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
Dark evergreen woods
these finest days of the year –
days so pure and still.
Last rays of the sun
falling on the Baker Farm
reflect a clear pink.
Long after the sun has set
and downy clouds have turned dark
and the shades of night
have taken possession of the east
some rosy clouds will be seen
in the upper sky
over the portals of the darkening west.
December 21, 1851
solstice 2019
It snowed slightly this morning, so as to cover the ground half an inch deep. December 21, 1854
I cross some mink or muskrat's devious path in the snow, with mincing feet and trailing body. December 21, 1851
Going to the post-office at 9 A. M. this very pleasant morning, I hear and see tree sparrows on Wheildon’s pines. December 21, 1855
Just beyond scare a downy woodpecker and a brown creeper in company, from near the base of a small elm within three feet of me. December 21, 1855
The former dashes off with a loud rippling of the wing, and the creeper flits across the street to the base of another small elm, whither I follow. December 21, 1855
At first he hides behind the base, but ere long works his way upward and comes in sight. December 21, 1855
He is a gray-brown, a low curve from point of beak to end of tail, resting flat against the tree. December 21, 1855
Walden is frozen over, apparently about two inches thick. December 21, 1854
It must have frozen, the whole of it, since the snow of the 18th,-- probably the night of the 18th. December 21, 1854
It is very thickly covered with what C. calls ice-rosettes, i.e. those small pinches of crystallized snow, -- as thickly as if it had snowed in that form. December 21, 1854
I think it is a sort of hoar frost on the ice. December 21, 1854
It was all done last night, for we see them thickly clustered about our skate-tracks on the river, where it was quite bare yesterday.
December 21, 1854
Walden is skimmed over, all but an acre, in my cove. December 21, 1855
To Walden . . . The pond is open again in the middle, owing to the rain of yesterday. December 21, 1856
To Walden . . . The pond is open again in the middle, owing to the rain of yesterday. December 21, 1856
Via Hubbard’s Grove and river to Fair Haven Pond. Return by Andromeda Ponds. December 21, 1855
Some dense sedge or rushes in tufts in the Andromeda Ponds have a decided greenish tinge, somewhat like well-cured hay. December 21, 1855
The Andromeda Ponds. How interesting and wholesome their color now! December 21, 1856
Walking over the Andromeda Ponds between Walden and Fair Haven. which have only frozen just enough to bear me December 21, 1857
The Andromeda Ponds. How interesting and wholesome their color now! December 21, 1856
Walking over the Andromeda Ponds between Walden and Fair Haven. which have only frozen just enough to bear me December 21, 1857
I go across to the cliffs by way of the Andromeda Ponds. December 21, 1856
I here take to the riverside. The broader places are frozen over, but I do not trust them yet. December 21, 1855
Fair Haven is entirely frozen over, probably some days. December 21, 1855
Already some eager fisherman has been here, this morning or yesterday, and I hear that a great pickerel was carried through the street. December 21, 1855
Sunlight on pine-needles is the phenomenon of a winter day. December 21, 1851
We are tempted to call these the finest days of the year. December 21, 1854
A few simple colors now prevail. December 21, 1855
Fair Haven Pond, for instance, a perfectly level plain of white snow, untrodden as yet by any fisherman, surrounded by snow-clad hills, dark evergreen woods, and reddish oak leaves, so pure and still. December 21, 1854
Apparently the red oak retains much fewer leaves than the white, scarlet, and black. I notice the petioles of both the black and red twisted in that peculiar way. December 21, 1856
The red oak leaves look thinner and flatter, and therefore perhaps show the lobes more, than those of the black. December 21, 1856
The white oak leaves are the palest and most shrivelled, the lightest, perhaps a shade of buff, but they are of various shades, some pretty dark with a salmon tinge. December 21, 1856
The swamp white oak leaves (which I am surprised to find Gray makes a variety (discolor) of the Quercus Prinus) are very much like the shrub oak, but more curled. These two are the best preserved, though they do not hang on so well as the white and scarlet. Both remarkable for their thick, leathery, sound leaves, uninjured by insects, and their very light downy under sides. December 21, 1856
The black oak leaves are the darkest brown, with clear or deep yellowish-brown under sides, obovate in outline. December 21, 1856
The scarlet oak leaves, which are very numerous still, are of a ruddy color, having much blood in their cheeks. They are all winter the reddest on the hillsides. They still spread their ruddy fingers to the breeze. After the shrub and swamp white, they are perhaps the best preserved of any I describe. December 21, 1856
I here take to the riverside. The broader places are frozen over, but I do not trust them yet. December 21, 1855
Fair Haven is entirely frozen over, probably some days. December 21, 1855
Already some eager fisherman has been here, this morning or yesterday, and I hear that a great pickerel was carried through the street. December 21, 1855
Sunlight on pine-needles is the phenomenon of a winter day. December 21, 1851
We are tempted to call these the finest days of the year. December 21, 1854
A few simple colors now prevail. December 21, 1855
Fair Haven Pond, for instance, a perfectly level plain of white snow, untrodden as yet by any fisherman, surrounded by snow-clad hills, dark evergreen woods, and reddish oak leaves, so pure and still. December 21, 1854
Apparently the red oak retains much fewer leaves than the white, scarlet, and black. I notice the petioles of both the black and red twisted in that peculiar way. December 21, 1856
The red oak leaves look thinner and flatter, and therefore perhaps show the lobes more, than those of the black. December 21, 1856
The white oak leaves are the palest and most shrivelled, the lightest, perhaps a shade of buff, but they are of various shades, some pretty dark with a salmon tinge. December 21, 1856
The swamp white oak leaves (which I am surprised to find Gray makes a variety (discolor) of the Quercus Prinus) are very much like the shrub oak, but more curled. These two are the best preserved, though they do not hang on so well as the white and scarlet. Both remarkable for their thick, leathery, sound leaves, uninjured by insects, and their very light downy under sides. December 21, 1856
The black oak leaves are the darkest brown, with clear or deep yellowish-brown under sides, obovate in outline. December 21, 1856
The scarlet oak leaves, which are very numerous still, are of a ruddy color, having much blood in their cheeks. They are all winter the reddest on the hillsides. They still spread their ruddy fingers to the breeze. After the shrub and swamp white, they are perhaps the best preserved of any I describe. December 21, 1856
The red oak leaves are a little lighter brown than the black oak, less yellowish beneath. Their lobes, methinks, are narrower and straighter-sided. They are the color of their own acorns. December 21, 1856
Hubbard’s barren pasture under Fair Haven Hill, whose surface now tinged with the pale leather or cinnamon color of the second-sized pinweed, which thickly covers it. December 21, 1855
I remark the different pale colors to which the grasses have faded and bleached. December 21, 1855
Those coarse sedges amid the button- bushes are bleached particularly light. December 21, 1855
Some, more slender, in the Pleasant Meadow, is quite light with singular reddish or pinkish radical blades making a mat at the base. December 21, 1855
A broad level thick stuff, without a crevice in it, composed of the dull brown-red andromeda. December 21, 1856
Is it not the most uniform and deepest red that covers a large surface now? December 21, 1856
No withered oak leaves are nearly as red at present. In a broad hollow amid the hills, you have this perfectly level red stuff, marked here and there only with gray streaks or patches of bare high blueberry bushes, etc., and all surrounded by a light border of straw-colored sedge, etc. December 21, 1856
Even the little red buds of the Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum and vacillans on the now bare and dry-looking stems attract me as I go through the open glades between the first Andromeda Pond and the Well Meadow Field. December 21, 1856
Many twigs of the Vaccinium vacillans appear to have been nibbled off, and some of its buds have unfolded, apparently in the fall. December 21, 1856
I observe sage willows with many leaves on them still. December 21, 1856
See a red squirrel out in two places. Do they not come out chiefly in the forenoon? December 21, 1859
Also a large flock of snow buntings, fair and pleasant as it is. Their whiteness, like the snow, is their most remarkable peculiarity. December 21, 1859
As I stand by the edge of the swamp (Ministerial), a heavy-winged hawk flies home to it at sundown, just over my head, in silence. December 21, 1851
Who ever saw a partridge soar over the fields? To every creature its own nature. They are very wild; but are they scarce? or can you exterminate them for that? December 21, 1851
I see the feathers of a partridge strewn along on the snow a long distance, the work of some hawk perhaps, for there is no track.
December 21, 1854
The last rays of the sun falling on the Baker Farm reflect a clear pink color. December 21, 1854
I see, close under the high bank on the east side [of Fair Haven Pond], a distinct tinge of that red in the ice for a rod. December 21, 1855
Crystals, though they be of ice, are not too cold to melt, but it was in melting that they were formed. December 21, 1851
To-night, as so many nights within the year, the clouds arrange themselves in the east at sunset in long converging bars, according to the simple tactics of the sky. It is the melon-rind jig. It would serve for a permanent description of the sunset. December 21, 1851
Such is the morning and such the evening, converging bars inclose the day at each end as within a melon rind, and the morning and evening are one day. December 21, 1851
Long after the sun has set, and downy clouds have turned dark, and the shades of night have taken possession of the east, some rosy clouds will be seen in the upper sky over the portals of the darkening west. December 21, 1851
Hubbard’s barren pasture under Fair Haven Hill, whose surface now tinged with the pale leather or cinnamon color of the second-sized pinweed, which thickly covers it. December 21, 1855
I remark the different pale colors to which the grasses have faded and bleached. December 21, 1855
Those coarse sedges amid the button- bushes are bleached particularly light. December 21, 1855
Some, more slender, in the Pleasant Meadow, is quite light with singular reddish or pinkish radical blades making a mat at the base. December 21, 1855
A broad level thick stuff, without a crevice in it, composed of the dull brown-red andromeda. December 21, 1856
Is it not the most uniform and deepest red that covers a large surface now? December 21, 1856
No withered oak leaves are nearly as red at present. In a broad hollow amid the hills, you have this perfectly level red stuff, marked here and there only with gray streaks or patches of bare high blueberry bushes, etc., and all surrounded by a light border of straw-colored sedge, etc. December 21, 1856
Even the little red buds of the Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum and vacillans on the now bare and dry-looking stems attract me as I go through the open glades between the first Andromeda Pond and the Well Meadow Field. December 21, 1856
Many twigs of the Vaccinium vacillans appear to have been nibbled off, and some of its buds have unfolded, apparently in the fall. December 21, 1856
I observe sage willows with many leaves on them still. December 21, 1856
See a red squirrel out in two places. Do they not come out chiefly in the forenoon? December 21, 1859
Also a large flock of snow buntings, fair and pleasant as it is. Their whiteness, like the snow, is their most remarkable peculiarity. December 21, 1859
As I stand by the edge of the swamp (Ministerial), a heavy-winged hawk flies home to it at sundown, just over my head, in silence. December 21, 1851
Who ever saw a partridge soar over the fields? To every creature its own nature. They are very wild; but are they scarce? or can you exterminate them for that? December 21, 1851
I see the feathers of a partridge strewn along on the snow a long distance, the work of some hawk perhaps, for there is no track.
December 21, 1854
The last rays of the sun falling on the Baker Farm reflect a clear pink color. December 21, 1854
I see, close under the high bank on the east side [of Fair Haven Pond], a distinct tinge of that red in the ice for a rod. December 21, 1855
Crystals, though they be of ice, are not too cold to melt, but it was in melting that they were formed. December 21, 1851
To-night, as so many nights within the year, the clouds arrange themselves in the east at sunset in long converging bars, according to the simple tactics of the sky. It is the melon-rind jig. It would serve for a permanent description of the sunset. December 21, 1851
Such is the morning and such the evening, converging bars inclose the day at each end as within a melon rind, and the morning and evening are one day. December 21, 1851
Long after the sun has set, and downy clouds have turned dark, and the shades of night have taken possession of the east, some rosy clouds will be seen in the upper sky over the portals of the darkening west. December 21, 1851
A few simple colors now prevail. December 21, 1855
December 21, 2022
*****
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, First Ice
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Snow Bunting
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The world can never be more beautiful than now
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Brown Creeper
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Andromeda Phenomenon
May 21, 1854 (“the finest days of the year, days long enough and fair enough for the worthiest deeds.")
October 10, 1856 ("These are the finest days in the year, Indian summer.")
October 25, 1853 ("The ground is strewn with pine-needles as sunlight.”)
November 26, 1859 (" I see here to-day one brown creeper busily inspecting the pitch pines. It begins at the base, and creeps rapidly upward by starts, adhering close to the bark and shifting a little from side to side often till near the top, then suddenly darts off downward to the base of another tree, where it repeats the same course")
November 26, 1859 (" I see here to-day one brown creeper busily inspecting the pitch pines. It begins at the base, and creeps rapidly upward by starts, adhering close to the bark and shifting a little from side to side often till near the top, then suddenly darts off downward to the base of another tree, where it repeats the same course")
November 29, 1857 ("Again I am struck by the singularly wholesome colors of the withered oak leaves, especially the shrub oak")
December 1, 1856 (“The dear wholesome color of shrub oak leaves, so clean and firm,. . .Well-tanned leather on the one side, sun-tanned, color of colors, color of the cow and the deer, silver-downy beneath.”)
December 10, 1853 (”These are among the finest days in the year.")
December 10, 1854 ("See a large flock of snow buntings (quite white against woods, at any rate), though it is quite warm.")
December 13, 1856 (“A fine healthy and handsome scarlet oak . . .The leaves have a little redness in them.”)
December 11, 1858 ("While the oak leaves look redder and warmer, the pines look much darker since the snow has fallen (the hemlocks darker still)")
December 13, 1858 ("A damp day brings out the color of oak leaves, somewhat as of lichens. They are of a brighter and deeper leather-color, richer and more wholesome")
December 13, 1858 ("A damp day brings out the color of oak leaves, somewhat as of lichens. They are of a brighter and deeper leather-color, richer and more wholesome")
December 18, 1859 (“The withered oak leaves, being thoroughly saturated with moisture, are of a livelier color.”)
December 19,1856 ("Walden froze completely over last night.")
December 20, 1851 ("The red shrub oaks on the white ground of the plain beneath make a pretty scene. . . .The red oak leaves are even more fresh and glossy than the white.")
December 20, 1851 ("Red, white, green, and, in the distance, dark brown are the colors of the winter landscape.")December 20, 1851 ("A clump of white pines, seen far westward over the shrub oak plain, which is now lit up by the setting sun, a soft, feathery grove, with their gray stems indistinctly seen, like human beings come to their cabin door, standing expectant on the edge of the plain, impress me with a mild humanity. The trees indeed have hearts.")
December 20, 1854 ("It has been a glorious winter day, its elements so simple, —the sharp clear air, the white snow everywhere covering the earth, and the polished ice.")
December 20, 1858 (“Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.”)
December 20, 1858 (“Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.”)
December 23, 1851 (“Now the sun has quite disappeared, but the afterglow, as I may call it, apparently the reflection from the cloud beyond which the sun went down on the thick atmosphere of the horizon, is unusually bright and lasting. Long, broken clouds in the horizon, in the dun atmosphere, — as if the fires of day were still smoking there, — hang with red and golden edging like the saddle cloths of the steeds of the sun. ”)
December 23, 1855 ("These are the colors of the earth now.")
December 24, 1851 (“The few clouds were dark, and I had given up all to night, but 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 24, 1850 (“It is never so cold but it melts somewhere. It is always melting and freezing at the same time when icicles form.”)
December 24, 1850 (“I observe that there are many dead pine-needles sprinkled over the snow, which had not fallen before.”)
December 24, 1850 (“I observe that there are many dead pine-needles sprinkled over the snow, which had not fallen before.”)
December 24, 1851 ("Saw a flock of snowbirds on the Walden road. I see them so commonly when it is beginning to snow that I am inclined to regard them as a sign of a snow-storm. The snow bunting (Emberiza nivalis) methinks it is, so white and arctic, not the slate-colored")
December 25, 1851 (“I go forth to see the sun set. Who knows how it will set, even half an hour beforehand ?”)
December 31, 1854 ("The shadows on the snow are indigo-blue. The pines look very dark. The white oak leaves are a cinnamon-color, the black and red oak leaves a reddish brown or leather-color.’)
January 2, 1859 (“The color of young oaks of different species is still distinct, but more faded and blended, becoming a more uniform brown”)
December, 21, 2015
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.
December 20 <<<<<<<< December 21 >>>>>>>> December 22
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, December 21
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 © 2009-2023
tinyurl.com/hdt21dec
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