The meadow ice is rapidly breaking up.

March 14.

P. M. — To Hunt house.

I thought from the above drawing that the original door must have been in the middle of the old part and not at one end, and that I should detect it in the manner in which the studs were set in. I really did so and found some other traces of the old door (where I have dotted it) when I got there. 

Some of the chalk- marks which have been preserved under the casing of the timbers so long have been completely washed off in yesterday's rain, as the frame stood bare. Also read in chalk on a chamber floor joist (which had been plastered over beneath) "enfine Brown," so many s. and d., and what most read for "Feb 1666," but, being written over a rough knot, it is doubtful.

"Hides 3." 

Saw E. Hosmer take up the cellar stairs.

They are of white oak, in form like one half of a squared white oak log sawed diagonally. These lie flat on their broadest sides on the slanting earth, resting near each end on a horse, which is a white oak stick with the bark on, hewed on the upper side and sunk in the earth, and they are fastened to this by two pins of wood placed as I have indicated.

I judge by my eye that the house is fifteen feet high to the eaves. The posts are remarkably sawn and hewn away on account of the projection of the upper story, so that they are more than twice as large above as below, thus:  the corner posts being cut on two sides or more  than half away (six inches off them) below the second story. 

The chimney was laid in clay. "T. B." were perhaps the initials of Thomas Brown; also "I. [?] H. D." 



The cowslip in pitcher has fairly blossomed to-day.

I see a large flock of grackles searching for food along the water's edge, just below Dr. Bartlett's. Some wade in the water. They are within a dozen rods of me and the road.

It must be something just washed up that they are searching for, for the water has just risen and is still rising fast. Is it not insects and worms washed out of the grass? and perhaps the snails ?

When a grackle sings, it is as if his mouth were full of cotton, which he was trying to spit out. 

The river is still rising. It is open [?] and generally over the meadows. 

The meadow ice is rapidly breaking up. Great cakes half a dozen rods long are drifted down against the bridges. There is a strong current on the meadow, not only north along the causeway, but south along the north end of the causeway, the water thus rushing both ways toward the only outlet at the bridge. 

This is proved by great cakes of ice floating swiftly along parallel with the causeway, but in opposite directions, to meet at the bridge. They are there soon broken up by the current after they strike the abutments. 

I see a large cake eight feet wide and ten inches thick, just broken off, carried under the bridge in a vertical position and wholly under water, such is the pressure there. This shows to what an extent the causeways and bridges act as dams to the flood.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, March 14, 1859

The cowslip in pitcher has fairly blossomed to-day. See March 5, 1859 ("The cowslip there Well Meadow] is very prominently flower-budded, lifting its yellow flower-buds above water in one place. The leaves are quite inconspicuous when they first come up, being rolled up tightly.");  March 24, 1855 ("It is too cold to think of those signs of spring which I find recorded under this date last year. The earliest signs of spring in vegetation noticed thus far are the maple sap, the willow catkins, grass on south banks, and perhaps cowslip in sheltered places") ;  March 26, 1857 ("The buds of the cowslip are very yellow, and the plant is not observed a rod off, it lies so low and close to the surface of the water in the meadow. It may bloom and wither there several times before villagers discover or suspect it"); March 27, 1855 ("Am surprised to see the cowslip so forward, showing so much green, in E. Hubbard’s Swamp, in the brook, where it is sheltered from the winds. The already expanded leaves rise above the water. If this is a spring growth, it is the most forward herb I have seen"); April 8, 1856 ("There, in that slow, muddy brook near the head of Well Meadow, within a few rods of its source, where it winds amid the alders, which shelter the plants somewhat, while they are open enough now to admit the sun, I find two cowslips in full bloom, shedding pollen")