The brown panicles of the June-grass now paint some fields with the color of early summer.

May 30 .

May 30, 2020

P. M. – To Second Division. A washing southwest wind. 

George Melvin said yesterday that he was still grafting, and that there had been a great blow on the apple trees this year, and that the blossoms had held on unusually long. I suggested that it might be because we had not had so much wind as usual. 

On the wall, at the brook behind Cyrus Hosmer’s barn, I start a nighthawk within a rod or two. It alights again on his barn-yard board fence, sitting diagonally. I see the white spot on the edge of its wings as it sits. It flies thence and alights on the ground in his corn-field, sitting flat, but there was no nest under it. This was unusual. Had it not a nest nearby? 

I observed that some of the June-grass was white and withered, being eaten off by a worm several days ago, or considerably before it blossoms. 

June-grass fills the field south of Ed. Hosmer’s ledge by the road, and gives it now a very conspicuous and agreeable brown or ruddy(?)-brown color, about as ruddy as chocolate, perhaps. This decided color stretching afar with a slightly undulating surface, like a mantle, is a very agreeable phenomenon of the season. The brown panicles of the June-grass now paint some fields with the color of early summer. 

Front-yard grass is mowed by some. 

The stems of meadow saxifrage are white now. 

The Salix tristis generally shows its down now along dry wood-paths. 

The Juncus filiformis not out yet, though some panicles are grown nearly half an inch. Much of it seems to be merely chaffy or effete, but much also plumper, with green sepals and minute stamens to be detected within. It arises, as described, from matted running rootstocks. Perhaps will bloom in a week. 

A succession of moderate thunder and lightning storms from the west, two or three, an hour apart. 

Saw some devil’s-needles (the first) about the 25th. 

I took refuge from the thunder-shower this afternoon by running for a high pile of wood near Second Division, and while it was raining, I stuck three stout cat-sticks into the pile, higher than my head, each a little lower than the other, and piled large flattish wood on them and tossed on dead pine-tops, making a little shed, under which I stood dry.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 30, 1860

A nighthawk alights on the ground in his corn-field, sitting flat, but there was no nest under it. See June 1, 1853 ("Walking up this side-hill, I disturb a nighthawk eight or ten feet from me . .Without moving, I look about and see its two eggs on the bare ground, on a slight shelf of the hill, on the dead pine-needles and sand, without any cavity or nest whatever.") and note to June 3, 1859 ("Nighthawk, two eggs, fresh. ")

The brown panicles of the June-grass now paint some fields with the color of early summer. See June 11, 1853 ("The upland fields are already less green where the June-grass is ripening its seeds.")

I took refuge from the thunder-shower this afternoon by running for a high pile of wood.  See May 30, 1857 ("When first I had sheltered myself under the rock, I began at once to look out on the pond with new eyes, as from my house. I was at Lee's Cliff as I had never been there before. .. .  This Cliff thus became my house. I inhabited it. . . I think that such a projection as this, or a cave, is the only effectual protection that nature affords us against the storm. ") See also  August 9, 1851 ("I meet the rain at the edge of the wood, and take refuge under the thickest leaves, where not a drop reaches me, and, at the end of half an hour, the renewed singing of the birds alone advertises me that the rain has ceased, and it is only the dripping from the leaves which I hear in the woods."); June 14, 1855 (“It suddenly begins to rain with great violence, and we in haste draw up our boat on the Clamshell shore, upset it, and get under, sitting on the paddles, . . .  It is very pleasant to lie there half an hour close to the edge of the water and see and hear the great drops patter on the river, each making a great bubble”); July 22, 1858 ("Took refuge from a shower under our boat at Clamshell; staid an hour at least. A thunderbolt fell close by."); August 17, 1858 (“Being overtaken by a shower, we took refuge in the basement of Sam Barrett’s sawmill, where we spent an hour, and at length came home with a rainbow over arching the road before us.”); October 17, 1859 ("The rain drives me from my berrying and we take shelter under a tree. It is worth the while to sit under the lee of an apple tree trunk in the rain, if only to study the bark and its inhabitants. ")

May 30 See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 30

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 © 2009-2021

A new season has arrived: heat, fireflies; mosquitoes; trumping bullfrogs

June 7. 

P. M. — To Walden. 

June 7, 2018
 (Avesong)

Warm weather has suddenly come, beginning yesterday. To-day it is yet warmer, 87° at 3 P. M., compelling me to put on a thin coat, and I see that a new season has arrived.

 June shadows are moving over waving grass-fields, the crickets chirp uninterruptedly, and I perceive the agreeable acid scent of high blueberry bushes in bloom. The trees having leaved out, you notice their rounded tops, suggesting shade. 

The nighthawk sparks and booms over arid hillsides and sprout-lands. 

It is evidence enough against crows and hawks and owls, proving their propensity to rob birds’ nests of eggs and young, that smaller birds pursue them so often. You do not need the testimony of so many farmers' boys when you can see and hear the small birds daily crying “Thief and murder” after these spoilers. 

What does it signify, the kingbird, black bird, swallow, etc., etc., pursuing a crow? They say plainly enough, “I know you of old, you villain; you want to devour my eggs or young. I have often caught you at it, and I’ll publish you now.” And probably the crow pursuing the fish hawk and eagle proves that the latter sometimes devour their young. 

The Salix tristis is now generally going or gone to seed.

Oxalis violacea in garden.

I see toads copulating and toad-spawn freshly laid in the Wyman meadow at Walden. 

Utricularia vulgaris out there. 

The water colored or dusted with the pollen of the pitch pine. 

As I was wading in this Wyman meadow, looking for bullfrog-spawn, I saw a hole at the bottom, where it was six or eight inches deep, by the side of a mass of mud and weeds which rose just to the surface three or four feet from the shore. It was about five inches in diameter, with some sand at the mouth, just like a musquash's hole. As I stood there within two feet, a pout put her head out, as if to see who was there, and directly came forth and disappeared under the target-weed; but as I stood perfectly still, waiting for the water which I had disturbed to settle about the hole, she circled round and round several times be tween me and the hole, cautiously, stealthily approaching the entrance but as often withdrawing, and at last mustered courage to enter it.

I then noticed another similar hole in the same mass, two or three feet from this. I thrust my arm into the first, running it in and downward about fifteen inches. It was a little more than a foot long and enlarged somewhat at the end, the bottom, also, being about a foot beneath the surface, — for it slanted downward, – but I felt nothing within; I only felt a pretty regular and rounded apartment with firm walls of weedy or fibrous mud. 

I then thrust my arm into the other hole, which was longer and deeper, but at first discovered nothing; but, trying again, I found that I had not reached the end, for it turned a little and descended more than I supposed. Here I felt a similar apartment or enlargement, some six inches in diameter horizontally but not quite so high nor nearly so wide at its throat.

 Here, to my surprise, I felt something soft, like a gelatinous mass of spawn, but, feeling a little further, felt the horns of a pout. I deliberately took hold of her by the head and lifted her out of the hole and the water, having run my arm in two thirds its length. She offered not the slightest resistance from first to last, even when I held her out of water before my face, and only darted away suddenly when I dropped her in the water. 

The entrance to her apartment was so narrow that she could hardly have escaped if I had tried to prevent her. Putting in my arm again, I felt, under where she had been, a flattish mass of ova, several inches in diameter, resting on the mud, and took out some. Feeling again in the first hole, I found as much more there. Though I had been stepping round and over the second nest for several minutes, I had not scared the pout.

 The ova of the first nest already contained white wiggling young. I saw no motion in the others. The ova in each case were dull-yellowish and the size of small buckshot. These nests did not communicate with each other and had no other outlet.

 Pouts, then, make their nests in shallow mud-holes or bays, in masses of weedy mud, or probably in the muddy bank; and the old pout hovers over the spawn or keeps guard at the entrance. Where do the Walden pouts breed when they have not access to this meadow?

 The first pout, whose eggs were most developed, was the largest and had some slight wounds on the back. The other may have been the male in the act of fertilizing the ova.

 I sit in my boat in the twilight by the edge of the river. Toads are now in full blast along the river. Some sit quite out at the edge of the pads, and hold up their heads so high when they ring, and make such a large bubble, that they look as if they would tumble over backward.

 Bullfrogs now are in full blast. I do not hear other frogs; their notes are probably drowned. I perceive that this generally is the rhythm of the bullfrog; er|er-r er-r-r| (growing fuller and fuller and more tremendous) and then doubling, er, er er, err er, er, er er, er, er and finally er, er, er, er er, er, er, er. Or I might write it oorar oorar oorar oorar-hah oorar-hah hah oorar hah hah hah.

Some of these great males are yellow or quite yellowish over the whole back. Are not the females oftenest white-throated?

 What lungs, what health, what terrenity (if not serenity) it suggests! 

At length I hear the faint stertoration of a Rana palustris (if not halecina).

Seeing a large head, with its prominent eyes, projecting above the middle of the river, I found it was a bullfrog coming across. It swam under water a  rod or two, and then came up to see where it was, or its way. It is thus they cross when sounds or sights attract them to more desirable shores. Probably they prefer the night for such excursions, for fear of large pickerel, etc.

 I thought its throat was not yellow nor baggy. Was it not the female attracted by the note of the male?

 Fireflies pretty numerous over the river, though we have had no thunder-showers of late.

 Mosquitoes quite troublesome here.

 The ledum is a very good plant to bloom in a pitcher, lasting a week or more.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 7, 1858


87° at 3 P. M and i see that a new season has arrived. . . .Fireflies pretty numerous over the river, though we have had no thunder-showers of late. Mosquitoes quite troublesome here. See  June 7, 1854 ("[M]osquitoes are very troublesome in the woods. . . .This muggy evening I see fireflies, the first I have seen"); See also June 16, 1860 ("It appears to me that these phenomena occur simultaneously, say June 12th, viz.: -

• Heat about. 85° at 2 P.M.
• Hylodes cease to peep.
• Purring frogs (Rana palustris) cease.
• Lightning-bugs first seen.
• Bullfrogs trump generally.
• Mosquitoes begin to be really troublesome.
• Afternoon thunder-showers almost regular.
• Sleep with open window.
• Turtles fairly and generally begun to lay.")

See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Fireflies, winged sparks of fire!

The nighthawk sparks and booms over arid hillsides and sprout-lands. See June 7, 1853 ("Visit my nighthawk on her nest. . . . The sight of this creature sitting on its eggs impresses me with the venerableness of the globe.");  See also  May 25, 1852 ("First nighthawks squeak and boom")  and also A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau,, the Nighthawk

Oxalis violacea in garden. See June 7, 2057 ("Pratt has got the . . . Oxalis violacea, which he says began about last Sunday, or May 31st, larger and handsomer than the yellow, though it blossoms but sparingly.")

June 7. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, June 7

I sit in my boat

in the twilight by the

edge of the river.

At length I hear the 

faint stertoration of a 

Rana palustris

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 © 2009-2021

A time to see the osprey.

April 28. 

Blustering northwest wind and wintry aspect. 

April 28, 2018

A. M. — Down river to look at willows. 

The common S. cordata apparently not yet within two days at least. This salix is not always conspicuously double-scaled, nor is the scale carried up on the catkin. It is not always even on that of the S. Torreyana. 

I see the fish hawk again . . . As it flies low, directly over my head, I see that its body is white beneath, and the white on the forward side of the wings beneath, if extended across the breast, would form a regular crescent. Its wings do not form a regular curve in front, but an abrupt angle. They are loose and broad at tips. This bird goes fishing slowly down one side of the river and up again on the other, forty to sixty feet high, continually poising itself almost or quite stationary, with its head to the northwest wind and looking down, flapping its wings enough to keep its place, some times stationary for about a minute. It is not shy. This boisterous weather is the time to see it. 

I see the myrtle-bird in the same sunny place, south of the Island woods, as formerly. Thus are the earliest seen each spring in some warm and calm place by the waterside, when it is cool and blustering elsewhere. 

The barn swallows and a martin are already skimming low over that small area of smooth water within a few feet of me, never leaving that spot, and I do not observe them thus playing elsewhere. Incessantly stooping back and forth there. 

P. M. — To Ledum Swamp. 

At Clamshell Ditch, one Equisetum sylvaticum will apparently open to-morrow. 

Strawberries are abundantly out there; how long?

Some Salix tristis, bank near baeomyces. Did I not put it too early in last year's list of willows? Probably earlier elsewhere? 

The snow was generally gone about 10 A.M., except in circular patches in the shadow of the still leafless trees.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 28, 1858

This boisterous weather is the time to see it. See April 28, 1860 ("Sitting on Mt. Misery, I see a very large bird of the hawk family, blackish with a partly white head but no white tail, - probably a fish hawk; sail quite near, looking very large. "); April 14, 1852 (“The streams break up; the ice goes to the sea. Then sails the fish hawk overhead, looking for his prey.”) See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Osprey (Fish Hawk)

Thus are the earliest seen each spring in some warm and calm place by the waterside, when it is cool and blustering elsewhere. See April 28, 1855 ("In a cold and windy day like this you can find more birds than in a serene one, because they are collected under the wooded hillsides in the sun.”)

At Clamshell Ditch, one Equisetum sylvaticum will apparently open to-morrow. Strawberries are abundantly out. See May 6, 1856 (“Equisetum sylvaticum a day or two on the ditch bank there.”); May 10, 1857 (“This side Clamshell, strawberries and cinquefoil are abundant. Equisetum sylvaticum.”)

Circular patches

of snow in the shadow of

the still leafless trees.

The seasons and all their changes are in me.

October 26

October 26, 2018

Hard rain in the night and almost steady rain through the day, the second day. Wind still easterly or northeasterly. 

P. M. – Round by Puffer's via Clamshell. 

A driving east or northeast storm. I can see through the drisk only a mile. The river is getting partly over the meadows at last, and my spirits rise with it. Me thinks this rise of the waters must affect every thought and deed in the town. It qualifies my sentence and life. I trust there will appear in this Journal some flow, some gradual filling of the springs and raising of the streams, that the accumulating grists may be ground. 

A storm is a new, and in some respects more active, life in nature. Larger migrating birds make their appearance. They, at least, sympathize with the movements of the watery element and the winds. 

I see two great fish hawks (possibly blue herons) slowly beating northeast against the storm, by what a curious tie circling ever near each other and in the same direction, as if you might expect to find the very motes in the air to be paired; two long undulating wings conveying a feathered body through the misty atmosphere, and this inseparably associated with another planet of the same species. I can just glimpse their undulating lines. Damon and Pythias they must be. The waves beneath, which are of kindred form, are still more social, multitudinous, dvip6aov. 

Where is my mate, beating against the storm with me? They fly according to the valley of the river, northeast or southwest. 

I start up snipes also at Clamshell Meadow. This weather sets the migratory birds in motion and also makes them bolder. 

These regular phenomena of the seasons get at last to be — they were at first, of course — simply and plainly phenomena or phases of my life. The seasons and all their changes are in me.  I see not a dead eel or floating snake, or a gull, but it rounds my life and is like a line or accent in its poem. Almost I believe the Concord would not rise and overflow its banks again, were I not here. After a while I learn what my moods and seasons are. I would have nothing subtracted. I can imagine nothing added. My moods are thus periodical, not two days in my year alike. The perfect correspondence of Nature to man, so that he is at home in her! 

Going along the road toward the baeomyces, I see, as I think, a space a yard or two square where the bank has been [burnt] over by accident, by some traveller or sportsman. Even as I stand within four or five feet I take it to be so. It was the fallen leaves of the Salix tristis, thickly covering the ground, so black, with an ashy reflection, that they look exactly like cinders of leaves. And the small twigs were also blackened and inconspicuous; I could hardly detect them. Just the right mingling of black and ash-color. It was a wet day, which made them look blacker.

Mere evergreen mossy banks, as that by this road in the woods, now more attract us when greenness is so rare. 

At the hewing-place on the flat above, many sparrows are flitting past amid the birches and sallows. They are chiefly Fringilla hyemalis. How often they may be  thus flitting along in a straggling manner from bush to bush, so that the hedgerow will be all alive with them, each uttering a faint chip from time to time, as if to keep together, bewildering you so that you know not if the greater part are gone by or still to come. One rests but a moment on the tree before you and is gone again. You wonder if they know whither they are bound, and how their leader is appointed. 

The pitch pine leaves not yet quite fallen. 

Yellowish leaves still adhere to the very tops of the birches. 

Those sparrows, too, are thoughts I have. They come and go; they flit by quickly on their migrations, uttering only a faint chip, I know not whither or why exactly. One will not rest upon its twig for me to scrutinize it. The whole copse will be alive with my rambling thoughts, bewildering me by their very multitude, but they will be all gone directly without leaving me a feather. 

My loftiest thought is somewhat like an eagle that suddenly comes into the field of view, suggesting great things and thrilling the beholder, as if it were bound hitherward with a message for me; but it comes no nearer, but circles and soars away, growing dimmer, disappointing me, till it is lost behind a cliff or a cloud. 

Spring is brown; summer, green; autumn, yellow; winter, white; November, gray.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, October 26, 1857

Yellowish leaves still adhere to the very tops of the birches. See note to October 26, 1860 ("This is the season of the fall when the leaves are whirled through the air like flocks of birds, the season of birch spangles, when you see afar a few clear-yellow leaves left on the tops of the birches.”)

The seasons and all their changes are in me . . . My moods are thus periodical, not two days in my year alike. See June 11, 1851 (“Hardly two nights are alike. . . .No one, to my knowledge, has observed the minute differences in the seasons.”); June 6, 1857 (“A year is made up of a certain series and number of sensations and thoughts which have their language in nature. . . . Each experience reduces itself to a mood of the mind. ”); August 7, 1853 ("The objects I behold correspond to my mood") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  Moods and Seasons of the Mind.

October 26. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, October 26 and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The seasons and all their changes are in me.

The seasons 

and all their changes 

are in me –

 my moods periodical 

not two days alike.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The seasons and all their changes are in me.

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

It is time now to bring our philosophy out of doors.

June 4. 

P. M. — To Bare Hill. 

The early potentilla is now erect in the June grass. 

Salix tristis is going to seed, showing some cotton; also some S. rostrate. 

I am surprised to see some kind of fish dart away in Collier's veronica ditch, for it about dries up and has no outlet. 

I observed yesterday, the first time this year, the lint on the smooth surface of the Assabet at the Hemlocks, giving the water a stagnant look. It is an agreeable phenomenon to me, as connected with the season and suggesting warm weather. I suppose it to be the down from the new leaves which so rapidly become smooth. There may be a little pitch pine pollen with it now. The current is hardly enough to make a clear streak in it here and there. The stagnant-looking surface, where the water slowly circles round in that great eddy, has the appearance of having been dusted over. This lint now covers my clothes as I go through the sprout- lands, but it gets off remarkably before long. Each under side of a leaf you strike leaves the mark of its lint on your clothes, but it is clean dirt and soon wears off. 

One thing that chiefly distinguishes this season from three weeks ago is that fine serene undertone or earth-song as we go by sunny banks and hillsides, the creak of crickets, which affects our thoughts so favorably, imparting its own serenity. It is time now to bring our philosophy out of doors. Our thoughts pillow themselves unconsciously in the troughs of this serene, rippling sea of sound. Now first we begin to be peripatetics. No longer our ears come in contact with the bold echoing earth, but everywhere recline on the spring cushion of a cricket's chirp. These rills that ripple from every hillside become at length a universal sea of sound, nourishing our ears when we are most unconscious. 

In that first apple tree at Wyman's an apparent hairy woodpecker's nest (from the size of the bird), about ten feet from ground. The bird darts away with a shrill, loud chirping of alarm, incessantly repeated, long before I get there, and keeps it up as long as I stay in the neighborhood. The young keep up an in cessant fine, breathing peep which can be heard across the road and is much increased when they hear you approach the hole, they evidently expecting the old bird. 

I perceive no offensive odor. I saw the bird fly out of this hole, May 1st, and probably the eggs were laid about that time. Vide it next year. 

In the high pasture behind Jacob Baker's, soon after coming out of the wood, I scare up a bay-wing. She runs several rods close to the ground through the thin grass, and then lurks behind tussocks, etc. The nest has four eggs, dull pinkish-white with brown spots; nest low in ground, of stubble lined with white horse hair. 

Carya glabra [Carya glabra – pignut hickory], apparently a day at least. 

Oldenlandia on Bare Hill, along above wall opposite the oak, a rod or more off and westerly. Apparently several days at least, but it appears not to do well. It has a dry, tufted look, somewhat like young savory- leaved aster, on the bare rocky hill and in the clear spaces between the huckleberry bushes. Reminds me of a heath. Does not blossom so full as once I saw it. 

Arethusa. 

Crimson fungus (?) on black birch leaves, as if bespattered with blood.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 4, 1857

The early potentilla is now erect in the June grass. See June 4, 1855 (“There are now many potentillas ascendant.”)

Each under side of a leaf you strike leaves the mark of its lint on your clothes, but it is clean dirt and soon wears off. See June 4, 1855 (“Lint comes off on to clothes from the tender leaves, but it is clean dirt and all gone when you get home. . .”); June 4, 1854 (“ The surface of the still water nowadays looking like dust at a little distance. Is it the down of the leaves blown off? . . .”)

That fine serene undertone or earth-song . . . imparting its own serenity. See June 4, 1854 (“These warm and dry days, which put spring far behind, the sound of the cricket at noon has a new value and significance, so serene and cool . . ..”) ;May 12, 1857 (“The spirit of its earth-song, of its serene and true philosophy, was breathed into me, and I saw the world as through a glass, as it lies eternally”);; May 22, 1854 (“The song suggests lateness, but only as we come to a knowledge of eternity after some acquaintance with time. . . . . Only in their saner moments do men hear the crickets. . . .A quire has begun which pauses not for any news, for it knows only the eternal.”); June 1, 1856 (“Was soothed and cheered by I knew not what at first, but soon detected the now more general creak of crickets”); June 13, 1851 ("I listen to the ancient, familiar, immortal, dear cricket sound under all others, and as these cease I become aware of the general earth-song.”)  June 17, 1852 (“The earth-song of the cricket! Before Christianity was, it is. Health! health! health! is the burden of its song. ”); July 14, 1851 (“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.”);

The [peep of the young] is much increased when they hear you approach the hole, they evidently expecting the old bird. I perceive no offensive odor. See June 10, 1856 ("They utter their squeaking hiss whenever I cover the hole with my hand, apparently taking it for the approach of the mother. A strong, rank fetid smell issues from the hole.?”)  

A bay-wing . . .  The nest has four eggs, dull pinkish-white with brown spots. . . .See May 18, 1855 ("At Clamshell a bay-wing sparrow’s nest, four eggs (young half hatched) -- some black-spotted, others not.”); May 27, 1856 ("Fringilla melodia’s nest in midst of swamp, with four eggs . . . with very dark blotches"); May 31, 1856 (“A ground-bird’s nest (melodia or graminea.), with six of those oblong narrow gray eggs speckled with much brown at end. . . .The bird would steal out through the grass when I came within a rod, and then, after running a rod or two, take to wing.”)

Oldenlandia on Bare Hill . . . See July 8, 1857 ("Edith Emerson shows me Oldenlandia purpurea var. longifolia, which she saw very abundantly in bloom on the Blue Hills . . .”)

Now is the time to paddle these smooth warm vernal waters.

May 3. 

Sunday. A remarkably warm and pleasant morning. A. M. — To Battle-Ground by river. 

I heard the ring of toads at 6 a. m. The flood on the meadows, still high, is quite smooth, and many are out this still and suddenly very warm morning, pushing about in boats. 

Now, thinks many a one, is the time to paddle or push gently far up or down the river, along the still, warm meadow's edge, and perhaps we may see some large turtles, or muskrats, or otter, or rare fish or fowl. It will be a grand forenoon for a cruise, to explore these meadow shores and inundated maple swamps which we have never explored. Now we shall be recompensed for the week's confinement to shop or garden. 

We will spend our Sabbath exploring these smooth warm vernal waters. Up or down shall we go? To Fair Haven Bay and the Sudbury meadows, or to Ball's Hill and Carlisle Bridge? Along the meadow's edge, lined with willow and alders and maples, under the catkins of the early willow, and brushing those of the sweet-gale with our prow, where the sloping pasture and the plowed ground, submerged, are fast drinking up the flood. What fair isles, what remote coast shall we explore? What San Salvador or Bay of All Saints arrive at? All are tempted forth, like flies, into the sun. 

All isles seem fortunate and blessed to-day; all capes are of Good Hope. 

The same sun and calm that tempts the turtles out tempts the voyagers. It is an opportunity to explore their own natures, to float along their own shores. The woodpecker cackles and the crow black bird utters his jarring chatter from the oaks and maples. All well men and women who are not restrained by superstitious custom come abroad this morning by land or water, and such as have boats launch them and put forth in search of adventure. 

Others, less free or, it may be, less fortunate, take their station on bridges, watching the rush of water through them and the motions of the departing voyagers, and listening to the notes of blackbirds from over the smooth water. They see a swimming snake, or a muskrat dive, — airing and sunning themselves there until the first bell rings. Up and down the town, men and boys that are under subjection are polishing their shoes and brushing their go-to-meeting clothes. 

I, a descendant of Northmen who worshipped Thor, spend my time worshipping neither Thor nor Christ; a descendant of Northmen who sacrificed men and horses, sacrifice neither men nor horses. I care not for Thor nor for the Jews. I sympathize not to-day with those who go to church in newest clothes and sit quietly in straight-backed pews. 

I sympathize rather with the boy who has none to look after him, who borrows a boat and paddle and in common clothes sets out to explore these temporary vernal lakes. I meet such a boy paddling along under a sunny bank, with bare feet and his pants rolled up above his knees, ready to leap into the water at a moment's warning. Better for him to read "Robinson Crusoe" than Baxter's "Saints' Rest."

I hear the soft, purring, stertorous croak of frogs on the meadow. 

The pine warbler is perhaps the commonest bird heard now from the wood-sides. It seems left [to] it almost alone to fill their empty aisles. 

The above boy had caught a snapping turtle, the third he had got this year. The first he said he got the fore part of April. He also had caught a bullfrog sitting on the shore just now. 

Thermometer from 1 to 2 p. m., at 78°. 

Neighbors come forth to view the expanding buds in their gardens. 

I see where some fish, probably a pickerel, darted away from high on the meadows, toward the river, and swims so high that it makes a long ripple for twenty rods. 

3 p. m. — To Cliffs. 

In the pool which dries up in Jonathan Wheeler's orchard, I see toads, or maybe frogs, spread out on the surface, uttering a short, loud, peculiar croak, not like that of the early croaking frog, nor the smooth, purring, stertorous one of this morning, but a coarse belching croak, at a little distance like quor and quar, being on various keys, but nearer like ow-oo-uk though one syllable or ar-r-r. Thus they lie, perhaps within a foot or two and facing each other, and alternately throwing their heads back, i. e. upward, swelling their white throats and uttering this abominable noise. 

Then one rushes upon the other, leaps upon him. They struggle and roll over and sink for a moment, and presently they show their heads again a foot or two apart. There are a dozen or more, with very prominent eyes, with bright golden irides. 

In another pool, in Warren's meadow, I hear the ring of toads and the peep of hylodes, and, taking off my stockings and shoes, at length stand in their midst. There are a hundred toads close around me, copulating or preparing to. These look at a little distance precisely like the last, but no one utters that peculiar rough, belching croak, only their common musical ring, and occasionally a short, fainter, interrupted, quivering note, as of alarm. They are continually swimming to and leaping upon each other. I see many large reddish-brown ones, probably females, with small grayish ones lying flat on their backs, the fore feet clasped around them. These commonly lie flat on the bottom, often as if dead, but from time [to time] the under one rises with its load to the surface, puts its nose out and then sinks again. 

The single ones leap upon these double ones and roll them over in vain like the rest. It is the single ones that ring and are so active. They make great gray, yellowish, greenish, or whitish bubbles (different specimens being thus various), as big as their heads. One that rings within a foot of me seems to make the earth vibrate, and I feel it and am thrilled to my very spine, it is so terrene a sound. It reminds me of many a summer night on the river. A bubbling ring, which is continuous about a minute, and then its bag must be inflated again. 

When I move suddenly, it is the single ones chiefly that conceal themselves. The others are not so easily disturbed. You would hardly believe that toads could be so excited and active. When that nearest ringer sounded, the very sod by my feet (whose spires rose above water) seemed to tremble, and the earth itself, and I was thrilled to my spine and vibrated to it. They like a rest for their toes when they ring. It is a sound as crowded with protuberant bubbles as the rind of an orange. A clear, ringing note with a bubbling trill. It takes complete possession of you, for you vibrate to it, and can hear nothing else. 

At length, too, a hylodes or two were heard close about me, but not one was seen. The nearest seemed to have his residence in my ear alone. It took such possession of my ear that I was unable to appreciate the source whence it came. 

It is so warm, mosquitoes alight on my hands and face. 

As I approach the entrance to the spring path, I hear some chickadees phe-be-ing. One sings phe-e — be' be — be' be, just as if another struck in immediately after the usual strain. 

Salix tristis is out to-day at least, perhaps yesterday, by what I may call S. tristis Path. 

Viola ovata is pretty common there. 

Above the Cliffs, scare up a pair of turtle doves from the stubble, which go off with their shrill rattling whistle. 

Corydalis glauca is five inches high. The pistillate Equisetum arvense shows itself. 

To-day we sit without fire. 

Emerson says that Brewer tells him my "night warbler" is probably the Nashville warbler.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 3, 1857

I heard the ring of toads at 6 a. m. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The ring of toads

Emerson says that Brewer tells him my "night warbler" is probably the Nashville warbler.  Thoreau;s night-warbler  is likely the oven-bird making its flight call. According to Emerson the night warbler is "a bird he had never identified, had been in search of twelve years, which always, when he saw it, was in the act of diving down into a tree or bush.”  See note to May 19, 1858 (" Heard the night-warbler begin his strain just like an oven-bird! I have noticed that when it drops down into the woods it darts suddenly one side to a perch when low.")

Black and white creepers utter oven-bird-like notes.

April 27.

5 A. M. — S. tristis Path around Cliffs. 

Cold and windy, but fair. 

The earliest willow by railroad begins to leaf and is out of bloom. 

April 27, 1854

Few birds are heard this cold and windy morning. Hear a partridge drum before 6 A. M., also a golden-crested wren. 

Salix tristis, probably to-day, the female more forward than the male. 

Hear a singular sort of screech, somewhat like a hawk, under the Cliff, and soon some pigeons fly out of a pine near me. 

The black and white creepers running over the trunks or main limbs of red maples and uttering their fainter oven-bird-like notes. 

The principal singer on this walk, both in wood and field away from town, is the field sparrow. I hear the sweet warble of a tree sparrow in the yard. 

Cultivated cherry is beginning to leaf. 

The balm-of Gilead catkins are well loosened and about three inches long, but I have seen only fertile ones. Say male the 25th, 26th, or 27th.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 27, 1855


Hear a partridge drum before 6 A. M.  See April 27, 1854 ("I hear the beat of a partridge and the spring hoot of an owl, now at 7 a.m.”) See also See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Partridge

Also a golden-crested wren. [probably the ruby-crowned kinglet] See May 7, 1854 ("A ruby-crested wren. . .Saw its ruby crest and heard its harsh note. (This was the same I have called golden-crowned . . . except that I saw its ruby crest.. ..Have I seen the two?)”) May 6, 1855 ("Hear at a distance a ruby(?)-crowned wren, . . . I think this the only Regulus I have ever seen.”); and note to December 25, 1859 ("I hear a sharp fine screep from some bird,. . . I can see a brilliant crown. . . . It is evidently the golden-crested wren, which I have not made out before.”)  See also A Book of the Seasons,   by Henry Thoreau: the ruby-crowned or crested wren. (Thoreau did not truly identify the golden-crested wren until  Christmas  1859. See note to December 25, 1859 

The black and white creepers running over the trunks or main limbs of red maples and uttering their fainter oven-bird—like notes. See April 27, 1854 ("I hear the black and white creeper's note , — seeser seeser seeser se.. . .Hear a faint sort of oven-bird's (?) note."); see also May 3, 1852. ("That oven-birdish note which I heard here on May 1st I now find to have been uttered by the black and white warbler or creeper. He has a habit of looking under the branches.")  See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Black and White Creeper

The principal singer on this walk, both in wood and field away from town, is the field sparrow. See April 27, 1852 ("Heard the field or rush sparrow this morning (Fringilla juncorum), George Minott's "huckleberry-bird." It sits on a birch and sings at short intervals, apparently answered from a distance. It is clear and sonorous heard afar; but I found it quite impossible to tell from which side it came; sounding like phe, phe, phe, pher-pher-tw-tw-tw-t-t-t-t, — the first three slow and loud, the next two syllables quicker, and the last part quicker and quicker, becoming a clear, sonorous trill or rattle, like a spoon in a saucer.”).  See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Field Sparrow

The balm-of Gilead catkins are well loosened and about three inches long. See April 27, 1854 ("The balm-of-Gilead is in bloom, about one and a half or two inches long, and some hang down straight.") See also  May 3, 1856 ("A staminate balm of Gilead poplar by Peter’s path. Many of the catkins fallen and effete in the rain, but many anthers still red and unopen. Probably began five or six days ago.")

April 27. See  A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, April 27

Hear a partridge drum

 also golden-crested wren

before 6 A. M.

From red maple trunks

black and white creepers utter 

oven-bird-like notes.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Black and white creepers utter oven-bird-like notes

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-550427