July 12.
I observed this morning a row of several dozen swallows perched on the telegraph-wire by the bridge, and ever and anon a part of them would launch forth as with one consent, circle a few moments over the water or meadow, and return to the wire again.
2 p. m. — To the Assabet. Still no rain.
The clouds, cumuli, lie in high piles along the southern horizon, glowing, downy, or cream-colored, broken into irregular summits in the form of bears erect, or demigods, or rocking stones, infant Herculeses; and still we think that from their darker bases a thunder-shower may issue.
The mower, perchance, cuts some plants which I have never seen in flower.
I hear the toads still at night, together with bullfrogs, but not so universally nor loud as formerly. I go to walk at twilight, — at the same time that toads go to their walks, and are seen hopping about the sidewalks or the pump.
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| July 12, 2012 |
I observed this morning a row of several dozen swallows perched on the telegraph-wire by the bridge, and ever and anon a part of them would launch forth as with one consent, circle a few moments over the water or meadow, and return to the wire again.
2 p. m. — To the Assabet. Still no rain.
The clouds, cumuli, lie in high piles along the southern horizon, glowing, downy, or cream-colored, broken into irregular summits in the form of bears erect, or demigods, or rocking stones, infant Herculeses; and still we think that from their darker bases a thunder-shower may issue.
The mower, perchance, cuts some plants which I have never seen in flower.
I hear the toads still at night, together with bullfrogs, but not so universally nor loud as formerly. I go to walk at twilight, — at the same time that toads go to their walks, and are seen hopping about the sidewalks or the pump.
Now, a quarter after nine, as I walk along the river-bank,
long after starlight, and perhaps an hour or more after sunset, I see some of
those high-pillared clouds of the day, in the southwest, still reflecting a
downy light from the regions of day, they are so high. It is a pleasing
reminiscence of the day in the midst of the deepening shadows of the night.
As I sit on the river-bank beyond the ash tree there is an
aurora, a low arc of a circle, in the north. The twilight ends to-night
apparently about a quarter before ten. There is no moon.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, July 12, 1852
I hear the toads still at night, together with bullfrogs, but not so universally nor loud as formerly. See July 12, 1859 (“In the evening, the moon being about full, I paddle up the river to see the moonlight and hear the bullfrogs. The toads and the pebbly dont dont are most common.”) See also July 8, 1855 (“I am surprised at the number of large light-colored toads everywhere hopping over these dry and sandy fields. ”); June 15, 1860 (“ For some time I have not heard toads by day, and the hylodes appear to have done."); July 16, 1856 (“See several bullfrogs lying fully out on pads at 5 p. m. They trump well these nights.”); July 17, 1852 (“As I walked by the river last evening, I heard no toads.”); July 17, 1856 (“I see many young toads hopping about on that bared ground amid the thin weeds, not more than five eighths to three quarters of an inch long.”); July 17, 1860 ("Clean and handsome bullfrogs. . .sit imperturbable out on the stones all around the pond.”)
I hear the toads still at night, together with bullfrogs, but not so universally nor loud as formerly. See July 12, 1859 (“In the evening, the moon being about full, I paddle up the river to see the moonlight and hear the bullfrogs. The toads and the pebbly dont dont are most common.”) See also July 8, 1855 (“I am surprised at the number of large light-colored toads everywhere hopping over these dry and sandy fields. ”); June 15, 1860 (“ For some time I have not heard toads by day, and the hylodes appear to have done."); July 16, 1856 (“See several bullfrogs lying fully out on pads at 5 p. m. They trump well these nights.”); July 17, 1852 (“As I walked by the river last evening, I heard no toads.”); July 17, 1856 (“I see many young toads hopping about on that bared ground amid the thin weeds, not more than five eighths to three quarters of an inch long.”); July 17, 1860 ("Clean and handsome bullfrogs. . .sit imperturbable out on the stones all around the pond.”)
July 12. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, July 12
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
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