Bay-wings about. Sparrows in flocks,

October 3

See Vanessa Antiopa.

The hard frost of September 28th, 29th, and 30th, and especially of October 1st, has suddenly killed, crisped, and caused to fall a great many leaves of ash, hickory, etc., etc. These ( and the locusts generally ) look shrivelled and hoary, and of course they will not ripen or be bright. They are killed and withered green, — all the more tender leaves. Has killed all the burdock flowers and no doubt many others.

Sam Barrett says that last May he waded across the Assabet River on the old dam in front of his house with out going over his india - rubber boots, which are sixteen and a half inches high. I do not believe you could have done better than this a hundred years ago, or before the canal dam was built.

Bay-wings about.

I have seen and heard sparrows in flocks, more as if flitting by, within a week, or since the frosts began.

Gathered to-day my apples at the Texas house. I set out the trees, fourteen of them fourteen years ago and five of them several years later, and I now get between ten and eleven barrels of apples from them.

“Texas” House

(Thoreau Family Residence, 1844-1850)

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, October 3, 1860

See Vanessa Antiopa. See . April 17, 1860 (“It is unexpectedly very warm on lee side of hilltop just laid bare and covered with dry leaves and twigs. See my first Vanessa Antiopa”); October 1, 1860.(“C. saw the first Vanessa Antiopa since spring.”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Buff-edged Butterfly

The hard frost of September 28th, 29th, and 30th, and especially of October 1st. See October 1, 1860 ("Remarkable frost and ice this morning . . . I do not remember such cold at this season.").”); Compare October 3, 1856 (“The frost keeps off remarkably .” )

Sam Barrett says that last May he waded across the Assabet River on the old dam. See August 17, 1858 (“Being overtaken by a shower, we took refuge in the basement of Sam Barrett’s sawmill, where we spent an hour, and at length came home with a rainbow over arching the road before us”)

Bay-wings about. See April 15, 1859 (“The bay-wing now sings — the first I have been able to hear — . . . about the Texas house ”); October 9, 1858 (“Bay-wings flit along road.”); October 11, 1856 (“Bay-wing sparrows numerous.”); October 12, 1859 (“ I see scattered flocks of bay-wings amid the weeds and on the fences.”)

I have seen and heard sparrows in flocks within a week. See September 17, 1858 (“Methinks, too, that there are more sparrows in flocks now about in garden”);  September 23, 1851 ("I scare up large flocks of sparrows in the garden.");September 26, 1858 (“Now is the time, too, when flocks of sparrows begin to scour over the weedy fields,”); September 27, 1858 ("What are those little birds in flocks in the garden and on the peach trees these mornings, about size of chip-birds, without distinct chestnut crowns?”); October 2, 1858 ("The garden is alive with migrating sparrows these mornings."); October 5, 1858 (“I still see large flocks, apparently of chip birds, on the weeds and ground in the yard.”); October 10, 1853 ("There are . . . large flocks of small sparrows,  which make a business of washing and pruning themselves in the puddles in the road, as if cleaning up after a long flight and the wind of yesterday.”)