The year is but a succession of days,
and I see that I could assign some office to each day
which, summed up, would be the history of the year.
Henry Thoreau, August 24, 1852
The truest beauty
surrounds us near at hand but
we fail to discern
these forms and colors
which adorn our daily life –
our fairest jewels.
 |
| September 18, 2017 |
They begin to have a fire occasionally below-stairs. September 18, 1852
In the forenoons I move into a chamber on the east side of the house, and so follow the sun round. It is agreeable to stand in a new relation to the sun. September 18, 1852
It is a fine September day . . . As we paddle westward, toward College Meadow, I perceive that a new season has come. September 18, 1858
The earth is yellowing in the September sun. September 18, 1858
The willows and button-bushes are a yellowed bower in parallel lines along the swollen and shining stream. September 18, 1860
The air is incredibly clear. The surface of both land and water is bright . . . seen through a much finer, clearer, and cooler air. September 18, 1858
I am struck by the soft yellow-brown or brown-yellow of the black willows, stretching in cloud-shaped wreaths far away along the edges of the stream. September 18, 1858
Both sky and earth are bright. The first clear blue and shining white (of clouds). September 18, 1860
Corn-stalk-tops are stacked about the fields; potatoes are being dug; smokes are seen in the horizon. It is the season of agricultural fairs. September 18, 1860
This is a beautiful day, warm but not too warm, a harvest day (I am going down the railroad causeway), the first unquestionable and conspicuous autumnal day. September 18, 1860
Perambulated Bedford line. September 18, 1851
By boat to Conantum, barberrying. September 18, 1856
Round Walden with C. We find the water cold for bathing. September 18, 1857
As I was going through the Cut, on my way, I saw what I thought a rare high-colored flower in the sun on the sandy bank. It was a Trifolium arvense whose narrow leaves were turned a bright crimson, enhanced by the sun shining through it and lighting it up. September 18, 1857
As I was going through the Cut, on my way, I saw what I thought a rare high-colored flower in the sun on the sandy bank. It was a Trifolium arvense whose narrow leaves were turned a bright crimson, enhanced by the sun shining through it and lighting it up. September 18, 1857
All bright colors seem brighter now . . . The very cows on the hill side are a brighter red amid the pines and the brown' hazels. September 18, 1858
The first autumnal tints (of red maples) are now generally noticed. The shrilling of the alder locust fills the air. September 18, 1860
Many red maples are now partly turned dark crimson along the meadow-edge. September 18, 1858
The crows congregate and pursue me through the half-covered woodland path, cawing loud and angrily above me, and when they cease, I hear the winnowing sound of their wings. September 18, 1852
The robins of late fly in flocks, and I hear them oftener. The partridges, grown up, oftener burst away. September 18, 1852
We started a pack of grouse, which went off with a whir like cannon-balls . . . they were birds of the season. September 18, 1857
I think that I see a white-throated sparrow this afternoon. September 18, 1858
There are many large toadstools, pecked apparently by birds. September 18, 1852
On account of freshet I have seen no Bidens Beckii nor chrysanthemoides. September 18, 1856
The goldenrods have generally lost their brightness. Methinks the asters were in their prime four or five days ago. September 18, 1852
I have seen no Viburnum nudum berries for some time. They are considerably earlier than the V. Lentago. September 18, 1859.
Viburnum nudum in flower again. September 18, 1854
The barberries are not fairly turned . . . The racemes appear unusually long this season, and the berries large, though not so thick as I have seen them. September 18, 1856
I gather them that I may not be anticipated, — a peck of large ones. September 18, 1856
I strip off a whole row of racemes at one sweep, bending the prickles and getting as few leaves as possible, so getting a handful at once. September 18, 1856
A pair of gloves would be convenient, for, with all my knack, it will be some days before I get all the prickles out of my fingers. September 18, 1856
I get a full peck from about three bushes. September 18, 1858
The small shrub oak . . .with its pretty acorns striped dark and light alternately. September 18, 1858
Coming out on to the Lincoln road . . . we found an abundance of haws by the roadside, just fit to eat, . . . These bushes bear a profusion of fruit, rather crimson than scarlet when ripe. September 18, 1857
Fringed gentian near Peter’s out a short time, but as there is so little, and that has been cut off by the mowers, and this is not the leading stem that blooms, it may after all be earlier than the hazel. September 18, 1854
The witch-hazel at Conantum just begun here and there; some may have been out two or three days . . .The gentian is now far more generally out here than the hazel. September 18, 1856
The witch-hazel fruit appears to be now opening. The double-fruited stone splits and reveals the two shining black oblong seeds. It has a peculiarly formed nut, in pretty clusters, clothed, as it were, in close-fitting buckskin, amid the now yellowing leaves. September 18, 1859
From the observation of this year I should say that the fringed gentian opened before the witch-hazel. September 18, 1859
White pine cones (a small crop), and all open that I see. September 18, 1860
There is an abundant crop of cones on the white pines this year, and they are now for the most part brown and open. The tops of the high trees for six or ten feet downward are quite browned with them, hanging straight downward. September 18, 1859.
The witch-hazel fruit appears to be now opening. The double-fruited stone splits and reveals the two shining black oblong seeds. It has a peculiarly formed nut, in pretty clusters, clothed, as it were, in close-fitting buckskin, amid the now yellowing leaves. September 18, 1859
From the observation of this year I should say that the fringed gentian opened before the witch-hazel. September 18, 1859
White pine cones (a small crop), and all open that I see. September 18, 1860
There is an abundant crop of cones on the white pines this year, and they are now for the most part brown and open. The tops of the high trees for six or ten feet downward are quite browned with them, hanging straight downward. September 18, 1859.
It is worth a long walk to look from some favorable point over a pine forest whose tops are thus covered with the brown cones just opened, — from which the winged seeds have fallen or are ready to fall. September 18, 1859.
How little observed are the fruits which we do not use! How few attend to the ripening and dispersion of the pine seed! September 18, 1859.
The Cornus sericea is most changed and drooping. Smilacina berries of both kinds now commonly ripe, but not so edible as at first, methinks. September 18, 1856
Finding grapes, we proceeded to pluck them, tempted more by their fragrance and color than their flavor, , — the evening air wafting the fragrance of the cargo back to us, we paddled homeward. September 18, 1858
We gathered many without getting out of the boat . . . piling them up in the prow of the boat till they reached to the top of the boat . . . Thus laden, the evening air wafting the fragrance of the cargo back to us, we paddled homeward. September 18, 1858
Above the railroad bridge, with our sail set, wind north-northwest, we see two small ducks, dusky, —— perhaps dippers, or summer ducks, — and sail within four rods before they fly. September 18, 1858
The ducks are now back again in numbers, since the storm and freshet. September 18, 1858
I see no traces of frost yet along the river. See no pontederia fall, for they are covered with water. September 18, 1856
The pads are drowned by the flood, but I see one pontederia spike rising blue above the surface. Elsewhere the dark withered pontederia leaves show themselves, and at a distance look like ducks, and so help conceal them. September 18, 1858
Near the pond we scare up twenty or thirty ducks, and at the pond three blue herons. September 18, 1858
The fisherman takes it for granted that I am after ducks or fishes, surely. September 18, 1856
The cooler air is so clear that we see Venus plainly some time before sundown. September 18, 1858
Coming home through the street in a thunder-shower at ten o’clock this night, it was exceedingly dark. I met two persons within a mile, and they were obliged to call out from a rod distant lest we should run against each other. September 18, 1857
When the lightning lit up the street, almost as plain as day, I saw that it was the same green light that the glow-worm emits. September 18, 1857
They [herons] are of a hoary blue. One flies afar and alights on a limb of a large white pine near Well Meadow Head, bending it down. I see him standing there with outstretched neck. September 18, 1858
The cooler air is so clear that we see Venus plainly some time before sundown. September 18, 1858
The wind had all gone down, and the water was perfectly smooth. The sunset was uncommonly fair. September 18, 1858
Some long amber clouds in the horizon, all on fire with gold, were more glittering than any jewelry. An Orient city . . .could not be contrived or imagined more gorgeous. September 18, 1858
And when you looked with head inverted the effect was increased tenfold, till it seemed a world of enchantment. September 18, 1858
Nevertheless, . . . I was inclined to think that the truest beauty was that which surrounded us but which we failed to discern, that the forms and colors which adorn our daily life, not seen afar in the horizon, are our fairest jewelry. September 18, 1858
Some long amber clouds in the horizon, all on fire with gold, were more glittering than any jewelry. An Orient city . . .could not be contrived or imagined more gorgeous. September 18, 1858
And when you looked with head inverted the effect was increased tenfold, till it seemed a world of enchantment. September 18, 1858
Nevertheless, . . . I was inclined to think that the truest beauty was that which surrounded us but which we failed to discern, that the forms and colors which adorn our daily life, not seen afar in the horizon, are our fairest jewelry. September 18, 1858
The beauty of Clamshell Hill, near at hand,. . . is an Occidental city, not less glorious than that we dream of in the sunset sky. September 18, 1858
The sun having for some time set, with our backs to the west we saw the light reflected from the slender clear white spikes of the P. hydropiperoides (now in its prime), which in large patches or masses rise about a foot above the surface of the water September 18, 1858
Coming home through the street in a thunder-shower at ten o’clock this night, it was exceedingly dark. I met two persons within a mile, and they were obliged to call out from a rod distant lest we should run against each other. September 18, 1857
When the lightning lit up the street, almost as plain as day, I saw that it was the same green light that the glow-worm emits. September 18, 1857
If you are not happy to-day you will hardly be so to-morrow. September 18, 1860
April 3, 1852 ("Venus is very bright now in the west, and Orion is there, too, now")September 16, 1858 ("I see green and closed cones beneath, which the squirrels have thrown down. On the trees many are already open. Say within a week have begun.")
October 2, 1853 ("The gentian in Hubbard's Close is frost-bitten extensively. As the witch-hazel is raised above frost and can afford to be later, for this reason also I think it is so.")
October 19, 1852 ("It is a very singular and agreeable surprise to come upon this conspicuous and handsome and withal blue flower at this season, when flowers have passed out of our minds and memories; the latest of all to begin to bloom.")
November 4, 1855 ("I have failed to find white pine seed this year, though I began to look for it a month ago. The cones were fallen and open. Look the first of September. ")
*****
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Blue Heron
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Partridge
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the White-throated Sparrow
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Viburnum lentago (nannyberry)
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Polygala
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Fringed Gentian
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Witch-Hazel
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Bidens Beckii
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Grape
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Red Maple
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The White Pines
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau. Willows on the Causeway
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Luxury of Bathing
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, September Moods
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Moods and Seasons of the Mind
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Inverted Head experiment.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The world can never be more beautiful than now.
*****
February 3, 1852 ("Venus is now like a little moon in the west . . . preparing to set, and I will return. )April 3, 1852 ("Venus is very bright now in the west, and Orion is there, too, now")
May 5, 1852 ("Every part of the world is beautiful today.")
May 8, 1852 ("Venus is the evening star and the only star yet visible.")
May 17, 1853 ("I was surprised, on turning round, to behold the serene and everlasting beauty of the world.")
May 17, 1853 ("Ah, the beauty of this last hour of the day — when a power stills the air and smooths all waters and all minds — that partakes of the light of the day and the stillness of the night.")
May 8, 1852 ("Venus is the evening star and the only star yet visible.")
May 17, 1853 ("I was surprised, on turning round, to behold the serene and everlasting beauty of the world.")
May 17, 1853 ("Ah, the beauty of this last hour of the day — when a power stills the air and smooths all waters and all minds — that partakes of the light of the day and the stillness of the night.")
May 18, 1852 (The world can never be more beautiful than now.)
June 15, 1852 ("The evening star, multiplied by undulating water, is like bright sparks of fire continually ascending.")
June 21, 1852 ("The perception of beauty is a moral test.")
June 25, 1852 ("Moon half full. Fields dusky; the evening star and one other bright one near the moon. It is a cool but pretty still night.")
June 15, 1852 ("The evening star, multiplied by undulating water, is like bright sparks of fire continually ascending.")
June 21, 1852 ("The perception of beauty is a moral test.")
June 25, 1852 ("Moon half full. Fields dusky; the evening star and one other bright one near the moon. It is a cool but pretty still night.")
June 26, 1853 ("Fishing is often the young man's introduction to the forest and wild. As a hunter and fisher he goes thither until at last the naturalist or poet distinguishes that which attracted him first, and he leaves the gun and rod behind.”)
June 28, 1852 ("Now it is starlight; perhaps that dark cloud in the west has concealed the evening star before.")
July 18, 1851 ("If the sun rises on you slumbering, if you do not hear the morning cock-crow, if you do not witness the blushes of Aurora, if you are not acquainted with Venus as the morning star, what relation have you to wisdom and purity?")
June 28, 1852 ("Now it is starlight; perhaps that dark cloud in the west has concealed the evening star before.")
July 18, 1851 ("If the sun rises on you slumbering, if you do not hear the morning cock-crow, if you do not witness the blushes of Aurora, if you are not acquainted with Venus as the morning star, what relation have you to wisdom and purity?")
September 3, 1853 ("Now is the season for those comparatively rare but beautiful wild berries which are not food for man.")
September 3, 1856 ("Gather four or five quarts of Viburnum nudum berries, now in their prime, attracted more by the beauty of the cymes than the flavor of the fruit.")
September 3, 1860 ("Here is a beautiful, and perhaps first decidedly autumnal, day, -- a, cloudless sky, a clear air, with, maybe, veins of coolness.”)
September 8, 1854 ("As I paddle home with my basket of grapes in the bow, every now and then their perfume was wafted to me in the stern, and I think that I am passing a richly laden vine on shore.")
September 9, 1857 ("To the Hill for white pine cones. Very few trees have any. I can only manage small ones, fifteen or twenty feet high, climbing till I can reach the dangling green pickle-like fruit in my right hand, while I hold to the main stem with my left.")
September 9, 1857 ("To the Hill for white pine cones. Very few trees have any. I can only manage small ones, fifteen or twenty feet high, climbing till I can reach the dangling green pickle-like fruit in my right hand, while I hold to the main stem with my left.")
September 11, 1853 ("Cool weather. Sit with windows shut, and many by fires. . . .The air has got an autumnal coolness which it will not get rid of again.
September 12, 1860 ("A dark and stormy night . . . Where the fence is not painted white I can see nothing, and go whistling for fear I run against some one.")
September 13, 1856 ("Barberries. . . already handsomely red, though not much more than half turned”)
September 13, 1852 ("The barberries, now reddening, begin to show.”)
September 13, 1856 ("The best are more admirable for fragrance than for flavor. Depositing them in the bows of the boat, they fill all the air with their fragrance, as we row along against the wind, as if we were rowing through an endless vineyard in its maturity.")
September 14, 1851 ("The cold wind makes me shudder after my bath, before I get dressed.")
September 17, 1851 ("Perambulated the Lincoln line.")
September 17, 1858 (“Cooler weather now for two or three days, so that I am glad to sit in the sun on the east side of the house mornings.”)
September 17, 1858 (“Cooler weather now for two or three days, so that I am glad to sit in the sun on the east side of the house mornings.”)
Autumnal Tints ("There is just as much beauty visible to us in the landscape as we are prepared to appreciate")
September 19, 1852 ("And in the distance is a maple or two by the water, beginning to blush.")
September 19, 1854 ("I see large flocks of robins . . . keeping up their familiar peeping and chirping.")
September 19, 1854("Viburnum Lentago berries now perhaps in prime, though there are but few blue ones.")
September 19, 1856 ("Gather just half a bushel of barberries on hill in less than two hours, or three pecks to-day and yesterday in less than three hours.")
September 20, 1857 ("A great many small red maples in Beck Stow's Swamp are turned quite crimson, when all the trees around are still perfectly green. It looks like a gala day there.")
September 21, 1854 ("The red maples, especially at a distance, begin to light their fires, some turning yellow, ")
September 21, 1854 ("The forenoon is cold, and I have a fire, but it is a fine clear day, as I find when I come forth to walk in the afternoon.”)
September 22, 1854 ("As I look off from the hilltop, wonder if there are any finer days in the year than these.")
September 24, 1854 (" The water begins to be clear of weeds, and the fishes are exposed. It is now too cold to bathe with comfort. ")
September 25, 1855 ("We get about three pecks of barberries from four or five bushes, but I fill my fingers with prickles to pay for them.”)
September 26 1854 ("Took my last bath the 24th. Probably shall not bathe again this year. It was chilling cold")
September 26, 1859 ("Is it not a reproach that so much that is beautiful is poisonous to us? . . . But why should they not be poisonous? Would it not be in bad taste to eat these berries which are ready to feed another sense?")October 2, 1853 ("The gentian in Hubbard's Close is frost-bitten extensively. As the witch-hazel is raised above frost and can afford to be later, for this reason also I think it is so.")
October 6, 1851 ("To Bedford line to set a stone by river on Bedford line.")
October 8, 1853 ("Surveying on the new Bedford road to-day,")
October 8, 1856 ("At length I discover some white pine cones, a few, on Emerson Heater Piece trees. They are all open, and the seeds, all the sound ones but one, gone. So September is the time to gather them.")October 19, 1852 ("It is a very singular and agreeable surprise to come upon this conspicuous and handsome and withal blue flower at this season, when flowers have passed out of our minds and memories; the latest of all to begin to bloom.")
November 4, 1855 ("I have failed to find white pine seed this year, though I began to look for it a month ago. The cones were fallen and open. Look the first of September. ")
November 18, 1857 ("Crows will often come flying much out of their way to caw at me.")
December 11. 1855 ("It is only necessary to behold thus the least fact or phenomenon, however familiar, from a point a hair’s breadth aside from our habitual path or routine, to be overcome, enchanted by its beauty and significance.")
December 23, 1851 ("I find that the evening star is shining brightly, and, beneath all, the west horizon is glowing red, — that dun atmosphere instead of clouds reflecting the sun, — and I detect, just above the horizon, the narrowest imaginable white sickle of the new moon")
December 27, 1851 ("Venus - I suppose it is - is now the evening star, and very bright she is immediately after sunset in the early twilight.")
December 27, 1853 ("It is a true winter sunset, almost cloudless, clear, cold indigo-y along the horizon. The evening star is seen shining brightly, before the twilight has begun.")
January 23, 1852 ("And the new moon and the evening star, close together, preside over the twilight scene”)
January 24, 1852 (“And now the crescent of the moon is seen, and her attendant star is farther off than last night.”)
February 3, 1852 ("The moon is nearly full tonight, and the moment is passed when the light in the east (i. e. of the moon) balances the light in the west. Venus is now like a little moon in the west.")
December 27, 1851 ("Venus - I suppose it is - is now the evening star, and very bright she is immediately after sunset in the early twilight.")
December 27, 1853 ("It is a true winter sunset, almost cloudless, clear, cold indigo-y along the horizon. The evening star is seen shining brightly, before the twilight has begun.")
January 23, 1852 ("And the new moon and the evening star, close together, preside over the twilight scene”)
January 24, 1852 (“And now the crescent of the moon is seen, and her attendant star is farther off than last night.”)
February 3, 1852 ("The moon is nearly full tonight, and the moment is passed when the light in the east (i. e. of the moon) balances the light in the west. Venus is now like a little moon in the west.")
September 18, 2020
If you make the least correct
observation of nature this year,
you will have occasion to repeat it
with illustrations the next,
and the season and life itself is prolonged.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, September 18
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau"A book, each page written in its own season,out-of-doors, in its own locality.”~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx © 2009-2022
https://tinyurl.com/HDT18September
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