In the evening lightning in the horizon – soon a gentle rain. (An irresistible necessity for mud turtles.)

August 26. 

August 26, 2016

I hear of a great many fires around us, far and near, both meadows and woods; in Maine and New York also. There may be some smoke in this haze, but I doubt it.  

I hear part of a phoebe's strain, as I go over the railroad bridge. It is the voice of dying summer. 

I think I hear a red-eye. 

Rudbeckia, — the small one, — still fresh. 

Open one of my snapping turtle's eggs. Its eyes are open. It puts out its head, stretches forth its claws, and liberates its tail. With its great head it has already the ugliness of the full-grown, and is already a hieroglyphic of snappishness. 

If Iliads are not composed in our day, snapping turtles are hatched and arrive at maturity. It already thrusts forth its tremendous head, — for the first time in this sphere, — and slowly moves from side to side, — opening its small glistening eyes for the first time to the light, — expressive of dull rage, as if it had endured the trials of this world for a century. 

When I behold this monster thus steadily advancing toward maturity, all nature abetting, I am convinced that there must be an irresistible necessity for mud turtles. With what tenacity Nature sticks to her idea!

Hear by telegraph that it rains in Portland and New York. In the evening, some lightning in the horizon, and soon after a little gentle rain ...

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 26, 1854

There may be some smoke in this haze, but I doubt it .) See August 25, 1854 ("Many refer all this to smoke . . . This blue haze is not dissipated much by the night, but is seen still with the earliest light."") See also note to August 31, 1854 ("There must be more smoke in this haze than I have supposed.")

I hear part of a phoebe's [sic] strain . . . It is the voice of dying summer. See  April 14, 1852 ("I do not hear those peculiar tender die-away notes from the pewee yet. Is it another pewee, or a later note?"); August 20, 1854 ("The pewees sit still on their perch a long time . . . It often utters a continous pe-e-e. ");  August 21, 1853 ("The peawai still,"); August 22, 1853 ("Hear a peawai whose note is more like singing — as if it were still incubating — than any other.") See also  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Eastern Wood-Pewee

I am convinced that there must be an irresistible necessity for mud turtles. See September 11, 1852 ("Genius is like the snapping-turtle born with a great developed head."); 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. "); September 16, 1854 ("I find the mud turtle’s eggs at the Desert all hatched, one still left in the nest . . . At length it puts out its head and legs, turns itself round, and crawls to the water."); April 1, 1858 ("I see on the wet mud a little snapping turtle evidently hatched last year . . . Talk of great heads, look at this one!"). See also August 28, 1856 ("I open the painted tortoise nest of June 10th,\ and find a young turtle partly out of his shell. . . .What's a summer? Time for a turtle's eggs to hatch. So is the turtle developed, fitted to endure, for he outlives twenty French dynasties. One turtle knows several Napoleons. "); September 9, 1854 ("Thus the earth is the mother of all creatures.”)

Hear by telegraph that it rains in Portland and New York. See May 31, 1856 ("It has been very cold for two or three days, and to-night a frost is feared. The telegraph says it snowed in Bangor to-day"); October 20, 1859 ("I learn the next day that snow fell to-day in northern New York and New Hampshire . . . We feel the cold of it here as soon as the telegraph can inform us.")

In the evening, some lightning in the horizon, and soon after a little gentle rain See  March 25, 1860 (" The first lightning is seen in the horizon by one who is out in the evening"); June 16, 1852 (“Heat lightning in the horizon. A sultry night. A flute from some villager.”); July 23, 1854 ("As so often, the rain comes, leaving thunder and lightning behind. ") July 29, 1857 ("Heat lightning flashes, which reveal a distant horizon to our twilight eyes. But my fellows simply assert that it is not broad day, which everybody knows, and fail to perceive the phenomenon at all. ")

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

 In the evening

 lightning in the horizon –

 soon a gentle rain.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, lightning in the horizon

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

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