Some fear to go to bed, lest the roof be blown off.

October 24. 

Early on Nawshawtuct. 

Black willows bare. Golden willow with yellow leaves. Larch yellow. Most alders by river bare except at top. Waxwork shows red. Celtis almost bare, with greenish-yellow leaves at top. 

Some hickories bare, some with rich golden-brown leaves. Locusts half bare, with greenish-yellow leaves. 

Catnip fresh and green and in bloom. Barberries green, reddish, or scarlet. Cranberry beds at distance in meadows (from hill) are red, for a week or more.

Lombardy poplar yellow. 

Red maples and elms alone very conspicuously bare in our landscape. 

White thorns bare, and berries mostly fallen, reddening the ground. 

Hedge-mustard still fresh and in bloom. Button- woods half bare. 

The rock maple leaves a clear yellow; now and then [one] shows some blood in its veins, and blushes. 

People are busy raking the leaves before their houses; some put them over their strawberries. 

It has rained all day, filling the streams. Just after dark, high southerly winds arise, but very warm, blowing the rain against the windows and roof and shaking the house. 

It is very dark withal, so that I can hardly find my way to a neighbor's. We think of vessels on the coast, and shipwrecks, and how this will bring down the remaining leaves and to-morrow morning the street will be strewn with rotten limbs of the elms amid the leaves and puddles, and some loose chimney or crazy building will have fallen. Some fear to go to bed, lest the roof be blown off.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal,  October 24, 1853

Some hickories bare, some with rich golden-brown leaves. See October 24, 1858 ("Hickories are two thirds fallen, at least.") and note to October 8, 1856 ("The hickory leaves are among the handsomest now, varying from green through yellow, more or less broadly green-striped on the principal veins, to pure yellow, at first almost lemon-yellow, at last browner and crisped. This mingling of yellow and green on the same leaf, the green next the veins where the life is most persistent, is very pleasing.")


Locusts half bare, with greenish-yellow leaves. See October 22, 1858 ("I see locusts are generally yellow but thinly leaved, and those at extremities. "); October 24, 1858 ("The locusts are bare except the tops,")

Just after dark, high southerly winds shaking the house. See October 17, 1857 ("Very high wind in the night, shaking the house. I feel it taking hold under the eaves, which project at the end of the house, each time with a jerk. Some rain also, and these two bring down the leaves.") and note to November 20, 1857 ("High wind in the night, shaking the house.")