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 pond so smooth and
full of reflections after
a dark breezy day.
Now after the rain
bright fresh green on fields and trees–
sense of summer past.
Is not the haze a
sort of smoke, the sun parching
and burning the earth?
The lost lower leaves
of birches now cover and
yellow the ground.
Rush of cooler air
and a hurried flight of birds –
dark-blue thunder-cloud.
Warmer this morning and considerably hazy again. August 31, 1854
First frost in our garden. .August 31, 1855
To Hubbard Bath Swamp by boat.August 31, 1856
To Flint's Pond. August 31, 1857
To Flint’s Pond. A hot afternoon. We have had but few warmer. August 31, 1858
To Fair Haven Hill. Was caught in five successive showers, and took refuge in Hayden's barn, under the cliffs, and under a tree. August 31, 1859
The rank growth of flowers (commonly called weeds) in this swamp now impresses me like a harvest of flowers. I am surprised at their luxuriance and profusion. August 31, 1853
There has been no such rank flowering up to this.August 31, 1853
These later weeds, — chenopodiums, Roman wormwood, amaranth, etc., — now so rank and prevalent in the cultivated fields which were long since deserted by the hoers, now that the potatoes are for the most part ripened, are preparing a crop for the small birds of the fall and winter, those pensioners on civilization. August 31, 1859
These weeds require cultivated ground, and... now that the potatoes are cared for, Nature is preparing a crop of chenopodium and Roman wormwood for the birds. August 31, 1859
Wormwood pollen yellows my clothes commonly. August 31, 1854
Bidens cernua well out, the flowering one. August 31, 1853
This high water will retard the blossoming of the Bidens Beckii perhaps. August 31, 1852
The asters and goldenrods are now in their prime, I think. August 31, 1853
Is that very dense-flowered small white aster with short branched racemes A. Tradescanti? — now begun to be conspicuous. August 31, 1853
A low aster by Brown's Ditch north of Sleepy Hollow like a Radula, but with narrower leaves and more numerous, and scales without herbaceous tips. August 31, 1853
A low aster by Brown's Ditch north of Sleepy Hollow like a Radula, but with narrower leaves and more numerous, and scales without herbaceous tips. August 31, 1853
The Solidago altissima is now the prevailing one, i. e. goldenrod, in low grounds where the swamp has been cleared. It occupies acres, densely rising as high as your head, with the great white umbel-like tops of the Diplopappus umbellatus [Tall flat-top white aster] rising above it. August 31, 1853
There are also intermixed Solidago stricta, erechthites (fire-weed), Aster puniceus and longifolius, Galium asprellum in great beds, thoroughwort, trumpet-weed, Polygonum Hydropiper, Epilobium molle, etc., etc. August 31, 1853
Raspberries still fresh. August 31, 1853
An abundance of fine high blackberries behind Britton's old camp on the Lincoln road, now in their prime there, which have been overlooked. Is it not our richest fruit? August 31, 1857
An abundance of fine high blackberries behind Britton's old camp on the Lincoln road, now in their prime there, which have been overlooked.August 31, 1857
High blackberries are abundant in Britton’s field. At a little distance you would not suspect that there were any, — even vines, — for the racemes are bent down out of sight, amid the dense sweet-ferns and sumachs, etc. The berries still not more than half black or ripe, keeping fresh in the shade. Those in the sun are a little wilted and insipid. August 31, 1858
High blackberries are abundant in Britton’s field. At a little distance you would not suspect that there were any, — even vines, — for the racemes are bent down out of sight, amid the dense sweet-ferns and sumachs, etc. The berries still not more than half black or ripe, keeping fresh in the shade. Those in the sun are a little wilted and insipid. August 31, 1858
The Cornus sericea, with its berries just turning, is generally a dull purple now, the first conspicuous change, methinks, along the river; half sunk in water. August 31, 1856
I see the first dogwood turned scarlet in the swamp. August 31, 1853
Great black cymes of elder berries now bend down the bushes. August 31, 1853
The Viburnum nudum berries are now in prime, a handsome rose-purple. I brought home a bunch of fifty-three berries, all of this color, and the next morning thirty were turned dark purple. In this state they are soft and just edible, having somewhat of a cherry flavor, not a large stone. August 31, 1856
Red choke-berry, apparently not long. August 31, 1858
The nightshade berries are handsome, not only for their clear red, but the beautifully regular form of their drooping clusters, suggesting a hexagonal arrangement for economy of room. August 31, 1859
Viola pedata out again. August 31, 1853
Leaves of Hypericum mutilum red about water. August 31, 1853
Cirsium muticum, in Moore's Swamp behind Indian field, going out of flower; perhaps out three weeks. August 31, 1853
Leaves of Hypericum mutilum red about water. August 31, 1853
Cirsium muticum, in Moore's Swamp behind Indian field, going out of flower; perhaps out three weeks. August 31, 1853
The rustling of aspen leaves (grandidentata) this cloudy day startled me as if it were rain-drops on the leaves. August 31, 1852
The birches on Wheeler's meadow have begun to yellow, apparently owing to the water. August 31, 1856
The birches have lately lost a great many of their lower leaves, which now cover and yellow the ground. August 31, 1858
Many brakes in the woods are perfectly withered. August 31, 1858
Also some chestnut leaves have fallen. August 31, 1858
Surveying for William Peirce. He says that several large chestnuts appear to be dying near him on account of the drought. August 31, 1854
He said that the outlet of F[lint's] Pond had not been dry before for four years, and then only two or three days; now it was a month. August 31, 1854
Saw a meadow said to be still on fire after three weeks; fire had burned holes one and a half feet deep; was burning along slowly at a considerable depth. August 31, 1854
Walden is unaffected by the drought, and is still very high. But for the most part silent are the watercourses, when I walk in rocky swamps where a tinkling is commonly heard. August 31, 1854
At nine this evening I distinctly and strongly smell smoke, I think of burning meadows, in the air in the village. There must be more smoke in this haze than I have supposed. Is not the haze a sort of smoke, the sun parching and burning the earth? August 31, 1854
At the Pout’s Nest, Walden, I find the Scirpus debilis, apparently in prime, generally aslant; also the Cyperus dentatus, with some spikes changed into leafy tufts; also here less advanced what I have called Juncus acuminatus. August 31, 1858
Ludwigia alternifolia still. Sericocarpus about done. August 31, 1858
The smooth sumach’s lower leaves are bright-scarlet on dry hills. August 31, 1858
Lobelia Dortmanna is not quite done. August 31, 1858
Lobelia Dortmanna is not quite done. August 31, 1858
Am surprised to see on the bottom and washing up on to the shore many little farinaceous roots or tubers like very small potatoes, in strings. . . . I never saw so many ground-nuts before. August 31, 1857
Some ground-nuts are washed out. August 31, 1858
The Flint’s Pond rush appears to be Cladium mariscoides, twig rush, or, in Bigelow, water bog rush, a good while out of bloom; style three-cleft. It is about three feet high. August 31, 1858
Some ground-nuts are washed out. August 31, 1858
The Flint’s Pond rush appears to be Cladium mariscoides, twig rush, or, in Bigelow, water bog rush, a good while out of bloom; style three-cleft. It is about three feet high. August 31, 1858
This, with Eleocharis palustris, which is nearest the shore, forms the dense rushy border of the pond. August 31, 1858
It extends along the whole of this end, at least about four rods wide, and almost every one of the now dry and brown flower-heads has a cobweb on it. I perceive that the slender semicircular branchlets so fit to the grooved or flattened culm as still, when pressed against it, to make it cylindrical! —very neatly. August 31, 1858
The monotropa is still pushing up.August 31, 1858
I hear and see but few bobolinks or blackbirds for several days past. The former, at least, must be withdrawing. August 31, 1858
I have not heard a seringo of late, but I see to-day one golden robin. August 31, 1858
At Goose Pond I scare up a small green bittern. It plods along low, a few feet over the surface, with limping flight, and alights on a slender water-killed stump, and voids its excrement just as it starts again, as if to lighten itself. August 31, 1858
Passed in boat within fifteen feet of a great bittern, standing perfectly still in the water by the riverside, with the point of its bill directly up, as if it knew that from the color of its throat, etc., it was much less likely to be detected in that position, near weeds.August 31, 1855
Edward Bartlett brings me a nest found three feet from the ground in an arbor-vitae, in the New Burying Ground, with one long-since addled egg in it. It is a very thick, substantial nest, five or six inches in diameter and rather deep; outwardly of much coarse stubble with its fine root-fibres attached, loose and dropping off, around a thin casing of withered leaves; then finer stubble within, and a lining of fine grass stems and horse hair. August 31, 1858
The nest is most like that found on Cardinal Shore with an addled pale-bluish egg, which I thought a wood thrush’s at first, except that that has no casing of leaves. It is somewhat like a very large purple finch’s nest, or perchance some red-wing’s with a hair lining. August 31, 1858
The egg is three quarters of an inch long, rather broad at one end (or for length), greenish-white with brown dashes or spots, becoming a large conspicuous purple-brown blotch at the large end; almost exactly like — but a little greener (or bluer) and a little smaller — the egg found on the ground in R. W. E.’s garden. August 31, 1858
Do the nest and egg belong together? Was not the egg dropped by a bird of passage in another’s nest? Can it be an indigo-bird’s nest? I take it to be too large. August 31, 1858
Edward Bartlett brings me a nest found three feet from the ground in an arbor-vitae, in the New Burying Ground, with one long-since addled egg in it. It is a very thick, substantial nest, five or six inches in diameter and rather deep; outwardly of much coarse stubble with its fine root-fibres attached, loose and dropping off, around a thin casing of withered leaves; then finer stubble within, and a lining of fine grass stems and horse hair. August 31, 1858
The nest is most like that found on Cardinal Shore with an addled pale-bluish egg, which I thought a wood thrush’s at first, except that that has no casing of leaves. It is somewhat like a very large purple finch’s nest, or perchance some red-wing’s with a hair lining. August 31, 1858
The egg is three quarters of an inch long, rather broad at one end (or for length), greenish-white with brown dashes or spots, becoming a large conspicuous purple-brown blotch at the large end; almost exactly like — but a little greener (or bluer) and a little smaller — the egg found on the ground in R. W. E.’s garden. August 31, 1858
Do the nest and egg belong together? Was not the egg dropped by a bird of passage in another’s nest? Can it be an indigo-bird’s nest? I take it to be too large. August 31, 1858
Our first muskmelon to-day. August 31, 1857
Lycopodium complanatum out, how long? August 31, 1857
I have seen for several days amphicarpaea with perfectly white flowers, in dense clusters. August 31, 1857
At Flint's Pond I wade along the edge eight or ten rods to the wharf rock, carrying my shoes and stockings. August 31, 1857
Am surprised to see on the bottom and washing up on to the shore many little farinaceous roots or tubers like very small potatoes, in strings. I see these at every step for more than a dozen rods and thought they must have been washed up from deeper waters. August 31, 1857
Examining very closely, I trace one long string through the sandy soil to the root of a ground-nut which grew on the edge of the bank, and afterwards see many more, whose tuberous roots lying in the sand are washed bare, the pond being unusually high. August 31, 1857
I could gather quarts of them. I pick up one string floating loose, about eighteen inches long, with as usual a little greenness and vitality at one end, which has thirteen nuts on it about the size of a walnut or smaller. I never saw so many ground-nuts before, and this makes on me the impression of an unusual fertility.August 31, 1857
Bathing there, I see a small potamogeton, very common there, wholly immersed and without floating leaves, which rises erect from the sandy bottom in curving rows four or five feet long. On digging I find it to rise from a subterranean shoot which is larger than any part above ground. It may be one I have, whose floating leaves the high water has destroyed or prevented. The leaves of it have small bits of that fresh-water sponge, so strong-scented, on them. August 31, 1857
Captain Hubbard is out inspecting his river meadow and his cranberries. Says he never saw the water so high at this season before. August 31, 1856.
A painted tortoise shedding its scales.August 31, 1856
I am frequently amused when I come across the proprietor in my walks, and he asks me if I am not lost. I commonly approach his territory by the river, or some other back way, and rarely meet with him. The other day Conant observed to me, "Well, you have to come out once in a while to take a survey." He thinks that I do not visit his neighborhood more than once in a year, but I go there about once a week, and formerly much oftener; perhaps as often as he. August 31, 1856
There sits one by the shore who wishes to go with me, but I cannot think of it . . .Some are so inconsiderate as to ask to walk or sail with me regularly every dayAugust 31, 1856
A thunder-cloud, seen from a hilltop, as it is advancing rapidly across the sky on one side, whose rear at least will soon strike us. The dark-blue mass (seen edgewise) with its lighter upper surface and its copious curving rain beneath and behind, like an immense steamer holding its steady way to its port, with tremendous mutterings from time to time, a rush of cooler air, and hurried flight of birds. August 31, 1859
While I stand under a pine for shelter during the rain, on Fair Haven Hill-side, I see many sarsaparilla plants fallen and withering green, i. e. before changing. It is as if they had a weak hold on the earth, on the subterranean stocks. August 31, 1859
Now especially the crickets are seen and heard on dry and sandy banks and fields, near their burrows, and some hanging, back down, to the stems of grass, feeding. I entered a dry grassy hollow where the cricket alone seemed to reign, — open like a bowl to the sky. August 31, 1859
I land at Lee's Cliff, in Fair Haven Pond, and sit on the Cliff. Late in the afternoon. The wind is gone down; the water is smooth; a serene evening is approaching; the clouds are dispersing. August 31, 1852
The pond, so smooth and full of reflections after a dark and breezy day, is unexpectedly beautiful. August 31, 1852
There is a little boat on it, schooner-rigged, with three sails, a perfect little vessel and perfectly reflected now in the water. There is hardly a puff of air, and the boatman is airing his sails after the storm. Being in the reflection of the opposite woods, the water on which the little boat rests is absolutely invisible, and it makes an impression of buoyancy and lightness.
I float slowly down from Fair Haven till I have passed the bridge. The sun, half an hour high, has come out again just before setting, with a brilliant, warm light, and there is the slightest undulation discernible on the water, from the boat or other cause, as it were its imitation in glass. August 31, 1852
The reflections are perfect. A bright, fresh green on fields and trees now after the rain, spring-like with the sense of summer past. The reflections are the more perfect for the blackness of the water.
This is the most glorious part of this day, the serenest, warmest, brightest part, and the most suggestive. Evening is fairer than morning. August 31, 1852
Morning is full of promise and vigor. Evening is pensive. The serenity is far more remarkable to those who are on the water.
That part of the sky just above the horizon seen reflected, apparently, some rods off from the boat is as light a blue as the actual, but it goes on deepening as your eye draws nearer to the boat, until, when you look directly down at the reflection of the zenith, it is lost in the blackness of the water. August 31, 1852
I observe, on the willows on the east shore, the shadow of my boat and self and oars, upside down. August 31, 1852
The evening of the year is colored like the sunset. August 31, 1852
I observe, on the willows on the east shore, the shadow of my boat and self and oars, upside down. August 31, 1852
The evening of the year is colored like the sunset. August 31, 1852
It is worth the while to have had a cloudy, even a stormy, day for an excursion, if only that you are out at the clearing up. August 31, 1852
There was another shower in the night (at 9 p. m.), making the sixth after 1.30 p. m. It was evidently one cloud thus broken into six parts, with some broad intervals of clear sky and fair weather. August 31, 1859
August 31, 2017
*****
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, American Bittern
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Lycopodiums
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Bidens Beckii
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, St. Johns-wort (Hypericum)
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Elder-berries
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Raspberry
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Blackberries
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Viburnum lentago
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Cricket in August
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Reflections
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Green Bittern
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Painted Turtle (Emys picta)
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Birches
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Aspens
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Bobolink
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Golden Robin
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Luxury of Bathing
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Seen from a Hillside
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, August Moods
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Serene as the Sky.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, That Rock by the Pondside
*****
August 31, 2022
February 14, 1851 ("One afternoon in the fall, November 21st, I saw Fair Haven Pond with its island and meadow; between the island and the shore, a strip of perfectly smooth water in the lee of the island; and two hawks sailing over it; and something more I saw which cannot easily be described . . .")
; April 14, 1852 ("Fair Haven Pond -- the pond, the meadow beyond the button-bush and willow curve, the island, and the meadow between the island and mainland with its own defining lines -- are all parted off like the parts of a mirror. A fish hawk is calmly sailing over all . . . ");
May 13, 1856 ("Wheeler says that many a pasture, if you plow it up after it has been lying still ten years, will produce an abundant crop of wormwood, and its seeds must have lain in the ground.");
May 16, 1855 ("A green bittern with its dark-green coat and crest, sitting watchful, goes off with a limping peetweet flight.”);
July 13, 1854 (“In the midst of July heat and drought.”)
July 24, 1854 ("A decided rain-storm to-day and yesterday, such as we have not had certainly since May.")
July 26, 1853 ("I mark again, about this time when the first asters open. . . This the afternoon of the year.")
July 28, 1852 ("Goldenrod and asters have fairly begun; there are several kinds of each out. ")
July 30, 1856 ("A green bittern. . .with heavy flapping flight, its legs dangling")
August 1, 1856 ("Diplopappus umbellatus at Peter's wall.")
August 2, 1856 ("A green bittern comes, noiselessly flapping, with stealthy and inquisitive looking to this side the stream and then that, thirty feet above the water.")
August 8, 1851 ("As I recross the string-pieces of the bridge, I see the water-bugs swimming briskly in the moonlight and scent the Roman wormwood in the potato fields.")
August 10, 1853 ("August, royal and rich . . .It is glorious to see those great shining high blackberries, now partly ripe . . .")
August 11, 1854 ("Aster Tradescanti, two or three days in low ground; flowers smaller than A. dumosus, densely racemed, with short peduncles or branchlets, calyx-scales narrower and more pointed.")
August 12, 1858 (“Saw a Viola pedata blooming again.”);
August 14, 1856 ("Aster tradescanti, apparently a day or two.")
August 13, 1852 ("Saw the head and neck of a great bittern projecting above the meadow-grass, exactly like the point of a stump, only I knew there could be no stump there.")
August 13, 1854 (“At Thrush Alley, I am surprised to behold how many birch leaves have turned yellow, — every other one, — while clear, fresh, leather-colored ones strew the ground with a pretty thick bed under each tree.”)
August 15, 1852 ("The swamp blackberry begins.");
August 16 1852 (“Apios tuberosa, ground-nut, a day or two.”)
August 16, 1854 ("At the steam mill sand-bank is the distinct shadow of our shadows, — first on the water, then the double one on the bank bottom to bottom, one being upside down, — three in all, — one on water, two on land or bushes.")
August 17, 1853 ("The high blackberries are now in their prime; the richest berry we have.”)
August, 19, 1853 (" The day is an epitome of the year.”)
August 19, 1854 ("There is now a remarkable drought, some of whose phenomena I have referred to during several weeks past.”)
August 20, 1852 ("Bidens, either connata or cernua, by Moore's potato- field. ")
August 21, 1856 ("The prevailing solidagos now are . . .”)
August 21, 2019 ("There is quite a drought, and I can walk almost anywhere over these meadows without wetting my feet., , , It is like the summer of '54.")
August 2, 1856 ("A green bittern comes, noiselessly flapping, with stealthy and inquisitive looking to this side the stream and then that, thirty feet above the water.")
August 8, 1851 ("As I recross the string-pieces of the bridge, I see the water-bugs swimming briskly in the moonlight and scent the Roman wormwood in the potato fields.")
August 10, 1853 ("August, royal and rich . . .It is glorious to see those great shining high blackberries, now partly ripe . . .")
August 11, 1854 ("Aster Tradescanti, two or three days in low ground; flowers smaller than A. dumosus, densely racemed, with short peduncles or branchlets, calyx-scales narrower and more pointed.")
August 12, 1858 (“Saw a Viola pedata blooming again.”);
August 14, 1856 ("Aster tradescanti, apparently a day or two.")
August 13, 1852 ("Saw the head and neck of a great bittern projecting above the meadow-grass, exactly like the point of a stump, only I knew there could be no stump there.")
August 13, 1854 (“At Thrush Alley, I am surprised to behold how many birch leaves have turned yellow, — every other one, — while clear, fresh, leather-colored ones strew the ground with a pretty thick bed under each tree.”)
August 15, 1852 ("The swamp blackberry begins.");
August 16 1852 (“Apios tuberosa, ground-nut, a day or two.”)
August 16, 1854 ("At the steam mill sand-bank is the distinct shadow of our shadows, — first on the water, then the double one on the bank bottom to bottom, one being upside down, — three in all, — one on water, two on land or bushes.")
August 17, 1853 ("The high blackberries are now in their prime; the richest berry we have.”)
August, 19, 1853 (" The day is an epitome of the year.”)
August 19, 1854 ("There is now a remarkable drought, some of whose phenomena I have referred to during several weeks past.”)
August 20, 1852 ("Bidens, either connata or cernua, by Moore's potato- field. ")
August 21, 1856 ("The prevailing solidagos now are . . .”)
August 21, 2019 ("There is quite a drought, and I can walk almost anywhere over these meadows without wetting my feet., , , It is like the summer of '54.")
August 22, 1854 (" Hundreds, if not thousands, of fishes have here perished on account of the drought.")
August 22, 1852 ("Is not the high blackberry our finest berry?");
August 23, 1856 ("Now for high blackberries, though the low are gone.” )
August 24, 1853 (Goldenrods and asters)
August 24, 1853 ("D. umbellatus is conspicuous enough in some places (low grounds)");
August 22, 1852 ("Is not the high blackberry our finest berry?");
August 23, 1856 ("Now for high blackberries, though the low are gone.” )
August 24, 1853 (Goldenrods and asters)
August 24, 1853 ("D. umbellatus is conspicuous enough in some places (low grounds)");
August 24, 1859 ("Diplopappus umbellatus, how long?")
August 25, 1854 ("Between me and Nawshawtuct is a very blue haze like smoke. Indeed many refer all this to smoke"):
August 26, 1854 ("I hear of a great many fires around us, far and near, both meadows and woods; in Maine and New York also. There may be some smoke in this haze, but I doubt it.")
August 26, 1859 ("Potato vines have taken a veil of wormwood.");
August 27, 1856 ("Hypericum Canadense and mutilum now pretty generally open at 4 P.M., thus late in the season")
August 25, 1854 ("Between me and Nawshawtuct is a very blue haze like smoke. Indeed many refer all this to smoke"):
August 26, 1854 ("I hear of a great many fires around us, far and near, both meadows and woods; in Maine and New York also. There may be some smoke in this haze, but I doubt it.")
August 26, 1859 ("Potato vines have taken a veil of wormwood.");
August 27, 1856 ("Hypericum Canadense and mutilum now pretty generally open at 4 P.M., thus late in the season")
August 27, 1857 ("Detected a, to me, new kind of high blackberry on the edge of the cliff beyond Conant's wall ")
August 28, 1854 ("I think that haze was not smoke;")
August 28, 1856("The bright china-colored blue berries of the Cornus sericea begin to show themselves along the river, . . .."
August 28, 1856("The bright china-colored blue berries of the Cornus sericea begin to show themselves along the river, . . .."
)August 28, 1856 (“low blackberries done, high blackberries still to be had.”)
August 29, 1859 ("Elder-berry clusters swell and become heavy and therefore droop, bending the bushes down, just in proportion as they ripen. Hence you see the green cymes perfectly erect, the half-ripe drooping, and the perfectly ripe hanging straight down on the same bush.")
August 29, 1854 ("The cymes of elder-berries, black with fruit, are now conspicuous.")
August 30, 1856 ("Bidens connata abundant at Moore's Swamp, how long?");
August 30, 1853 ("Why so many asters and goldenrods now?")
September 1, 1856 ("I think it stands about thus with asters and golden-rods now.”)
September 1, 1854 ("The Aster Tradescanti is perhaps beginning to whiten the shores on moist banks.")
September 1, 1856 ("A. Tradescanti, got to be pretty common, but not yet in prime.")
September 1, 1856 ("D. umbellatus, perhaps in prime or approaching it, but not much seen.")
September 1, 1859 ("The elder-berry cyme, held erect, is of very regular form, four principal divisions drooping toward each quarter around an upright central one.")
September 4, 1856 ("Viola pedata again.")
September 10, 1854 ("The first fall rains after the long drought").
September 12, 1859 ("The four kinds of bidens (frondosa, connata, cernua, and chrysanthemoides) abound now")
September 14, 1856 ("Now for the Aster Tradescanti along low roads, like the Turnpike, swarming with butterflies and bees. Some of them are pink.")
September 15, 1855 ("See many painted tortoise scales being shed, half erect on their backs.")
September 16, 1859 ("Ask me for a certain number of dollars if you will, but do not ask me for my afternoons.")
September 24, 1856 ("D. umbellatus, still abundant.")
September 24, 1856 (“Methinks it stands thus with goldenrods and asters now”)
September 25, 1854 ("I think that if that August haze had been much of it smoke, I should have smelt it much more strongly, for I now smell strongly the smoke of this burning half a mile off,")
September 27, 1856 ("The Aster multiflorus may easily be confounded with the A. Tradescanti.Like it, it whitens the roadside in some places. It has purplish disks, but a less straggling top than the Tradescanti")
October 2, 1856 ("Now and then I see a Hypericum Canadense flower still. The leaves, . . . turned crimson.")
October 8, 1856 ("The following is the condition of the asters and goldenrods")
October 12, 1855 ("I see a painted tortoise still out on shore. Three of his back scales are partly turned up and show fresh black ones ready beneath. And now I see that the six main anterior scales have already been shed. They are fresh black and bare of moss. Is not this the only way they get rid of the moss, etc., which adhere to them?");
October 18, 1853("Returning late, we see a double shadow of ourselves and boat, one, the true, quite black, the other directly above it and very faint, on the willows and high bank.")
October 21, 1856 ("It is remarkably hazy , , , but when I open the door I smell smoke, which may in part account for it..")
October 22, 1859 (" In the wood-path below the Cliffs I see perfectly fresh and fair Viola pedata flowers, as in the spring, though but few together. No flower by its second blooming more perfectly brings back the spring to us")
October 23, 1853 (" The Viola pedata looking up from so low in the wood-path makes a singular impression.")
November 1, 1852 ("As I approached their edge, I saw the woods beneath, Fair Haven Pond, and the hills across the river, — which, owing to the mist, was as far as I could see, and seemed much further in consequence. I saw these between the converging boughs of two white pines a rod or two from me on the edge of the rock; and I thought that there was no frame to a landscape equal to this, — to see, between two near pine boughs, whose lichens are distinct, a distant forest and lake, the one frame, the other picture.")
November 2, 1854 ("Sailing past the bank above the railroad, just before a clear sundown, close to the shore on the east side I see a second fainter shadow of the boat, sail, myself, and paddle, etc., directly above and upon the first on the bank. What makes the second? At length I discovered that it was the reflected sun which cast a higher shadow like the true one. As I moved to the west side, the upper shadow rose, grew larger and less perceptible; and at last when I was so near the west shore that I could not see the reflected sun, it disappeared; but then there appeared one upside down in its place!")
November 9, 1850 ("I found many fresh violets (Viola pedata) to-day (November 9th) in the woods.”).
November 14, 1853 (“October [w]ith respect to its colors and its season, it is the sunset month of the year, when the earth is painted like the sunset sky.”)
Walden, The Pond in Winter ("Sometimes, also, when the ice was covered with shallow puddles, I saw a double shadow of myself, one standing on the head of the other, one on the ice, the other on the trees or hillside.”)
August 29, 1859 ("Elder-berry clusters swell and become heavy and therefore droop, bending the bushes down, just in proportion as they ripen. Hence you see the green cymes perfectly erect, the half-ripe drooping, and the perfectly ripe hanging straight down on the same bush.")
August 29, 1854 ("The cymes of elder-berries, black with fruit, are now conspicuous.")
August 30, 1856 ("Bidens connata abundant at Moore's Swamp, how long?");
August 30, 1853 ("Why so many asters and goldenrods now?")
The persistent song
of the eastern wood pewee,
high on an oak snag.
Zphx August 31, 2019
September 1, 1856 ("I think it stands about thus with asters and golden-rods now.”)
September 1, 1854 ("The Aster Tradescanti is perhaps beginning to whiten the shores on moist banks.")
September 1, 1856 ("A. Tradescanti, got to be pretty common, but not yet in prime.")
September 1, 1856 ("D. umbellatus, perhaps in prime or approaching it, but not much seen.")
September 1, 1859 ("The elder-berry cyme, held erect, is of very regular form, four principal divisions drooping toward each quarter around an upright central one.")
September 4, 1856 ("Viola pedata again.")
September 10, 1854 ("The first fall rains after the long drought").
September 12, 1859 ("The four kinds of bidens (frondosa, connata, cernua, and chrysanthemoides) abound now")
September 14, 1856 ("Now for the Aster Tradescanti along low roads, like the Turnpike, swarming with butterflies and bees. Some of them are pink.")
September 15, 1855 ("See many painted tortoise scales being shed, half erect on their backs.")
September 16, 1859 ("Ask me for a certain number of dollars if you will, but do not ask me for my afternoons.")
September 24, 1856 ("D. umbellatus, still abundant.")
September 24, 1856 (“Methinks it stands thus with goldenrods and asters now”)
September 25, 1854 ("I think that if that August haze had been much of it smoke, I should have smelt it much more strongly, for I now smell strongly the smoke of this burning half a mile off,")
September 27, 1856 ("The Aster multiflorus may easily be confounded with the A. Tradescanti.Like it, it whitens the roadside in some places. It has purplish disks, but a less straggling top than the Tradescanti")
October 2, 1856 ("Now and then I see a Hypericum Canadense flower still. The leaves, . . . turned crimson.")
October 8, 1856 ("The following is the condition of the asters and goldenrods")
October 12, 1855 ("I see a painted tortoise still out on shore. Three of his back scales are partly turned up and show fresh black ones ready beneath. And now I see that the six main anterior scales have already been shed. They are fresh black and bare of moss. Is not this the only way they get rid of the moss, etc., which adhere to them?");
October 18, 1853("Returning late, we see a double shadow of ourselves and boat, one, the true, quite black, the other directly above it and very faint, on the willows and high bank.")
October 21, 1856 ("It is remarkably hazy , , , but when I open the door I smell smoke, which may in part account for it..")
October 22, 1859 (" In the wood-path below the Cliffs I see perfectly fresh and fair Viola pedata flowers, as in the spring, though but few together. No flower by its second blooming more perfectly brings back the spring to us")
October 23, 1853 (" The Viola pedata looking up from so low in the wood-path makes a singular impression.")
November 1, 1852 ("As I approached their edge, I saw the woods beneath, Fair Haven Pond, and the hills across the river, — which, owing to the mist, was as far as I could see, and seemed much further in consequence. I saw these between the converging boughs of two white pines a rod or two from me on the edge of the rock; and I thought that there was no frame to a landscape equal to this, — to see, between two near pine boughs, whose lichens are distinct, a distant forest and lake, the one frame, the other picture.")
November 2, 1854 ("Sailing past the bank above the railroad, just before a clear sundown, close to the shore on the east side I see a second fainter shadow of the boat, sail, myself, and paddle, etc., directly above and upon the first on the bank. What makes the second? At length I discovered that it was the reflected sun which cast a higher shadow like the true one. As I moved to the west side, the upper shadow rose, grew larger and less perceptible; and at last when I was so near the west shore that I could not see the reflected sun, it disappeared; but then there appeared one upside down in its place!")
November 9, 1850 ("I found many fresh violets (Viola pedata) to-day (November 9th) in the woods.”).
November 14, 1853 (“October [w]ith respect to its colors and its season, it is the sunset month of the year, when the earth is painted like the sunset sky.”)
Walden, The Pond in Winter ("Sometimes, also, when the ice was covered with shallow puddles, I saw a double shadow of myself, one standing on the head of the other, one on the ice, the other on the trees or hillside.”)
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| August 31, 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.
tinyurl.com/HDT31August |
