May 7.
Forenoon. — Up North River to stone-heaps.
The willows (Salix alba) where I keep my boat resound with the hum of bees and other insects.
The leaves of the aspen are perhaps the most conspicuous of any, though the Salix alba, from its mass and its flowers in addition, makes the greater impression.
I hear the loud cackling of the flicker about the aspen at the rock.
A gray squirrel is stealing along beneath.
Hundreds of tortoises, painted and wood, are heard hurrying through the dry leaves on the bank, and seen tumbling into the water as my boat approaches; sometimes half a dozen and more are sunning on a floating rail, and one will remain with outstretched neck, its head moving slowly round in a semicircle, while the boat passes within a few feet.
Fresh green meadow-grass is springing up, as the water goes down, and flags.
The larch has grown a quarter of an inch or more, studded with green buds; not so forward as the Scotch larch.
The hemlock and the pitch pine have also started.
The keys of the white maple are more than half an inch long, not including stem; a dull-purplish cottony white. They make no such show as the red.
The keys of the red are longer-stemmed but as yet much smaller.
The leaves of the white are perhaps most advanced, yet lost in the fruit.
The catkins of the hop-hornbeam, yellow tassels hanging from the trees, which grow on the steep bank of the Assabet, give them a light, graceful, and quite noticeable appearance.
It is among the more conspicuous growths now; yet the anthers shed no pollen yet.
Smaller trees and limbs which have few or no catkins have leaves, elm-like, already an inch long.
The black cherry leaves are among the more conspicuous, more than an inch long.
One of the many cherries which have when bruised the strong cherry scent.
But this is the strongest and most rummy of all.
The black oak buds are considerably expanded, probably more than any oaks.
Their catkins are more than half an inch long.
The swamp white oak is late, but the tips of the buds show yellowish green.
The sugar maple in blossom, probably for a day or two, but since April 30th, though the peduncles are not half their length yet.
Apple trees are greened with opening leaves, and their blossom-buds show the red.
As I advance up the Assabet, the lively note of the yellowbird is borne from the willows, and the creeper is seen busy amid the lichens of the maple, and the loud, jingling tche tche tche tche, etc., of the chip-bird rings along the shore occasionally.
The chewink is seen and heard scratching amid the dry leaves like a hen.
The woods now begin to ring with the woodland note of the oven-bird.
I hear the mew of the first catbird, and, soon after, its rich and varied melody; and there sits on a tree over the water the ungainly king fisher, who flies off with an apparently laborious flight, sounding his alarum.
A few yellow lily pads are already spread out on the surface, tender reddish leaves, with a still crenate or scalloped border like that of some tin platters on which turnovers are cooked, while the muddy bottom is almost everywhere spotted with the large reddish ruffle-like leaves, from the midst of which the flower stems already stand up a foot, aiming toward the light and heat.
That long reddish bent grass abounds on the river now.
That small kind of pondweed, with a whorl of small leaves on the surface and nutlets already in the axils of the very common linear leaves, is common in the river.
I hear the witter-che of the Maryland yellow-throat, also, on the willows.
The note of the peetweet resounds along the river, — standing on the rocks laid bare by the fallen water or running along the sandy shore.
The rich medley of the thrasher is also heard.
In the frog-spawn (which looks like oats in a jelly, masses as big as the fist), I distinguish the form of the pollywog, which squirms a little.
The female flowers of the sweet-gale, somewhat like but larger and more crowded than the hazel, is now an interesting sight along the edge of the river.
That early cross-like plant is a foot high and budded.
The stone heaps have been formed since I was here before, methinks about a month ago, and for the most part of fresh stones; i. e., piles several feet in diameter by a foot high have evidently been made (no doubt commonly on the ruins of old ones) within a month. The stones are less than the size of a hen's egg, down to a pebble; now all under water. The Haverhill fisherman found the young of the common eel in such, and referred them to it.
I take it to be the small pewee whose smart chirp I hear so commonly.
The delicate cherry-like leaf, transparent red, of the shad-bush is now interesting, especially in the sun. Some have green leaves. There is one of the former, five inches in diameter and eighteen or twenty feet high, on the Island, with only four to six flowers to a raceme.
Heard stake-driver.
Saw a large snake, I think a black one, drop into the river close by; pursued, and as he found me gaining, he dived when he had reached the middle, and that was the last I saw of him.
Fishing has commenced in the river.
A white-throated sparrow (Fringilla Pennsylvanica) died in R. W. E.'s garden this morning. Half the streak over eye yellow. A passer.
The odor of the sweet-briar along the side of a house.
Riding through Lincoln, found the peach bloom now in prime, gen erally a dark pink with a lighter almost white inmixed, more striking from the complete absence of leaves, and especially when seen against the green of pines.
I can find no wild gooseberry in bloom yet.
The barberry bushes are in some places now quite green.
Various grasses in bloom for a week.
With respect to leafing, the more conspicuous and forward trees and shrubs are the following, and nearly in this order, as I think, and these have formed small leaves : Gooseberry, aspens (not grandidentata), willows, young maples of all kinds, balm-of-Gilead (?), elder, meadow-sweet, back cherry, and is that Jersey tea on Island? or diervilla? ostrya, alder, white birch and the three others, Pyrus arbutifolia (?), apple, amelanchier, choke (?)-cherry, dwarf ditto, wild red, Viburnum nudum (?) and Lentago, barberry.
The following are bursting into leaf: Hazel, shrub oak, black oak and red, white pine, larch, cornel, thorns, etc., elms.
Yorrick.
Some birds-pewees, ground birds, robins, etc. — have already built nests and laid their eggs, before the leaves are expanded or the fields fairly green.
Heard to-day that more slumbrous stertorous sound (not the hoarse one of early frogs) as I paddled up the river.
Is it tortoises? These are abundantly out.
The Viola pedata with the large pale-blue flower is now quite common along warm sandy banks.
The ovata is a smaller and darker and striped violet.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 7, 1853
The keys of the white maple are more than half an inch long, not including stem; a dull-purplish cottony white. They make no such show as the red.
The keys of the red are longer-stemmed but as yet much smaller.
The leaves of the white are perhaps most advanced, yet lost in the fruit.
The catkins of the hop-hornbeam, yellow tassels hanging from the trees, which grow on the steep bank of the Assabet, give them a light, graceful, and quite noticeable appearance.
It is among the more conspicuous growths now; yet the anthers shed no pollen yet.
Smaller trees and limbs which have few or no catkins have leaves, elm-like, already an inch long.
The black cherry leaves are among the more conspicuous, more than an inch long.
One of the many cherries which have when bruised the strong cherry scent.
But this is the strongest and most rummy of all.
The black oak buds are considerably expanded, probably more than any oaks.
Their catkins are more than half an inch long.
The swamp white oak is late, but the tips of the buds show yellowish green.
The sugar maple in blossom, probably for a day or two, but since April 30th, though the peduncles are not half their length yet.
Apple trees are greened with opening leaves, and their blossom-buds show the red.
As I advance up the Assabet, the lively note of the yellowbird is borne from the willows, and the creeper is seen busy amid the lichens of the maple, and the loud, jingling tche tche tche tche, etc., of the chip-bird rings along the shore occasionally.
The chewink is seen and heard scratching amid the dry leaves like a hen.
The woods now begin to ring with the woodland note of the oven-bird.
I hear the mew of the first catbird, and, soon after, its rich and varied melody; and there sits on a tree over the water the ungainly king fisher, who flies off with an apparently laborious flight, sounding his alarum.
A few yellow lily pads are already spread out on the surface, tender reddish leaves, with a still crenate or scalloped border like that of some tin platters on which turnovers are cooked, while the muddy bottom is almost everywhere spotted with the large reddish ruffle-like leaves, from the midst of which the flower stems already stand up a foot, aiming toward the light and heat.
That long reddish bent grass abounds on the river now.
That small kind of pondweed, with a whorl of small leaves on the surface and nutlets already in the axils of the very common linear leaves, is common in the river.
I hear the witter-che of the Maryland yellow-throat, also, on the willows.
The note of the peetweet resounds along the river, — standing on the rocks laid bare by the fallen water or running along the sandy shore.
The rich medley of the thrasher is also heard.
In the frog-spawn (which looks like oats in a jelly, masses as big as the fist), I distinguish the form of the pollywog, which squirms a little.
The female flowers of the sweet-gale, somewhat like but larger and more crowded than the hazel, is now an interesting sight along the edge of the river.
That early cross-like plant is a foot high and budded.
The stone heaps have been formed since I was here before, methinks about a month ago, and for the most part of fresh stones; i. e., piles several feet in diameter by a foot high have evidently been made (no doubt commonly on the ruins of old ones) within a month. The stones are less than the size of a hen's egg, down to a pebble; now all under water. The Haverhill fisherman found the young of the common eel in such, and referred them to it.
I take it to be the small pewee whose smart chirp I hear so commonly.
The delicate cherry-like leaf, transparent red, of the shad-bush is now interesting, especially in the sun. Some have green leaves. There is one of the former, five inches in diameter and eighteen or twenty feet high, on the Island, with only four to six flowers to a raceme.
Heard stake-driver.
Saw a large snake, I think a black one, drop into the river close by; pursued, and as he found me gaining, he dived when he had reached the middle, and that was the last I saw of him.
Fishing has commenced in the river.
A white-throated sparrow (Fringilla Pennsylvanica) died in R. W. E.'s garden this morning. Half the streak over eye yellow. A passer.
The odor of the sweet-briar along the side of a house.
Riding through Lincoln, found the peach bloom now in prime, gen erally a dark pink with a lighter almost white inmixed, more striking from the complete absence of leaves, and especially when seen against the green of pines.
I can find no wild gooseberry in bloom yet.
The barberry bushes are in some places now quite green.
Various grasses in bloom for a week.
With respect to leafing, the more conspicuous and forward trees and shrubs are the following, and nearly in this order, as I think, and these have formed small leaves : Gooseberry, aspens (not grandidentata), willows, young maples of all kinds, balm-of-Gilead (?), elder, meadow-sweet, back cherry, and is that Jersey tea on Island? or diervilla? ostrya, alder, white birch and the three others, Pyrus arbutifolia (?), apple, amelanchier, choke (?)-cherry, dwarf ditto, wild red, Viburnum nudum (?) and Lentago, barberry.
The following are bursting into leaf: Hazel, shrub oak, black oak and red, white pine, larch, cornel, thorns, etc., elms.
Yorrick.
Some birds-pewees, ground birds, robins, etc. — have already built nests and laid their eggs, before the leaves are expanded or the fields fairly green.
Heard to-day that more slumbrous stertorous sound (not the hoarse one of early frogs) as I paddled up the river.
Is it tortoises? These are abundantly out.
The Viola pedata with the large pale-blue flower is now quite common along warm sandy banks.
The ovata is a smaller and darker and striped violet.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 7, 1853
May 7. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 7.
The willows (Salix alba) where I keep my boat resound with the hum of bees and other insects. See May 10, 1860 ("Salix alba flower in prime and resounding with the hum of bees on it. The sweet fragrance fills the air for a long distance."); May 11, 1854 ("The willows on the Turnpike now resound with the hum of bees,")
As I advance up the Assabet, the lively note of the yellowbird is borne from the willow. See May 7, 1852 ("The first summer yellowbirds on the willow causeway. The birds come not singly, as the earliest, but all at once, i. e. many yellowbirds all over town. Now I remember the yellowbird comes when the willows begin to leave out") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Summer Yellowbird
The woods now begin to ring with the woodland note of the oven-bird. See May 7, 1852 ("The first oven-bird.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Oven-bird
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