A frail creature, rarely met with, though not uncommon.

June 27. 

I find that the tops of my stakes in Moore's Swamp are nearly two feet lower than a fortnight ago, or when Garfield began to fill it.

A frail creature, rarely met with

P. M. — To Walden. At the further Brister's Spring, under the pine, I find an Attacus luna, half hidden under a skunk-cabbage leaf, with its back to the ground and motionless, on the edge of the swamp. The underside is a particularly pale hoary green. It is somewhat greener above with a slightly purplish brown border on the front edge of its front wings, and a brown, yellow, and whitish eye-spot in the middle of each wing. 

It is very sluggish and allows me to turn it over and cover it up with another leaf, — sleeping till the night come. It has more relation to the moon by its pale hoary-green color and its sluggishness by day than by the form of its tail. A frail creature, rarely met with, though not uncommon.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 27, 1859

At the further Brister's Spring, under the pine, I find an Attacus luna. See June 27, 1858 ("See an Attacus luna in the shady path, smaller than I have seen before. At first it appears unable or unwilling to fly, but at length it flutters along and upward two or three rods into an oak tree, and there hangs inconspicuous amid the leaves. ") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Luna Moth (Attacus luna)