam with the dear old wintry sheen.

A week or two ago Fair Haven Pond was frozen and the ground was still bare. Now  the Pond is open and ground is covered with snow and ice.

A week ago I saw cows being driven home from pasture. Now they are kept at home.

I see no tracks now of cows or men or boys beyond the edge of the wood. Suddenly they are shut up. The remote pastures and hills beyond the woods are now closed to cows and cowherds, aye, and to cowards.

I am struck by this sudden solitude and remoteness that these places have acquired. The dear privacy and retirement and solitude which winter makes possible! 

This evening for the first time the new moon is reflected from the frozen snow-crust.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 8, 1850

The ground is now covered, - our first snow, two inches deep. See note to November 29, 1856 (“This is the first snow.”)

I am struck by this sudden solitude and remoteness that these places have acquired. The dear privacy and retirement and solitude which winter makes possible! See December 5, 1856 ("I love the winter, with its imprisonment and its cold,"); January 7, 1857 ("I come out to these solitudes, where the problem of existence is simplified. I get away a mile or two from the town into the stillness and solitude of nature, with rocks, trees, weeds, snow about me. I enter some glade in the woods, perchance, where a few weeds and dry leaves alone lift themselves above the surface of the snow, and it is as if I had come to an open window. I see out and around myself. "); January 10, 1856 ("I love to wade and flounder through the swamp now, these bitter cold days when the snow lies deep on the ground, and I need travel but little way from the town to get to a Nova Zembla solitude, — to wade through the swamps, all snowed up, untracked by man, into which the fine dry snow is still drifting . . .”)

in addition

to my solitude

frost on the window

Issa

See also Farewell, my friend

For the first time the

new moon is reflected from

the frozen snow-crust .

The retirement

and solitude that Winter

now makes possible!

Dec. 8. It snowed in the night of the 6th, and the ground is now covered, — our first snow, two inches deep. A week ago I saw cows being driven home from pasture. Now they are kept at home. Here 's an end to their grazing. The farmer improves this first slight snow to accomplish some pressing jobs, — to move some particular rocks on a drag, or the like. I perceive how quickly he has seized the opportunity. I see no tracks now of cows or men or boys beyond the edge of the wood. Suddenly they are shut up. The remote pastures and hills beyond the woods are now closed to cows and cowherds, aye, and to cowards. I am struck by this sudden solitude and remoteness which these places have acquired. The dear privacy and retirement and solitude which winter makes possible! carpeting the earth with snow, furnishing more than woolen feet to all walkers, cronching the snow only. From Fair Haven I see the hills and fields, aye, and the icy woods in the corner shine, gleam with the dear old wintry sheen. Those are not surely the cottages I have seen all summer. They are some cottages which I have in my mind. Now Fair Haven Pond is open and ground is covered with snow and ice; a week or two ago the pond was frozen and the ground was still bare. Still those particular red oak leaves which I had noticed are quite unwilted under the cliffs, and the apple leaves, though standing in snow and ice and incrusted with the latter, still ripe red, and tender fresh green leaves. It is interesting to observe the manner in which the plants bear their snowy burden. The dry calyx leaves, like an oblong cup, of the Triclwstema dichotomum have caught the rain or melting snow, and so this little butter boat is filled with a frozen pure drop which stands up high above the sides of the cup, — so many pearly drops covering the whole plant, — in the wood-paths. The pennyroyal there also retains its fragrance under the ice and snow. I find that the indigo-weed, whose shade still stands and holds its black seed-vessels, is not too humble to escape enemies. Almost every seed-vessel, which con tains half a dozen seeds or more, contains also a little black six-legged bug about as big as a bug [sic], which gnaws the seeds; and sometimes I find a grub, though it is now cold weather and the plant is covered with ice. Not only our peas and grain have their weevils, but the fruit of the indigo-weed! This evening for the first time the new moon is reflected from the frozen snow-crust.

December 8

Went up home after school. Went over to Collinses in the Eve. Also to Mr. Whittens.

EDK, December 8, 1860

December 7

Wallace Keyes called in the Eve.


EDK, December 7, 1860

December 6

Returned to my school this morning.

EDK, December 6, 1860

Winter air.

December 4.

Fair Haven Pond is now open, and there is no snow.

It is a beautiful, almost Indian summer, afternoon, though the air is more pure and glassy.

The shrub oak fire burns briskly as seen from the Cliffs.

The evergreens are greener than ever.

I notice the row of dwarf willows advanced into the water in Fair Haven, three or four rods from the dry land, just at the lowest water-mark.

You can get no disease but cold in such an atmosphere.

Though the sun is now an hour high, there is a peculiar bright light on the pines and on their stems. The lichens on their bark reflect it.

In the horizon I see a succession of the brows of hills, bare or covered with wood, -- look over the eyebrows of the recumbent earth. These are separated by long valleys filled with vapory haze.

If there is a little more warmth than usual at this season, then the beautiful air which belongs to winter is perceived and appreciated.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 4, 1850

Fair Haven Pond is now open, and there is no snow. See December 4, 1855 ("A pleasant day and yet no snow nor ice. ") Compare December 4, 1859 ("Awake to winter, and snow two or three inches deep, the first of any consequence.") December 4, 1860 ("The first snow, four or five inches, this evening."); December 5, 1853 ("Fair Haven Pond is skimmed completely over."); November 25, 1850 (“I found Fair Haven skimmed entirely over. . . ice on the water and winter in the air, but yet not a particle of snow on the ground “; December 8, 1850 ("A week or two ago Fair Haven Pond was frozen and the ground was still bare. Now the Pond is open and ground is covered with snow and ice. This evening for the first time the new moon is reflected from the frozen snow-crust.")

The shrub oak fire burns briskly as seen from the Cliffs.  See October 22, 1858 ("I see, from the Cliffs, that color has run through the shrub oak plain like a fire or a wave, not omitting a single tree");  December 1. 1856 ("The shrub oak, lowly, loving the earth and spreading over it, tough, thick-leaved; leaves firm and sound in winter and rustling like leather shields; leaves fair and wholesome to the eye, clean and smooth to the touch")

Though the sun is now an hour high, there is a peculiar bright light on the pines and on their stems. The lichens on their bark reflect it. See November 1, 1857 ("I see that the sun, when low, will shine into a thick wood, which you had supposed always dark, as much as twenty rods, lighting it all up, making the gray, lichen-clad stems of the trees all warm and bright with light");  December 31, 1851 ("The round greenish-yellow lichens on the white pines loom through the mist. . . . They eclipse the trees they cover.")

The beautiful air which belongs to winter. See November 25, 1850 (“This afternoon the air was indescribably clear and exhilarating, and though the thermometer would have shown it to be cold, I thought that there was a finer and purer warmth . . .The landscape looked singularly clean and pure and dry, the air, like a pure glass, being laid over the picture. . . ice on the water and winter in the air“)

December 4. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, December 4; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, I love you like I love the sky

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

December 5

Hired Fay's horse to fo to Cavendish. Went to K.E.D.  Had a good time.
  E. 62



EDK, December 5, 1860

Young hickory mystery

December 3.

The hickory that was blown down by the wall has been cut up into lengths. The end of one is sixteen inches in diameter and has I12 rings distinct, the first 50 within five and three quarters inches. The bark is one inch thick.

Under and about the hickory that stands near the white oak (under the north side of the hill), there are many small hickories two to four feet high amid the birches and pines. Yet, I find no young hickories springing up on the open hillside.  If they do so elsewhere, why should they not here, where nuts are abundant?

I am inclined to think now that both oaks and hickories are occasionally planted in open land a rod or two or more beyond the edge of a pine or other wood, but that the hickory roots are more persistent under these circumstances and hence oftener succeed there. 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 3, 1860

I find no young hickories springing up on the open hillside. See December 2, 1860 ("I do not think that a single hickory has been planted in either of these places for some years at least. “); December 1, 1860 (“What is most remarkable is that they should be planted so often in open land, on a bare hillside, where oaks rarely are.”)

December 3

Came from home this morning and commenced my school at Felchville. Martha commenced in the primary department.

EDK, December 3. 1860

To Smith's Hickory Hillside.

December 2.

I come via Britton's to see if I can find a seedling hickory under half a dozen years old. After searching long amid the very numerous young hickories at Britton's shanty and Smith's Hill I fail to find one so recently planted. I do not think that a single hickory has been planted in either of these places for some years at least.

I find many at the last place only one or two feet, but they invariably have great roots, and old stubs which have died down are visible at or beneath the surface of the ground.  They seem to be able to resist fire, cultivation, and frost. The last is apparently their great enemy at present . It is astonishing how many efforts they make, how persistent they are.

It may be that when pine and oaks and hickories, young and old, are cut off and the land cleared, the two former are exterminated but the hickories are tough and stubborn and do not give up the ground. I cannot as yet account for their existence in these two localities otherwise.

Yet I still think that some must have been planted within a dozen years on Fair Haven Hill without the pines in a manner in which oaks are not.

H. D. Thoreau,  Journal, December 2, 1860

I do not think that a single hickory has been planted in either of these places for some years at least. See December 1, 1860 (“What is most remarkable is that they should be planted so often in open land, on a bare hillside, where oaks rarely are.”); December 3, 1860 (“Under and about the hickory that stands near the white oak (under the north side of the hill), there are many small hickories two to four feet high amid the birches and pines. Yet, I find no young hickories springing up on the open hillside.”) See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau. The Hickory

December 2

At home nearly all day.  Wallace & Amanda, Wm & Laura  Aunt Rhoda & Martha there.

Rec'd form James Emery 1.50. Martha went to school.

EDK, December 2, 1860

December 1

Came home from Boston today. Found Mother quite sick. Paid fare from Boston to Felchville 4.50

EDK, December 1, 1860

To Fair Haven Hill.

December 1.

Measure a great red maple near the south end of E. Hubbard's swamp, dividing in two at the ground, the largest trunk 7 feet and 10 inches at three feet. This the largest I know.

Examine the young hickories on Fair Haven Hill slope to see how old they are. These hickories are most numerous in openings four or five rods over amid the pines, and are also found many rods from the pines in the open pasture, and also especially along walls, though yet very far from other trees of any kind. I infer that animals plant them, and perhaps their growing along walls may be accounted for in part by the fact that the squirrels with nuts oftenest take that road.

What is most remarkable is that they should be planted so often in open land, on a bare hillside, where oaks rarely are. I do not know of a grove of oaks springing up in this manner, with broad intervals of bare sward between them, and away from pines.

How is this to be accounted for? It may be that they are more persistent at the root than oaks, and so at last succeed in becoming trees in these localities, where oaks fail.

It will be very suggestive to a novice just to go and dig up a dozen seedling oaks and hickories and see what they have had to contend with. Theirs is like the early career of genius.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 1, 1860

Measure a great red maple near the south end of E. Hubbard's swamp 7 feet and 10 inches at three feet. This the largest I know. See November 14, 1860 ("The red maple on south edge of Trillium Wood is six feet three inches in circumference at three feet"); November 16, 1860 ("To Inches Woods . . . we next went west by south through a maple and yellow birch swamp, in which a black oak eight feet and four twelfths [ in ] circumference, a red maple six feet and a half, a black birch seven feet, a black birch eight feet.")

What is most remarkable is that they should be planted so often in open land, on a bare hillside, where oaks rarely are. See October 26, 1860 ("Are not hickories most commonly found on hills? There are a few hickories in the open land which I once cultivated there, and these may have been planted there by birds or squirrels"); December 2, 1860 ("It may be that when pine and oaks and hickories, young and old, are cut off and the land cleared, the two former are exterminated but the hickories are tough and stubborn and do not give up the ground"); December 3, 1860 ("I am inclined to think now that both oaks and hickories are occasionally planted in open land a rod or two or more beyond the edge of a pine or other wood, but that the hickory roots are more persistent under these circumstances and hence oftener succeed there. ")