A Book of the Seasons: The Cricket in October

 I would make a chart of our life,

know why just this circle of creatures completes the world.

Henry Thoreau, April 18, 1852

I love very well this cloudy afternoon, 

so sober and favorable to reflection

 after so many bright ones.

What if the clouds shut out the heavens, 

provided they concentrate my thoughts 

and make a more celestial heaven below! 

I hear the crickets plainer; 

I wander less in my thoughts, 

am less dissipated; 

am aware how shallow 

was the current of my thoughts before.

October 12, 1852

We take an afternoon walk to the view and return via the double chair not stopping there. It rained earlier. We hear crickets the whole time if we listen. At the view the sound of jay’s screaming and, just as we leave, a raven in a nearby tree. The sky is cloudy and it looks like twilight all afternoon. Just before we leave the whole lake to the south is illuminated yellow. There are no fresh leaves on the trail and generally there is no color in the woods or overlooking the valley. It seems late this year. Hiking to the double chair the understory of striped maples is bright yellow; a single branch of a red small red maple is in full color. An owl hoots beyond the middle pond. We arrive at the lower view just as the sun sets  to the south in the trees – the air is full of moisture and is glowing orange over Shelburne Pond and beyond.   Zphx 20171007

*****

October 1. Looking west at this hour, the earth is an unvaried, undistinguishable black in contrast with the twilight sky. It is as if you were walking in night up to your chin. There is no wind stirring. An oak tree in Hubbard's pasture stands absolutely motionless and dark against the sky. The crickets sound farther off or fainter at this season, as if they had gone deeper into the sod to avoid the cold. There are no crickets heard on the alders on the causeway. The moon looks colder in the water, though the water-bugs are still active. October 1, 1851

October 2. Since the cooler weather many crickets are seen clustered on warm banks and by sunny wall-sides. October 2, 1857

October 2. Nowadays I see most of the election-cake fungi, with crickets and slugs eating them. I see a cricket feeding on an apple, into which he has eaten so deep that only his posteriors project, but he does not desist a moment though I shake the apple and finally drop it on the ground. October 2, 1859

October 4. See crickets eating the election-cake toadstools. October 4, 1858

October 5. A cricket has eaten out the whole inside of [a puffball] in which he is housed . . .Crickets are seen now moving slowly about in the paths, often with their heads only concealed in a burrow, as if looking out for winter quarters. I saw, on my return, a dozen crickets of various sizes gathered on an apple paring which I had dropped in the path when I came along. October 5, 1856

October 7.  It is the reign of crickets now. You see them gliding busily about over all sunny surfaces. They sometimes get into my shoes; but oftener I have to empty out the seeds of various shrubs and weeds which I have been compelled to transport.  October 7, 1857

October 9. I hear the crickets singing loudly in the walls as they have not done (so loudly) for some weeks, while the sun is going down shorn of his rays by the haze. October 9, 1851

October 11. These are cricket days.  October 11, 1857

October 14. But few crickets are heard. October 14, 1852

October 15. I saw the other day a cricket standing on his head in a chocolate-colored (inside) fungus, only his tail-yards visible. He had sunk a well an inch deep, and was even then sinking it, perpendicularly, unconscious of what was going on above. October 15, 1857 

October 18.  As I was returning over Hubbard's stump fence pasture, I heard some of the common black field crickets [Acheta abbreviata] (three quarters of an inch long), two or three rods before me, make, as I thought, a peculiar shrilling, like a clear and sharp twittering of birds, that I looked up for some time to see a flock of small birds going over, but they did not arrive. These fellows were, one or two, at the mouth of their burrows, and as I stood over one I saw how he produced the sound, by very slightly lifting his wing-cases (if that is the name of them), and shuffling them (transversely of course) over each other about an eighth of an inch, perhaps three or four times, and then stopping. Thus they stand at the mouths of their burrows, in the warm pastures, near the close of the year, shuffling their wing-cases over each other (the males only), and produce this sharp but pleasant creaking sound, – helping to fetch the year about. Thus the sounds of human industry and activity — the roar of cannon, blasting of rocks, whistling of locomotives, rattling of carts, tinkering of artisans, and voices of men - may sound to some distant ear like an earth-song and the creaking of crickets. The crickets keep about the mouths of their burrows as if apprehending cold. October 18, 1857

October 18.  Hunter's moon. We hike to the moss ledge where we have an open view. It is 8:02 PM, twelve minutes past the peak of the partial eclipse. Crickets are silent. The moon is bright, casting sharp shadows as if daylight; then shines through a moving cloud like a jack-o-lantern cat. The dogs sit and watch the sky. zphx 20131018

October 19. Harris says the crickets produce their shrilling by shuffling their wing-covers together lengthwise. I should have said it was sidewise, or transversely to the insect's length, as I looked down on it. You may see these crickets now everywhere in the ruts, as in the cross-road from the Turnpike to the Great Road, creeping along, or oftenest three or four together, absorbed in feeding on, i. e. sucking the juices of, a crushed companion. There are two broad ruts made by ox-carts loaded with muck, and a cricket has been crushed or wounded every four or five, feet in each. It is one long slaughter-house. But as often as a cart goes by, the survivors each time return quickly to their seemingly luscious feast. At least two kinds there. October 19, 1857

October 20. Amid the young pitch pines in the pasture behind I notice, as elsewhere of late, a great many brownish-yellow (and some pink) election-cake fungi, eaten by crickets; about three inches in diameter.  October 20, 1856

October 20.  The large crickets now swarm in dry paths, each at the mouth of its burrow, as I notice when crossing to Martial Miles’s.  October 20, 1858

October 26. Very few crickets for a long time. October 26, 1852

October 29. As I am picking cranberries below Flint's Bridge, they being drifted against the shore together with much loose meadow wreck, I notice many crickets wrecked with them and half drowned, as well as snails’ shells. Spiders, however, are in their element. October 29, 1857

See also

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in Spring

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Cricket in August

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Cricket in September

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in November 

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  The Cricket in October

 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 ©  2009-2026

A Book of the Seasons: The Cricket in July

I came here to live . . .

 Always there was the sound of 

the morning cricket. 

Henry Thoreau, July 5, 1845 

*****

July 5.  Saturday. Walden. - Yesterday I came here to live . . . Always there was the sound of the morning cricket. July 5, 1845 

July 7. It is a mark of serenity and health of mind when a person hears the sound of the cricket. Be ever so little distracted, your thoughts so little confused, your engagements so few, your attention so free, your existence so mundane, that in all places and in all hours you can hear the sound of crickets in those seasons when they are to be heard.  July 7, 1851

July 9. The crickets appear to have received a reinforcement during the sultry night. July 9, 1852

July 14. The creaking of the crickets seems at the very foundation of all sound. At last I cannot tell it from a ringing in my ears. It is a sound from within, not without. You cannot dispose of it by listening to it. In proportion as I am stilled I hear it. It reminds me that I am a denizen of the earth. July 14, 1851

July 15. The robin sings still, but the goldfinch twitters over oftener, and I hear the link link of the bobolink, and the crickets creak more as in the fall. All these sounds dispose our minds to serenity. July 15, 1854

July 16. The earliest corn begins to tassel out. The lark sings in the meadow; the very essence of the afternoon is in his strain. This is a New England sound, but the cricket is heard under all sounds. July 16, 1851

July 16. Many men walk by day; few walk by night. It is a very different season. Instead of the sun, there are the moon and stars; instead of the wood thrush, there is the whip-poor-will;. . . Instead of singing birds, the croaking of frogs and the intenser dream of crickets  .July 16, 1860

July 19. Beyond the bridge there is a goldenrod partially blossomed. First came the St. John's-wort and now the goldenrod to admonish us. I hear, too, a cricket amid these stones under the blackberry vines, singing as in the fall. Yesterday it was spring, and to-morrow it will be autumn. Where is the summer then?  July 19, 1851

July 19. I hear now that very fine pittering sound of a locust or cricket in the grass. July 19, 1860

July 20. The light of the moon is a cold, almost frosty light, white on the ground. There are a few fireflies about. Green, their light looks sometimes, and crickets are heard. You are pretty sure also to hear some human music, vocal or instrumental, far or near. July 20, 1853

July 21. There are few sounds but the slight twittering of swallows, and the springy note of the sparrow in the grass or trees, and a lark in the meadow (now at 8 A.M.), and the cricket under all to ally the hour to night. Day is, in fact, about as still as night. July 21, 1851

July 24. The corn now forms solid phalanxes, though the ears have not set, and, the sun going down, the shadows, even of corn-fields, fall long over the meadows, and a sweetness comes up from the shaven grass, and the crickets creak more loud in the new-springing grass. July 24, 1852

July 24.  I hear incessantly a cricket or locust, inspired by the damp, cool shade, telling of autumn. July 24, 1853

July 26. Dog-days, - sultry, sticky weather, - now when the corn is topped out. Clouds without rain. Rains when it will. Old spring and summer signs fail . . . I mark again, about this time when the first asters open, the sound of crickets or locusts that makes you fruitfully meditative, helps condense your thoughts, like the mel dews in the afternoon. This the afternoon of the year. How apt we are to be reminded of lateness, even before the year is half spent! July 26, 1853 

July 27. New creaking or shrilling from crickets (?) for a long time past, more fine and piercing than the other. July 27, 1852

July 28. Last evening it was much cooler, and I heard a decided fall sound of crickets. July 28, 1854

July 29. The sight of the small rough sunflower about a dry ditch bank and hedge advances me at once further toward autumn. At the same time I hear a dry, ripe, autumnal chirp of a cricket. It is the next step to the first goldenrod. July 29, 1853

July 31. Returning home last evening, I heard that exceedingly fine z-ing or creaking of crickets (?), low in the grass in the meadows. You might think it was a confused ringing in your head, it is so fine. Heard it again toward evening. Autumnalish. July 31, 1859

See also:

July Days

July Moods

The Cricket in Spring

The Cricket in August

Locust Days, Dogdayish Days

The Cricket in November (Listening for the last cricket)

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in July

 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 ©  2009-2025

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-julycricket

Apples are frozen on the trees and rattle like stones in my pocket.

November 11

November 11, 2017

7 Α . M. - To Hubbard Bathing-Place. 

A fine, calm, frosty morning, a resonant and clear air except a slight white vapor which escaped being frozen or perchance is the steam of the melting frost. 

Bracing cold, and exhilarating sunlight on russet and frosty fields. I wear mittens now. 

Apples are frozen on the trees and rattle like stones in my pocket. 

Aster puniceus left. 

A little feathery frost on the dead weeds and grasses, especially about water, - springs and brooks (though now slightly frozen), where was some vapor in the night. 

I notice also this little frostwork about the mouth of a woodchuck's hole, where, perhaps, was a warm, moist breath from the interior, perchance from the chuck! 

 А. M. - To Fair Haven Pond by boat. 

The morning is so calm and pleasant, winter-like, that I must spend the forenoon abroad.

The river is smooth as polished silver. 

A little ice has formed along the shore in shallow bays five or six rods wide. It is for the most part of crystals imperfectly united, shaped like birds' tracks, and breaks with a pleasant crisp sound when it feels the undulations produced by my boat. 

I hear a linaria-like mew from some birds that fly over. 

Some muskrat-houses have received a slight addition in the night. The one I opened day before yesterday has been covered again, though not yet raised so high as before. 

The hips of the late rose still show abundantly along the shore, and in one place nightshade berries. 

I hear a faint cricket (or locust?) still, even after the slight snow. 

I hear the cawing of crows toward the distant wood through the clear, echoing, resonant air, and the lowing of cattle. 

It is rare that the water is smooth in the forenoon. It is now as smooth as in a summer evening or a September or October afternoon.

There is frost on all the weeds that rise above the water or ice. 

The Polygonum Hydropiper is the most conspicuous, abundant, and enduring of those in the water. 

I see the spire of one white with frost-crystals, a perfect imitation at a little distance of its loose and narrow spike of white flowers, that have withered. 

I have noticed no turtles since October 31st, and no frogs for a still longer time. 

At the bathing-place I looked for clams, in summer almost as thick as paving-stones there, and found none. They have probably removed into deeper water and into the mud (?). When did they move? 

The jays are seen and heard more of late, their plumage apparently not dimmed at all. 

I counted nineteen muskrat-cabins between Hubbard Bathing-Place and Hubbard's further wood, this side the Hollowell place, from two to four feet high. They thus help materially to raise and form the river-bank. 

I opened one by the Hubbard Bridge. The floor of chamber was two feet or more beneath the top and one foot above the water. It was quite warm from the recent presence of the inhabitants. 

I heard the peculiar plunge of one close by.  The instant one has put his eyes noiselessly above water he plunges like a flash, showing tail, and with a very loud sound, the first notice you have of his proximity, –that he has been there, – as loud as if he had struck a solid substance. 

This had a sort of double bed, the whole about two feet long by one foot wide and seven or eight inches high, floored thinly with dry meadow-grass. 

There were in the water green butts and roots of the pontederia, which I think they eat. I find the roots gnawed off. Do they eat flagroot? A good deal of a small green hypnum-like river-weed forms the mouthfuls in their masonry. It makes a good sponge to mop the boat with! 

The wind has risen and sky overcast. 

I stop at Lee's Cliff, and there is a Veronica serpyllifolia out. Sail back. 

Scared up two small ducks, perhaps teal. I had not seen any of late. They have probably almost all gone south.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, November 11, 1853

I wear mittens now. See November 11, 1851 (”A bright, but cold day, finger-cold. One must next wear gloves, put his hands in winter quarters.”); See also February 12, 1854 ("I begin to dream of summer even. I take off my mittens.")

Apples are frozen on the trees and rattle like stones in my pocket. See November 11, 1850 ("Now is the time for wild apples. I pluck them as a wild fruit native to this quarter of the earth, fruit of old trees that have been dying ever since I was a boy and are not yet dead . . . Food for walkers. Sometimes apples red inside, perfused with a beautiful blush, faery food, too beautiful to eat, – apple of the evening sky, of the Hesperides.");  See also December 19, 1850 ("The wild apples are frozen as hard as stones, and rattle in my pockets, but I find that they soon thaw when I get to my chamber and yield a sweet cider.")

I hear the cawing of crows toward the distant wood. See November 1, 1853 ("I only hear some crows toward the woods."); January 12, 1855 ("I hear faintly the cawing of a crow far, far away, echoing from some unseen wood-side . . .I am part of one great creature with him; if he has voice, I have ears. I can hear when he calls.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow

I hear a faint cricket (or locust?) still, even after the slight snow. See November 8, 1853 ("Perchance I heard the last cricket of the season yesterday. They chirp here and there at longer and longer intervals, till the snow quenches their song."); November 11, 1858 ("I hear here a faint creaking of two or three crickets or locustæ. . . They are quite silent long before sunset.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in November

The hips of the late rose still show abundantly along the shore. See July 23, 1860 ("The late rose is now in prime along the river, a pale rose-color but very delicate, keeping up the memory of roses."); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Wild Rose

November 11. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, November 11

Toward the distant wood

I hear the cawing of crows –

I wear mittens now.

Apples are frozen on the trees and rattle like stones in my pocket.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Apples are frozen on the trees 

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 ©  2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-531111

Now after sunset the river is full of light in the dark landscape

August 14

No rain, only the dusty road spotted with the few drops which fell last night, — but there is quite a high and cool wind this morning.

Since August came in, we have begun to have considerable wind, as not since May, at least.

The roads nowadays are covered with a light-colored, powdery dust (this yesterday), several inches deep, which also defiles the grass and weeds and bushes, and the traveller is deterred from stepping in it.

The dusty weeds and bushes leave their mark on your clothes.

Mountain-ash berries orange (?), and its leaves half yellowed in some places.


3 P.M. To climbing fern with E. Hoar. 

It takes a good deal of care and patience to unwind this ' fern without injuring it. Sometimes same frond is half leaf, half fruit.  E. talked of sending one such leaf to G. Bradford to remind him that the sun still shone in America.

The uva-ursi berries beginning to turn.

August 14, 2014

6 P.M. To Hubbard Bath and Fair Haven Hill.

I notice now that saw-like grass seed where the mowers have done.

The swamp blackberries are quite small and rather acid.

Though yesterday was quite a hot day, I find by bathing that the river grows steadily cooler, as yet for a fortnight, though we have had no rain here.  Is it owing solely to the cooler air since August came in, both day and night, or have rains in the southwest cooled the stream within a week?

I now, standing on the shore, see that in sailing or floating down a smooth stream at evening it is an advantage to the fancy to be thus slightly separated from the land.

It is to be slightly removed from the common- place of earth.

To float thus on the silver-plated stream is like embarking on a train of thought itself.

You are surrounded by water, which is full of reflections; and you see the earth at a distance, which is very agreeable to the imagination.



I see the blue smoke of a burning meadow.

The clethra must be one of the most conspicuous flowers not yellow at present.

I sit three-quarters up the hill.

The crickets creak strong and loud now after sunset. No word will spell it.  It is a short, strong, regular ringing sound, as of a thousand exactly together, — though further off some alternate, repeated regularly and in rapid time, perhaps twice in a second.

Methinks their quire is much fuller and louder than a fortnight ago.

Ah ! I need solitude.

I have come forth to this hill at sunset to see the forms of the mountains in the horizon, to behold and commune with something grander than man.

Their mere distance and unprofanedness is an infinite encouragement.

It is with infinite yearning and aspiration that I seek solitude, more and more resolved and strong; but with a certain genial weakness that I seek society ever.

I hear the nighthawk squeak and a whip-poor-will sing.

I hear the tremulous squealing scream of a screech owl in the Holden Woods, sounding somewhat like the neighing of a horse, not like the snipe.


Now at 7.45, perhaps a half-hour after sunset, the river is quite distinct and full of light in the dark landscape,  -- 

a silver strip of sky

of the same color and 

brightness with the sky.

As I go home by Hayden's I smell the burning meadow.

I love the scent.

It is my pipe.

I smoke the earth.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, August 14, 1854

Mountain-ash berries orange (?) See July 28, 1859 ("Young purple finches eating mountain-ash berries (ours). "); August 25, 1859 ("Mountain-ash berries partly turned. Again see, I think, purple finch eating them.")

The uva-ursi berries beginning to turn. See July 16, 1855 ("Uva-ursi berries begin to redden."); September 21, 1856 ("Uva-ursi berries quite ripe.")

I find by bathing that the river grows steadily cooler. See August 12, 1854 ("I bathe at Hubbard's. The water is rather cool, comparatively."); September 6, 1854 ("Hubbard Bath . . . The water is again warmer than I should have believed; say an average summer warmth, yet not so warm as it has been. It makes me the more surprised that only that day and a half of rain should have made it so very cold when I last bathed here. "); September 12, 1854 ("bathing I find it colder again than on the 2d, so that I stay in but a moment. I fear that it will not again be warm."): September 24, 1854 (" It is now too cold to bathe with comfort."; September 26 1854 ("Took my last bath the 24th . Probably shall not bathe again this year. It was chilling cold.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Luxury of Bathing

I have come forth to this hill at sunset to see the forms of the mountains in the horizon, — to behold and commune with something grander than man. See December 27, 1851 ("The man is blessed who every day is permitted to behold anything so pure and serene as the western sky at sunset, while revolutions vex the world.");  June 5, 1854 ("I have come to this hill to see the sun go down, to recover sanity and put myself again in relation with Nature.”); July 24, 1853 ("On Fair Haven a quarter of an hour before sunset .. . .A golden sheen is reflected from the river so brightly, that it dazzles me as much as the sun . The now silver-plated river is burnished gold there,");  January 7, 1857 “This stillness, solitude, wildness of nature is . . . what I go out to seek. It is as if I always met in those places some grand, serene, immortal, infinitely encouraging, though invisible, companion, and walked with him”);  October 7, 1857 ("When I turn round half-way up Fair Haven Hill, by the orchard wall, and look northwest, I am surprised for the thousandth time at the beauty of the landscape, and I sit down to behold it at my leisure. I think that Concord affords no better view.")

August 14. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, August 14.

Now after sunset 

the river is full of light 

in the dark landscape

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, a silver strip of sky

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 © 2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-540814

I see where the crickets are eating the wild strawberries.

June 20. 

 Tuesday. 

June 20, 2014

Motherwort to-morrow. 

Elder. 

A cloud of minute black pollywogs in a muddy pool. I see where the crickets are eating the wild strawberries. 

P. M. - To Shadbush Meadow. 

Heard a new bird –– chut-cheeter-varrer-chutter-wit ––on the low bushes, about the size of Wilson's thrush apparently. Apparently olivaceous (?) above, most so on head, yellow front, dark bill, dark wings with two white bars, all yellow or yellowish breast and beneath. Perhaps never heard it before. 

Cow-wheat, apparently two or three days.

A three-leaved Lysimachia stricta apparently, with reddish flower-buds, not open. 

Shad-berries almost, but scarce. 

There seems to be much variety in the Rosa lucida, some to have stouter hooked prickles than the R. Carolina.  

Upland haying begun, or beginning. 

Common nettle.

H. D Thoreau, Journal, June 20, 1854


Motherwort to-morrow. See June 29, 1852 ("Leonurus Cardiaca, motherwort, a nettle-like plant by the street-side.")

Elder. See June 21, 1852 ("Elder is blossoming; flowers opening now where black berries will be by and by.")

A cloud of minute black pollywogs in a muddy pool..See June 15, 1852 ("This half-stagnant pond-hole, drying up and leaving bare mud, with the pollywogs and turtles making off in it, is agreeable and encouraging to behold, as if it contained the seeds of life, the liquor rather, boiled down. The foulest water will bubble purely.");  See also June 15, 1851 ("The pollywogs in the pond are now fulltailed"); June 15, 1855 ("Many pollywogs an inch long.") and note to May 19, 1857 ("See myriads of minute pollywogs, recently hatched, in the water of Moore's Swamp.")

I see where the crickets are eating the wild strawberries. See June 22, 1851 ("Only in the quiet of evening do I so far recover my senses as to hear the cricket, which in fact has been chirping all day.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in Spring and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau: Strawberries

Cow-wheat, apparently two or three days. See June 14, 1859 ("Cow-wheat, how long ?"); June 16, 1856 ("Cow-wheat numerously out."); June 19, 1853 ("Cow-wheat out"); August 6, 1851("After how few steps, how little exertion, the student stands in pine woods above the Solomon's-seal and the cow-wheat, in a place still unaccountably strange and wild to him, and to all civilization!") [Cow-wheat is a native annual hemiparasite (partially parasitic), using specialized root structures to invade the roots of its host and steal nutrients, while also performing photosynthesis. Its hosts may be several species of pine (Pinus) and poplar (Populus) ~ GoBotany].

Shad-berries almost, but scarce. See June 25, 1853. ("An unusual quantity of amelanchier berries, – I think of the two common kinds . . . Both these are now in their prime. These are the first berries after strawberries. . .I  never saw nearly so many before. It is a very agreeable surprise."); June 25, 1854 ("Shad-berry ripe.") 

The Rosa lucida . . . have stouter hooked prickles than the R. Carolina. See June 21, 1852 (" I observe a rose (called by some moss rose), with a bristly reddish stem; another, with a smooth red stem and but a few prickles; another, with many prickles and bristles."); July 24, 1853 ("The late rose, -- R. Carolina, swamp rose,-- I think has larger and longer leaves; at any rate they are duller above (light beneath). and the bushes higher.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Wild Rose
Upland haying begun. See June 21, 1853 ("The farmers have commenced haying. With this the summer culminates.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Haymaking

July 20. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, June 20

Rosa lucida –

stouter hooked prickles than the

R. Carolina.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Crickets are eating the Wild Strawberries

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 © 2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-540620

Listening for the Last Cricket.

 I would make a chart of our life,

know why just this circle of creatures completes the world.

Henry Thoreau, April 18, 1852

At the east window. — A temperate noon.

I hear a cricket creak in the shade; also the sound of a distant piano  . . .

At length the melody steals into my being. 

I know not when it began to occupy me.

By some fortunate coincidence of thought or circumstance 

I am attuned to the universe.

August 3, 1852

I hear one cricket – 

his theme is life immortal

now after one snow.

November 12, 1853

November 12, 2023

November 1.  The crickets now sound faintly and from very deep in the sod.   November 1, 1851

November 1.   I hear in the fields just before sundown a shriller chirping of a few crickets, reminding me that their song is getting thin and will soon be quenched . . . I seemed to recognize the November evening as a familiar thing come round again, and yet I could hardly tell whether I had ever known it  or only divined it . . . The long railroad causeway through the meadows west of me, the still twilight in which hardly a cricket was heard of [Probably too cool for any these evenings; only in the afternoon],  the dark bank of clouds in the horizon long after sunset, the villagers crowding to the post-office, and the hastening home to supper by candle-light, had I not seen all this before! What new sweet was I to extract from it?  November 1, 1858

November 3. I hear a few crickets and locusts (?) and see a very small brown beetle. November 3, 1853

November 3. Though I listen for them, I do not hear a cricket this afternoon. I think that I heard a few in the afternoon of November 1st. They then sounded peculiarly distinct, being but few here and there on a dry and warm hill, bird-like. Yet these seemed to be singing a little louder and in a little loftier strain, now that the chirp of the cricket generally was quenched.  November 3, 1858

November 5.  I hear one cricket this louring day. Since but one is heard, it is the more distinct and therefore seems louder and more musical. It is a clearer note, less creaking than before. . . It is quite still; no wind, no insect hum, and no note of birds, but one hairy woodpecker. November 5, 1858

November 7. I hear one faint cricket's chirp this afternoon. November 7, 1858

November 8.  Perchance I heard the last cricket of the season yesterday. They chirp here and there at longer and longer intervals, till the snow quenches their song.  November 8, 1853

November 8.    I hear a small z-ing cricket. November 8, 1859

November 9.  I hear a cricket singing the requiem of the year . . . Soon all will be frozen up, and I shall hear no cricket chirp in the land. November 9, 1851 

November 11. I hear a faint cricket (or locust?) still, even after the slight snow. November 11, 1853

November 11. Frogs are rare and sluggish, as if going into winter quarters. A cricket also sounds rather rare and distinct.  November 11, 1855

November 11.  I hear here a faint creaking of two or three crickets or locustæ, but it is a steady sound, - not the common cricket's, long-continued, and when one pauses, generally another continues the strain, so that it seems absolutely continuous. They are either in the grass or on the bushes by the edge of the water, under this sunny wood-side. I afterward hear a few of the common cricket on the side of Clamshell. Thus they are confined now to the sun on the south sides of hills and woods. They are quite silent long before sunset.  November 11, 1858

November 12 The ground is frozen and echoes to my tread. There are absolutely no crickets to be heard now. They are heard, then, till the ground freezes. November 12, 1851

November 12  I do not remember any hum of insects for a long time, though I heard a cricket to-day. November 12, 1853

November 12 I hear one cricket singing still, faintly deep in the bank, now after one whitening of snow. His theme is life immortal. The last cricket, full of cheer and faith, piping to himself, as the last man might. November 12, 1853

November 13. Not a mosquito left. Not an insect to hum. Crickets gone into winter quarters.  November 13, 1851

November 13.   Of course frozen ground, ice, and snow have now banished the few remaining skaters (if there were any ?), crickets, and water-bugs.  November 13, 1858

November 15.  Cricket still. November 15,  1853

November 15. I hear in several places a faint cricket note, either a fine z-ing or a distincter creak, also see and hear a grasshopper's crackling flight.  November 15, 1859

November 19.  Turning up a stone on Fair Haven Hill, I find many small dead crickets about the edges, which have endeavored to get under it and apparently have been killed by the frost. November 19, 1857

November 22.  Saw E. Hosmer this afternoon making a road for himself along a hillside . . . He turned over a stone, and I saw under it many crickets and ants still lively, which had gone into winter quarters there apparently . . . That is the reason, then, that I have not heard the crickets lately.   November 22, 1851

See also :

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in Spring

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Cricket in August

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Cricket in September

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  The Cricket in October

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Cricket in November 

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

https://tinyurl.com/HDTnovcrkt