December 19.
In all woods is heard now far and near the sound of the woodchopper's axe, a twilight sound, now in the night of the year, men having come out for fuel to the forests, as if men had stolen forth in the arctic night to get fuel to keep their fires a-going.
Men go to the woods now for fuel who never go other time.
Why should it be so pleasing to look into a thick pine wood where the sunlight streams in and gilds it?
The sound of the axes far in the horizon sounds like the dropping of the eaves.
Now the sun sets suddenly without a cloud– & with scarcely any redness following so pure is the atmosphere – only a faint rosy blush along the horizon.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, December 19, 1851
Why should it be so pleasing to look into a thick pine wood where the sunlight streams in and gilds it? See December 3, 1856 ("The pine forest's edge seen against the winter horizon. . . .The silvery needles of the pine straining the light."); December 21, 1851 ("Sunlight on pine-needles is the phenomenon of a winter day.")
So pure is the atmosphere, only a faint rosy blush along the horizon. See December 21, 1851 ("Long after the sun has set . . . some rosy clouds will be seen in the upper sky over the portals of the darkening west. "); December 24, 1851 (“When I had got home and chanced to look out the window from supper, I perceived that all the west horizon was glowing with a rosy border.”); December 25, 1851 (“I go forth to see the sun set. Who knows how it will set, even half an hour beforehand?”); January 5, 1853 ("A fine rosy sky in the west after sunset; and later an amber-colored horizon.")
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