A pile of snow-fleas

December 7

Perhaps the warmest day yet. True Indian summer. The walker perspires. 

The shepherd's-purse is in full bloom; the andromeda not turned red.

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; and when a stick was passed through the living and skipping mass, each side of the furrow preserved its edge as in powder.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 7, 1852

The shepherd's-purse is in full bloom. See November 3, 1852 (“Shepherd's-purse abundant still in gardens.”); November 5, 1855 (“I see the shepherd’s-purse, hedge-mustard, and red clover, — November flowers. ”);   January 23, 1855 ("The radical leaves of the shepherd’s-purse, seen in green circles on the water-washed plowed grounds, remind me of the internal heat and life of the globe, anon to burst forth anew.")

The andromeda not turned red. See December 21, 1856 ("How interesting and wholesome their color now! A broad level thick stuff, without a crevice in it, composed of the dull brown-red andromeda. Is it not the most uniform and deepest red that covers a large surface now?")

Saw a pile of snow-fleas in a rut in the wood-path to the eye exactly like powder, as if a sportsman had spilled it from his flask. See December 16, 1850 ("The snow everywhere is covered with snow-fleas like pepper . . .They look like some powder which the hunter has spilled in the path.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Snow-flea

A pile of snow-fleas 

in a rut in the wood-path 

like powder 

spilled from a flask.