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
By mid-afternoon
I will see the sun setting
far through the woods.
That peculiar
clear greenish sky in the west
like a molten gem.
The day is short and
we now have these early still
clear winter sunsets.
Two twilights merely –
the morning and the evening
now make the whole day.
December 11, 2020
An overcast afternoon and rather warm. December 11, 1858
Almost a complete Indian-summer day, clear and warm. I am without greatcoat. December 11, 1853
For the first time I wear gloves, but I have not walked early this season. December 11, 1855
No snow; scarcely any ice to be detected. It is only an aggravated November. December 11, 1855
At 2 p. m. begins to snow, and snows till night. Still, normal storm, large flakes, warm enough, lodging. December 11, 1859
The sound of the snowflakes falling on the dry oak leaves (which hold on) is exactly like a rustling produced by a steady but slight breeze. But there is no wind. It is a gentle and uninterrupted susurrus. December 11, 1859
This light snow, which has been falling for an hour, resting on the horizontal spray of the hemlocks, produces the effect of so many crosses, or checker or lattice work. December 11, 1859
The sound of the snowflakes falling on the dry oak leaves (which hold on) is exactly like a rustling produced by a steady but slight breeze. But there is no wind. It is a gentle and uninterrupted susurrus. December 11, 1859
This light snow, which has been falling for an hour, resting on the horizontal spray of the hemlocks, produces the effect of so many crosses, or checker or lattice work. December 11, 1859
The snow on the ground in pastures brings out the warm red in leafy oak woodlands by contrast. December 11, 1858
All browns, indeed, are warmer now than a week ago. These oak woodlands half a mile off, commonly with pines intermingled, look like warm coverts for birds and other wild animals. 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 11, 1858 . December 11, 1858
A mile or two distant they are dark brown, or almost black, as, still further, is all woodland, and in the most distant horizon have a blue tinge like mountains, from the atmosphere. December 11, 1858
The boughs of old and bare oak woods are gray and in harmony with the white ground, looking as if snowed on. December 11, 1858
Already, in hollows in the woods and on the sheltered sides of hills, the fallen leaves are collected in small heaps on the snow-crust, simulating bare ground and helping to conceal the rabbit and partridge. December 11, 1858
A gray rabbit scuds away over the crust in the swamp on the edge of the Great Meadows beyond Peter’s. December 11, 1854
A partridge goes off, and, coming up, I see where she struck the snow first with her wing, making five or six as it were finger-marks. December 11, 1854
We find Heywood's Pond frozen five inches thick. December 11, 1853
C. says he found Fair Haven frozen over last Friday, i. e. the 8th. I find Flint’s frozen to-day, and how long? December 11, 1854
Walden is about one-third skimmed over. December 11, 1858
It is evident that whether a pond shall freeze this side or that first depends much on the wind. December 11, 1858
See one sheldrake in Walden. December 11, 1859
I see no birds, but hear, methinks, one or two tree sparrows. December 11, 1855
I hear rarely a bird except the chickadee, or perchance a jay or crow. December 11, 1854
This ice being whitened and made partially opaque by heat, while the surface is quite smooth, perhaps from new freezings, reflects the surrounding trees, their forms and colors, distinctly like water. December 11, 1853
The white air-bubbles are the quicksilver on the back of the mirror. December 11, 1853
This pond is bordered on the northeast with much russet sedge grass beneath the bushes, and the sun, now falling on the ice, seems to slide or glance off into this grass and light it up wonderfully, filling it with yellowish light. December 11, 1853
Great winter itself looked like a precious gem, reflecting rainbow colors from one angle. December 11, 1855
I saw this familiar fact at a different angle. 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. To perceive freshly, with fresh senses, is to be inspired. December 11, 1855
My body is all sentient. As I go here or there, I am tickled by this or that I come in contact with, as if I touched the wires of a battery. December 11, 1855
Beauty and music are not mere traits and exceptions. They are the rule and character. It is the exception that we see and hear. December 11, 1855
Standing there, though in this bare November landscape, I am reminded of the incredible phenomenon of small birds in winter. December 11, 1855
When some rare northern bird like the pine grosbeak is seen thus far south in the Winter, he does not suggest poverty, but dazzles us with his beauty. December 11, 1855
Now it is wild apples, now river reflections, now a flock of lesser redpolls. December 11 1855
I am struck by the perfect confidence and success of nature. The existence of these delicate creatures, their adaptedness to their circumstances. Here is no imperfection. The-winter, with its snow and ice, is not an evil to be corrected. It is as it was designed and made to be. December 11, 1855
Standing at the right angle, we are dazzled by the colors of the rainbow in colorless ice. From the right point of view, every storm and every drop in it is a rainbow. December 11, 1855
We have now those early, still, clear winter sunsets over the snow. It is but mid-afternoon when I see the sun setting far through the woods, and there is that peculiar clear vitreous greenish sky in the west, as it were a molten gem. December 11, 1854
The day is short; it seems to be composed of two twilights merely; the morning and the evening twilight make the whole day. You must make haste to do the work of the day before it is dark. December 11, 1854
December 11, 2020
*****
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Indian Summer
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Winter Sunsets
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Western Sky
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The anthropic principle
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Partridge
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, First Ice
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Winter Colors
*****
November 1, 1857 ("When I enter the woods I notice the drier crispier rustle of withered leaves on the oak trees, – a sharper susurrus.")
November 27, 1853 ("The days are short enough now. The sun is already setting before I have reached the ordinary limit of my wall . . . In December there will be less light than in any month in the year.”)
November 28, 1859 ("We make a good deal of the early twilights of these November days, they make so large a part of the afternoon.”);
November 30, 1858 (“The short afternoons are come.");
December 4, 1853 ("Flint's Pond only skimmed a little at the shore, like the river.")
December 5, 1853 (" Fair Haven Pond is skimmed completely over.");
December 7, 1856 (" Take my first skate to Fair Haven Pond”)
December 9, 1856 (“Yesterday I met Goodwin bringing a fine lot of pickerel from Flint's, which was frozen at least four inches thick.”)
December 9, 1856 ("Coming through the Walden woods, I see already great heaps of oak leaves collected in certain places on the snow-crust by the roadside, where an eddy deposited them.")
December 9, 1856 ("There is scarcely a particle of ice in Walden yet . . .This is, no doubt, owing solely to the greater depth of Walden.")
December 9, 1856 ("The worker who would accomplish much these short days must shear a dusky slice off both ends of the night”)
December 9, 1859 (“I observe at mid-afternoon that peculiarly softened western sky , . . . giving it a slight greenish tinge.")
December 10, 1856 (“How short the afternoons! I hardly get out a couple of miles before the sun is setting”)
Great winter itself
reflecting rainbow colors
like a precious gem.
December 12, 1859 ("The night comes on early these days, and I soon see the pine tree tops distinctly outlined against the dun (or amber) but cold western sky.");
December 14. 1851 ("There is a beautifully pure greenish-blue sky under the clouds now in the southwest just before sunset.")
December 14, 1859 ("Snow-storms might be classified. . . .That of the 11th was a still storm, of large flakes falling gently in the quiet air, like so many white feathers descending in different directions when seen against a wood-side, — the regular snow-storm such as is painted. A myriad falling flakes weaving a coarse garment by which the eye is amused. The snow was a little moist and the weather rather mild.")
December 19,1856 ("Walden froze completely over last night.This is very sudden,.");
December 20, 1858(“Walden is frozen over, except two small spots, less than half an acre in all, in middle.”)
December 20, 1859 ("December. 11th was a lodging snow, it being mild and still, like to-day (only it was not so moist). Was succeeded next day noon by a strong and cold northwest wind.")
December 20, 1854 ("The sky in the eastern horizon has that same greenish-vitreous, gem-like appearance which it has at sundown,")
December 21, 1855 (“Walden is skimmed over, all but an acre, in my cove.”);
December 21, 1854 (“Walden is frozen over, apparently about two inches thick.”)
December 24, 1851 (“Saw also some pine grosbeaks, magnificent winter birds, among the weeds and on the apple trees; . . .when they flit by, are seen to have gorgeous heads, breasts, and rumps, with red or crimson reflections, more beautiful than a steady bright red would be.”)
December 29, 1855 ("Am surprised to find eight or ten acres of Walden still open. . . It must be owing to the wind partly.")
December 30, 1853 ("The pond [Walden] not yet frozen entirely over; about six acres open, the wind blew so hard last night.")
December 11, 2020
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,
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, December 11
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
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