A slight sea-turn, the wind coming cool and easterly this morning,

May 31. 

May 31,, 2018

A. M. – To Island.

Choke-cherry, a day or two.

Cornus florida, not yet for two or three days. I saw some in Connecticut with involucres much more rosaceous than ours.

A yellowbird’s nest of that grayish milkweed fibre, one egg, in alder by wall west of Indian burying(?)-ground.

P. M. — To Laurel Glen.

I see, running along on the flat side of a railroad rail on the causeway, a wild mouse with an exceedingly long tail. Perhaps it would be called the long-tailed meadow mouse. It has no white, only the feet are light flesh-color; but it is uniformly brown as far as I can see, — for it rests a long time on the rail within a rod, – but when I look at it from behind in the sun it is a very tawny almost golden brown, quite hand some. It finally runs, with a slight hop, — the tarsus of the hind legs being very long while the fore legs are short and its head accordingly low, – down the bank to the meadow.

I saw on the 29th white Viola pedata, and to-day a white V. cucullata.

There were severe frosts on the nights of the 28th and 29th, and now I see the hickories turned quite black, and in low ground the white oak shoots, though they do not show black in drying. Also many ferns are withered and black and some Prinos lavigatus tips, etc.

I find a chewink's nest with four eggs (fresh) on the side-hill at Jarvis’s wood-lot, twenty feet below wood-chuck’s hole at canoe birch. The nest is first of withered leaves, then stubble, thickly lined with withered grass and partly sheltered by dead leaves, shoved [?] up a huckleberry bush.

There was a slight sea-turn, the wind coming cool and easterly this morning, which at first I mistook for the newly leafing deciduous trees investing the evergreens, which is a kind of sea-turn in harmony with the other. I remember that the stage-drivers riding back and forth daily from Concord to Boston and becoming weather-wise perforce, often meeting the sea-breeze on its way into the country, were wont to show their weather wisdom by telling anxious travellers that it was nothing but a sea-turn.

At 5 P.M., go to see a gray squirrel's nest in the oak at the Island point. It is about fifteen feet from the ground, – the entrance, — where a limb has been broken off, and the tree is hollow above and below. One young one darted past downward under my face, with the speed of a bird. There is much short brown dung about, and a smell of urine, and the twigs around have been gnawed.

Does not the voice of the toad along the river sound differently now from what it did a month ago? I think it is much less sonorous and ringing, a more croaking and inquisitive or qui vive sound. Is it not less prolonged also?


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, May 31, 1858

Cornus florida, not yet. See June 4, 1858 ("I find the Cornus florida out in my pitcher when I get home June 4th, though it was not out on Island May 31st, and it is well out on Island when I look June 6th. I will say, therefore, that it opened June 3d."); See also May 22, 1856 ("The Cornus florida does not bloom this year."); May 25, 1855 ("Cornus florida, no bloom. Was there year before last? Does it not flower every other year?”)

A yellowbird’s nest of that grayish milkweed fibre. See  May 31, 1855 ("See a yellowbird building a nest on a white oak on the Island. She goes to a fern for the wool."); See also January 19, 1856 ("Knocked down the bottom of that summer yellow bird’s nest made on the oak at the Island last summer. It is chiefly of fern wool and also, apparently, some sheep’s wool (?), with a fine green moss (apparently that which grows on button-bushes) inmixed, and some milkweed fibre, and all very firmly agglutinated together.") and A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau The Summer Yellowbird

A wild mouse with an exceedingly long tail. Perhaps it would be called the long-tailed meadow mouse. [Likely the jumping mouse] See December 13, 1852 ("I observed a mouse . . . reddish brown above and cream-colored beneath . . . I think it must be the Gerbillus Canadensis, See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Wild Mouse

I saw on the 29th white Viola pedata, and to-day a white V. cucullata. See May 18, 1857 ("Pratt has found perfectly white Viola pedata behind Easterbrook place, and cultivated them, but now lost them.") A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Violets

There were severe frosts on the nights of the 28th and 29th, and now I see the hickories turned quite black. See May 31, 1854 ("Cold weather. "); May 31, 1856 ("It has been very cold for two or three days, and to-night a frost is feared. The telegraph says it snowed in Bangor to-day. The hickory leaves are blackened by blowing in the cold wind.”); See also May 21, 1855 (“[C]old weather, indeed, from the 20th to 23d inclusive. Sit by fires, and sometimes wear a greatcoat and expect frosts.”); May 22, 1859 (“”I see that by the very severe frost of about the 15th, or full of the moon, a great many leaves were killed. . . which now show brown or blackish.")

I find a chewink's nest with four eggs. See June 1, 1856 ("A chewink’s nest a rod and a half south of Walden road, opposite Goose Pond path, under a young oak, covered by overarching dry sedge; four eggs, pretty fresh. I am pretty sure the bird uttered the unusual hoarse and distressed note while I was looking at them. "); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Chewink (Rufous-sided Towhee)

There was a slight sea-turn, the wind coming cool and easterly this morning. See April 30, 1856 ("At one o’clock there was the usual fresh easterly wind and sea-turn , and before night it grew quite cold for the season. The regularity of the recurrence of this phenomenon is remarkable . . . Early in the afternoon, or between one and four, the wind changes . . . and a fresh cool wind from the sea produces a mist in the air.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Sea-turn

Go to see a gray squirrel's nest See note to June 1, 1860 ("This makes three gray squirrels' nests that I have seen and heard of (seen two of them) this year, made thus of leaves and sticks open in the trees, and I hear of some more similar ones found in former years, so that I think this mode of nesting their young may be the rule with them here")

Does not the voice of the toad along the river sound differently now from what it did a month ago? See May 31, 1860 ("Hear the sprayey note of toads now more than ever, after the rain."); See also  May 13, 1860 ("It is so warm that I hear the peculiar sprayey note of the toad generally at night."); May 16, 1853 ("Nature’appears to have passed a crisis. . . . The sprayey dream of the toad has a new sound."); May 19, 1854 ("I hear the sprayey-note frog now at sunset."); May 25, 1859 ("Hear within a day or two what I call the sprayey note of the toad, different and later than its early ring.") and A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Ring of Toads

May 31. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, May 31

The voice of the toad

first heard a month ago sounds

differently now.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The voice of the toad

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 does not rain.

June 30.

A. M. — To Ball's Hill.

June 30, 2017

Yesterday afternoon it was remarkably cool, with wind, it being easterly, and I anticipated a sea-turn. There was a little, a blue mistiness, ere long. 

The coolness continues, and this morning the sky is full of clouds, but they look to me like dog-day clouds and not rain-threatening. 

It does not rain.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, June 30, 1857

Remarkably cool, with wind, it being easterly, and I anticipated a sea-turn. See June 30, 1859 ("Cooler, with a northerly wind."); June 30,1855 ("2 P. M. -- Thermometer north side of house, 95°") See also April 28, 1856(" ...on our return the wind changed to easterly, and I felt the cool, fresh sea-breeze."); April 30, 1856 ("at one o’clock there was the usual fresh easterly wind and sea-turn . . .and a fresh cool wind from the sea produces a mist in the air.")  See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Sea-turn

Hearing with the side of the ear.

April 30

Surveying the Tommy Wheeler farm. A fine morning. 

I hear the first brown thrasher singing within three or four rods of me on the shrubby hill side in front of the Hadley place. I think I had a glimpse of one darting down from a sapling-top into the bushes as I rode by the same place on the morning of the 28th. This, I think, is the very place to hear them early, a dry hillside sloping to the south, covered with young wood and shrub oaks. 

I am the more attracted to that house as a dwelling-place. To live where you would hear he first brown thrasher! First, perchance, you have a glimpse of one’s ferruginous long brown back, instantly lost amid the shrub oaks, and are uncertain if it was a thrasher, or one of the other thrushes; and your uncertainty lasts commonly a day or two, until its rich and varied strain is heard. 

Surveying seemed a noble employment which brought me within hearing of this bird. I was trying to get the exact course of a wall thickly beset with shrub oaks and birches, making an opening through them with axe and knife, while the hillside seemed to quiver or pulsate with the sudden melody. 

Again, it is with the side of the ear that you hear. The music or the beauty belong not to your work itself but some of its accompaniments. You would fain devote yourself to the melody, but you will hear more of it if you devote yourself to your work. 

June 30, 2017

Cutting off the limbs of a young white pine in the way of my compass, I find that it strips freely. How long this? By the time I have run through to the Harvard road, I hear the small pewee’s tche-vet’ repeatedly.

The Italian with his hand-organ stops to stare at my compass, just as the boys are curious about his machine. We have exchanged places. 

As I go along the Assabet, a peetweet skims away from the shore. 

The canoe birch sap still flows. It is much like that of the white, and is now pink, white, and yellow on the bark. 

Bluets out on the bank by Tarbell’s spring brook, maybe a day or two.

This was a very warm as well as pleasant day, but at one o’clock there was the usual fresh easterly wind and sea-turn, and before night it grew quite cold for the season. The regularity of the recurrence of this phenomenon is remarkable. I have noticed it, at least, on the 24th late in the day, the 28th and the 29th about 3 P. M., and to-day at 1 P. M. It has been the order. 

Early in the afternoon, or between one and four, the wind changes (I suppose, though I did not notice its direction in the forenoon), and a fresh cool wind from the sea produces a mist in the air. 

About 3.30 P. M., when it was quite cloudy as well as raw, and I was measuring along the river just south of the bridge, I was surprised by the great number of swallows—white-bellied and barn swallows and perhaps republican — flying round and round, or skimming very low over the meadow, just laid bare, only a foot above the ground. 

Either from the shape of the hollow or their circling, they seemed to form a circular flock three or four rods in diameter and one swallow, deep. There were two or three of these centres and some birds equally low over the river. It looked like rain, but did not rain that day or the next. Probably their insect food was flying at that height over the meadow at that time. 

There were a thousand or more of swallows, and I think that they had recently arrived together on their migration. Only this could account for there being so many together. We were measuring through one little circular meadow, and many of them were not driven off by our nearness. The noise of their wings and their twittering was quite loud.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal,  April 30, 1856


You have a glimpse of one’s ferruginous long brown back, instantly lost amid the shrub oaks, and are uncertain if it was a thrasher; and your uncertainty lasts commonly a day or two, until its rich and varied strain is heard.  See May 3, 1852 ("Hear the first brown thrasher, — two of them.  They drown all the rest. He says cherruwit, cherruwit ; go ahead, go ahead; give it to him, give it to him. ");  May 4, 1859 ("We hear a thrasher sing for half an hour steadily, — a very rich singer and heard a quarter of a mile off very distinct . . . He sings as if conscious of his power.");  May 12, 1855 (“The brown thrasher is a powerful singer; he is a quarter of a mile off across the river, when he sounded within fifteen rods.”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Brown Thrasher

Again, it is with the side of the ear that you hear. . . . you will hear more of it if you devote yourself to your work. See November 18, 1851 ("The man who is bent upon his work is frequently in the best attitude to observe what is irrelevant to his work.”); November 20, 1851 ("Hard and steady and engrossing labor with the hands, especially out of doors, is invaluable to the literary man and serves him directly. Here I have been for six days surveying in the woods, and yet when I get home at evening, somewhat weary at last, and beginning to feel that I have nerves, I find myself more susceptible than usual to the finest influences, as music and poetry. The very air can intoxicate me, or the least sight or sound, as if my finer senses had acquired an appetite by their fast.");  June 14, 1853 (“You see those rare sights with the unconscious side of the eye, which you could not see by a direct gaze before.”); April 12, 1854 ("I observe that it is when I have been intently, and it may be laboriously, at work, and am somewhat listless or abandoned after it, reposing, that the muse visits me, and I see or hear beauty."); 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. “);  April 28, 1856 ("I am reminded of the advantage to the poet, and philosopher, and naturalist, and whomsoever, of pursuing from time to time some other business than his chosen one, — seeing with the side of the eye. The poet will so get visions which no deliberate abandonment can secure. The philosopher is so forced to recognize principles which long study might not detect. And the naturalist even will stumble upon some new and unexpected flower or animal.”); May 12, 1857 (“Methinks I hear these sounds, have these reminiscences, only when well employed.”);April 15, 1859 (. If you yield for a moment to the impressions of sense, you hear some bird giving expression to its happiness in a pleasant strain. We are provided with singing birds and with ears to hear them ")

I hear the small pewee’s tche-vet’ repeatedly.  See . May 3, 1854 ("What I have called the small pewee on the willow by my boat, — quite small, uttering a short tchevet from time to time.”); May 3, 1855 ("Small pewee; tchevet, with a jerk of the head.”); May 7, 1852 ("The first small pewee sings now che-vet, or rather chirrups chevet, tche-vet — a rather delicate bird with a large head and two white bars on wings.) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, ,the “Small Pewee" [Empidonax minimus]

As I go along the Assabet, a peetweet skims away from the shore. See May 2, 1859 ("The river seems really inhabited when the peetweet is back . . . This bird does not return to our stream until the weather is decidedly pleasant and warm. . . .Its note peoples the river, like the prattle of children once more in the yard of a house that has stood empty."); May 4, 1856 (“As soon as the rocks begin to be bare the peetweet comes and is seen teetering on them and skimming away from me.”) [Thoreau's Peetweet  is the Spotted Sandpiper  (Actitis macularia)]

Bluets out on the bank by Tarbell’s spring brook, maybe a day or two.  See April 24, 1857 ("Bluets numerous and fully out at the Smith hillside"); April 25, 1859 ("Bluets and potentilla are first noticed by me"); May 7, 1860 ("I saw bluets whitening the fields yesterday a quarter of a mile off. "); May 14, 1852 ("The grass is now whitened with bluets; the fields are green.")

Early in the afternoon . . . the wind changes and a fresh cool wind from the sea produces a mist in the air. See April 28, 1856 ("On our return the wind changed to easterly, and I felt the cool, fresh sea-breeze.");  April 29, 1856 ("About 3 P. M. I felt a fresh easterly wind, and saw quite a mist in the distance produced by it, a sea-turn,") See also  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Sea-turn

The great number of swallows . . . flying round and round. See April 30, 1855 ("Circling about and flying . . . about six inches above the water, — it was cloudy and almost raining”); April 29, 1854 (" The barn swallows are very numerous, flying low over the water in the rain.”) and note to  April 29, 1856 ("Barn swallows and chimney, with white-bellied swallows, are flying together over the river."); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The White-bellied Swallow

April 30. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, April 30

Sudden melody –

absorbed in my work I hear 

my first brown thrasher.

Early afternoon

a fresh cool wind from the sea –

a mist in the air.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Hearing with the side of the Ear

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

tinyurl.com/hdt-560430

Red maple in bloom.

April 29

Was awakened early this morning by thunder and some rain, — the second thunder-shower of the season, —but it proved a fair day. 

At mid forenoon saw a fish hawk flying leisurely over the house northeasterly. 

April 29, 2026

P. M. — To Cedar Swamp. 

J Monroe’s larch staminate buds have now erected and separated their anthers, and they look somewhat withered, as if they had shed a part of their pollen. If so, they began yesterday. 

It was quite warm when I first came out, but about 3 P. M. I felt a fresh easterly wind, and saw quite a mist in the distance produced by it, a sea-turn. There was the same phenomenon yesterday at the same hour, and on the 24th, later in the day. Yet to-day the air was not much cooled. Your first warning of it may be the seeing a thick mist on all the hills and in the horizon. The wind is southeast. 

I see great devil’s-needles whiz by, coupled.

Do not sail well till I reach Dove Rock, then glide swiftly up the stream. I move upward against the current with a moderate but fair wind, the waves somewhat larger, probably because the wind contends with the current. 

The sun is in my face, and the waves look particularly lively and sparkling. I can steer and write at the same time. They gurgle under my stern, in haste to fill the hollow which I have created. The waves seem to leap and roll like porpoises, with a slight surging sound when their crests break, and I feel an agreeable sense that I am swiftly gliding over and through them, bound on my own errands, while their motion is chiefly but an undulation, and an apparent one. 

It is pleasant, exhilarating, to feel the boat tossed up a little by them from time to time. Perhaps a wine-drinker would say it was like the effect of wine. It is flattering to a sense of power to make the wayward wind our horse and sit with our hand on the tiller. Sailing is much like flying, and from the birth of our race men have been charmed by it. 

Near the little larch, scared a small dark-brown hawk from an apple tree, which flew off low to another apple tree beside Barrett’s Pond. Just before he flew again I saw with my glass that his tail was barred with white. Must it not be a pigeon hawk then? He looked a dark slate as he sat, with tawny-white thighs and under head, —far off. He soon started a third time, and a crow seemed to be in chase of him. I think I have not described this white—barred hawk before, but for the black-barred vide May 8, 1854, and April 16, 1855. 

The white cedar now sheds pollen abundantly. Many flowers are effete, though many are not open. Probably it began as much as three days ago. I strike a twig, and its peculiar pinkish pollen fills the air.

Sat on the knoll in the swamp, now laid bare. How pretty a red maple in bloom (they are now in prime), seen in the sun against a pine wood, like these little ones in the swamp against the neighboring wood, they are so light and ethereal, not a heavy mass of color impeding the passage of the light, and they are of so cheerful and lively a color. 

The pine warbler is heard very much now at mid day, when already most birds are quiet. It must be the female which has so much less yellow beneath. 

Do not the toads ring most on a windy day like this? I heard but few on the still 27th. 

A pigeon woodpecker alights on a dead cedar top near me. Its cackle, thus near, sounds like eh eh eh eh eh, etc., rapidly and emphatically repeated. 

Some birch sprouts in the swamp are leafed as much as any shrub or tree. 

April 29, 2016

Barn swallows and chimney, with white-bellied swallows, are flying together over the river. I thought before that I distinguished the twitter of the chimney swallow.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 29, 1856

J. Monroe’s larch staminate buds have now erected and separated their anthers. See April 29, 1855 ("A few of the cones within reach on F. Monroe’s larches shed pollen; say, then, yesterday. The
crimson female flowers are now handsome but small.");April 23, 1855 ("The anthers of the larch are conspicuous, but I see no pollen. White cedar to-morrow.") See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Larch in Spring

The white cedar now sheds pollen abundantly. Probably it began as much as three days ago. I strike a twig, and its peculiar pinkish pollen fills the air. See April 26, 1857 ("The white cedar is apparently just out.") ; April 26, 1856 ("The white cedar gathered the 23d does not shed pollen in house till to-day, and I doubt if it will in swamp before to-morrow."); April 24, 1855 ("The [pollen] of the white cedar is very different, being a faint salmon.”)  See also  A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Cedar Swamps

About 3 P. M. I felt a fresh easterly wind, and saw quite a mist in the distance produced by it, a sea-turn, See  April 28, 1856 ("On our return the wind changed to easterly, and I felt the cool, fresh sea-breeze."); April 30, 1856 ("The regularity of the recurrence of this phenomenon is remarkable . . . between one and four, the wind changes . . . and a fresh cool wind from the sea produces a mist in the air.") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Sea-turn

Must it not be a pigeon hawk then?  I think I have not described this white-barred hawk before. See April 27, 1860 ("Saw yesterday, and see to-day, a small hawk which I take to be a pigeon hawk. This one skims low along over Grindstone Meadow, close to the edge of the water, and I see the blackbirds rise hurriedly from the button bushes and willows before him. I am decided by his size (as well as color) and his low, level skimming.") See also A Book of the Seasons by Henry Thoreau, The Pigeon Hawk (Merlin)

To make the wayward wind our horse and sit with our hand on the tiller. Sailing is much like flying, and from the birth of our race men have been charmed by it. See July 29, 1851 ("The sailboat is an admirable invention, by which you compel the wind to transport you even against itself. It is easier to guide than a horse; the slightest pressure on the tiller suffices. I think the inventor must have been greatly surprised, as well as delighted, at the success of his experiment.”)

How pretty a red maple in bloom (they are now in prime), seen in the sun against a pine wood. See April 23, 1856 ("The red maple did not shed pollen on the 19th and could not on the 20th, 21st, or 22d, on account of rain; so this must be the first day, — the 23d."); April 26, 1855 ("The blossoms of the red maple (some a yellowish green) are now most generally conspicuous and handsome scarlet crescents over the swamps. "); April 26, 1860 (" Red maples are past prime. . . .They are especially handsome when seen between you and the sunlit trees. "); April 28, 1855  ("The red maples, now in bloom, are quite handsome at a distance over the flooded meadow. "); May 1, 1856 ("It is the red maple’s reign now,. . . Looking over the swamps a quarter of a mile distant, you see dimly defined crescents of bright brick red above and amid a maze of ash-colored branches. ") See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Red Maple

 Barn swallows and chimney, with white-bellied swallows, are flying together over the river.   See April 28, 1855 ("The chimney swallow, with the white-bellied and barn swallows, over the river. "); April 28, 1858 ("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,"); April 30, 1856  ("Great number of swallows  — white-bellied and barn swallows and perhaps republican — flying round and round, or skimming very low over the meadow, just laid bare, only a foot above the ground . . .There were a thousand or more of swallows, and I think that they had recently arrived together on their migration."); May 11, 1856 (" There are many swallows circling low over the river behind Monroe’s, — bank swallows, barn, republican, chimney, and white-bellied. These are all circling together a foot or two over the water, passing within ten or twelve feet of me in my boat. It is remarkable how social the different species of swallow are one with another. They recognize their affinity more than usual."); May 20, 1858 (“Hundreds of swallows are now skimming close over the river. . .. There are bank, barn, cliff, and chimney swallows, all mingled together.”) See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The White-bellied Swallow

April 29. See A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, April 29

Red maple in bloom

now in prime seen in the sun

against a pine wood. 

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  Red maple in bloom

 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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560429 

How daring, even rash, Nature appears, who sends out butterflies so early!

April 28. 

Surveying the Tommy Wheeler farm.

April 28, 2017

Again, as so many times, I am reminded of the advantage to the poet, and philosopher, and naturalist, and whomsoever, of pursuing from time to time some other business than his chosen one, — seeing with the side of the eye. 

The poet will so get visions which no deliberate abandonment can secure. The philosopher is so forced to recognize principles which long study might not detect. And the naturalist even will stumble upon some new and unexpected flower or animal. 

Mr. Newton, with whom I rode, thought that there was a peculiar kind of sugar maple which he called the white; knew of a few in the middle of Framingham and said that there was one on our Common. 

How promising a simple, unpretending, quiet, some what reserved man, whether among generals or scholars or farmers! How rare an equanimity and serenity which are an encouragement to all observers! Some youthfulness, some manliness, some goodness. Like Tarbell, a man apparently made a deacon on account of some goodness, and not on account of some hypocrisy and badness as usual. 

Is not the Hubbard Ditch plant the same I see in a Nut Meadow pool, and a remarkable evergreen? with much slime and many young snails on it? 

I hear to-day frequently the seezer seezer seezer of the black and white creeper, or what I have referred to that, from J. P. Brown’s wood bounding on Dugan. It is not a note, nor a bird, to attract attention; only suggesting still warmer weather, —that the season has revolved so much further. 

See, but not yet hear, the familiar chewink amid the dry leaves amid the underwood on the meadow’s edge.  

Many Anemone nemorosa in full bloom at the further end of Yellow Thistle Meadow, in that warm nook by the brook, some probably a day or two there. I think that they are thus early on account of Miles’s dam having broken away and washed off all the snow for some distance there, in the latter part of the winter, long before it melted elsewhere. - It is a warm corner under the south side of a wooded hill, where they are not often, if ever before, flooded. 

As I was measuring along the Marlborough road, a fine little blue-slate butterfly fluttered over the chain. Even its feeble strength was required to fetch the year about. How daring, even rash, Nature appears, who sends out butterflies so early! Sardanapalus-like, she loves extremes and contrasts.

I began to survey the meadow there early, before Miles’s new mill had been running long this Monday morning and flooded it, but a great stream of water was already rushing down the brook, and it almost rose over our boots in the meadow before we had done. 

Observing the young pitch pines by the road south of Loring’s lot that was so heavily wooded, George Hubbard remarked that if they were cut down oaks would spring up, and sure enough, looking across the road to where Loring’s white pines recently stood so densely, the ground was all covered with young oaks. 

Mem. — Let me look at the site of some thick pine woods which I remember, and see what has sprung up; e. g. pitch pines on Thrush Alley and the white pines on Cliffs, also at Baker’s chestnuts, and the chestnut lot on the Tim. Brooks farm. 

This was a very pleasant or rather warm day, looking a little rainy, but on our return the wind changed to easterly, and I felt the cool, fresh sea-breeze. 

This has been'a remarkably pleasant, and I think warm, spring. We have not had the usual sprinklings of snow, having had so much in the winter, — none since I can remember. There is none to come down out of the air.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 28, 1856

Pursuing from time to time some other business than his chosen one, —seeing with the side of the eye. See April 28, 1858 ("While standing by my compass over the supposed town bound . . ., I saw with the side of my eye some black creature crossing the road,"); See also, e.g. September 13, 1852 ("Go not to the object; let it come to you. What I need is not to look at all, but a true sauntering of the eye.”); March 23, 1853 ("Man cannot afford to be a naturalist, to look at Nature directly, but only with the side of his eye.”); June 14, 1853 (". . . you are in that favorable frame of mind described by De Quincey, open to great impressions, and you see those rare sights with the unconscious side of the eye, which you could not see by a direct gaze before.”); December 11, 1855 (" 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.”); April 13, 1860 ("It distinctly occurred to me that, perhaps, if I came . . .to look at the sweet-gale as a matter of business, I might discover something else interesting.")

A fine little blue-slate butterfly fluttered over the chain. Even its feeble strength was required to fetch the year about. See April 24, 1855 ("That fine slaty-blue butterfly, bigger than the small red, in wood-paths."); See April 30, 1859 ("That interesting small blue butterfly (size of small red) is apparently just out, fluttering over the warm dry oak leaves within the wood in the sun."); See also March 23, 1856 ("By their various movements and migrations they fetch the year about to me."); March 10, 1855; ("You are always surprised by the sight of the first spring bird or insect; they seem premature, and there is no such evidence of spring as themselves, so that they literally fetch the year about. . . . But you think, They have come, and Nature cannot recede.") and A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The  Blue Butterfly in Spring

A bird suggesting still warmer weather, —that the season has revolved so much further.  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"); April 27, 1855 ("The black and white creepers running over the trunks or main limbs of red maples and uttering their fainter oven-bird—like notes.");  See also August 19, 1851 ("The seasons do not cease a moment to revolve, and therefore Nature rests no longer at her culminating point than at any other.”); September 17, 1857 (“How perfectly each plant has its turn! – as if the seasons revolved for it alone.!”); March 23, 1856 ("By their various movements and migrations they fetch the year about to me.") See also A Book of the Seasons,   by Henry Thoreau, The Black and White Creeper

See, but not yet hear, the familiar chewink amid the dry leaves amid the underwood on the meadow’s edge. See April 26, 1854  ("Hear the first chewink hopping and chewinking among the shrub oaks."); April 26, 1855 ("See and hear chewinks, — all their strains; the same date with last year, by accident"): April 26, 1858 (" See a chewink (male) in the Kettell place woods."). See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Chewink  (Rufous-sided Towhee)

Let me look at the site of some thick pine woods. . .and see what has sprung up. . . . See October 27, 1860 ("I have now examined many dense pine woods, both pitch and white, and several oak woods, and I do not hesitate to say that oak seedlings under one foot high are very much more abundant under the pines than under the oaks. They prevail and are countless under the pines, while they are hard to find under the oaks.")

I hear first to-day

the seezer seezer of the

black and white creeper.

The epigaea shows a good deal of the pink.

April 24

A rain-threatening April day. Sprinkles a little in the forenoon. 

P. M. — To mayflower. 

The yellow willow peels fairly, probably for several days. Its buds are bursting and showing a little green, at end of railroad bridge. 

On Money-Diggers’ Shore, much large yellow lily root washed up; that white root with white fibres and yellowish leaf—buds. I doubt if I have seen any pontederia this year. 

I find, on the southeast side of Lupine Hill, nearly four rods from the water and a dozen feet above its level, a young Emys picta, one and five eighths inches long and one and a half wide. I think it must have been hatched year before last. It was headed up-hill. Its rear above was already covered with some kind of green moss (?) or the like, which probably had adhered or grown to it in its winter quarters. 

The epigaea on the upper edge of the bank shows a good deal of the pink, and may open in two or three days if it is pleasant. 

April 23, 2024

Trailing arbutus (epigaea) April 24, 2020

Equisetum arvense, by path beyond second brook, probably yesterday. As usual, am struck with the forwardness of the dark patch of slender rush at the cowslip place. 

Returning, in the low wood just this side the first Second Division Brook, near the meadow, see a brown bird flit, and behold my hermit thrush, with one companion, flitting silently through the birches. I saw the fox-color on his tail-coverts, as well as the brown streaks on the breast. Both kept up a constant jerking of the tail as they sat on their perches. 

This season of rain and superabundant moisture makes attractive many an unsightly hollow and recess. I see some roadside lakes, where the grass and clover had already sprung, owing to previous rain or melted snow, now filled with perfectly transparent April rain water, through which I see to their emerald bottoms, -- paved with emerald.

In the pasture beyond Nut Meadow Brook Crossing, the unsightly holes where rocks have been dug and blasted out are now converted into perfect jewels. They are filled with water of crystalline transparency, paved with the same emerald, with a few hardhacks and meadow-sweets standing in them, and jagged points of rock, and a few skaters gliding over them.

Even these furnish goblets and vases of perfect purity to hold the dews and rains, and what more agreeable bottom can we look to than this which the earliest moisture and sun had tinged green? We do not object to see dry leaves and withered grass at the bottom of the goblet when we drink, if these manifestly do not affect the purity of the water. What wells can be more charming? 

If I see an early grasshopper drowning in one, it looks like a fate to be envied. Here is no dark unexplored bottom, with its imagined monsters and mud, but perfect sincerity, setting off all that it reveals. Through this medium we admire even the decaying leaves and sticks at the bottom. 

The brook had risen so, owing to Miles’s running his mill, that I could not get over where I did going.* 

April wells, call them, vases clean as if enameled.

There is a slight sea-turn. I saw it like a smoke beyond Concord from Brown’s high land, and felt the Cool fresh east wind. Is it not common thus early?

The old caterpillar-nests which now lie on the ground under wild cherry trees, and which the birds may use, are a quite light-colored cottony web, close and thick matted, together with the dried excrement of caterpillars, etc., on the inside. 

See a dog’s-bane with two pods open and partially curved backward on each side, but a third not yet open. This soon opens and scatters its down and seeds in my chamber. The outside is a dull reddish or mahogany-color, but the inside is a singularly polished very pale brown. The inner bark of this makes a strong twine like that of the milkweed, but there is not so much of it. 

What is that now ancient and decayed fungus by the first mayflowers, —trumpet-shaped with a very broad mouth, the chief inner part green, the outer dark brown?   

The earliest gooseberry leaf has spread a third of an inch or more.

Goodwin shot, about 6 P. M., and brought to me a cinereous coot (Fulica Americana) which was flying over the willows at Willow Bay, where the water now runs up. It measures fourteen inches to end of tail; eighteen and one half to end of legs. Tail projects a half inch beyond closed wings. Alar extent twenty-six inches. (These dimensions are somewhat stretched.) Above it is a bluish slate, passing into olive behind the wings, the primaries more brownish. Beneath, ash color or pale slate. Head and neck, uniform deep black. Legs, clear green in front, passing into lead-color behind and on the lobes. Edging of wings, white; also the tips of the secondaries for one fourth of an inch, and a small space under the tail. Wings beneath, very light,  almost silvery, slate. Vent, for a small space, black. Bill, bluish-white, with a chestnut bar near tip, and corresponding chestnut spot on each side of lower mandible and a somewhat diamond-shaped chestnut spot at base in front. No noticeable yellow on bill. Irides, reddish. No noticeable whitish spot beneath eyes; only bare lid. Legs and feet are very neat; talons very slender, curving, and sharp, the middle ones 1/2 inch+ long. Lobes chiefly on the inner side of the toes. Legs bare half an inch above the joint. From its fresh and tender look I judge it to be a last year’s bird. It is quite lousy. 

According to Nuttall, they range from 55° north latitude to Florida and Jamaica and west to Oregon (?) and Mexico. Probably breed in every part of North America, —even in Fresh Pond, he would imply, — but their nests, eggs, and breeding-habits are yet unknown. Nocturnal, hiding by day. In Florida in the winter. Come to Fresh Pond in September. A pair there in April, and seen with young birds in June. When alarmed utter a “hoarse kruk.” Called “flusterers” in Carolina, according to Lawson, because they fly trailing their legs or pattering with them over the water. Food: vegetables, also small shellfish, insects, gravel, etc. Leave the Northern States in November.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 24, 1856

*Warren Miles at his new mill tells me eels can’t get above his mill now, in the spring.


A young Emys picta, one and five eighths inches long. See April 21, 1855 ("Saw a painted turtle not two inches in diameter. This must be more than one year old”). See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Painted Turtle (Emys picta)

The inner bark of [the dog's-bane] makes a strong twine like that of the milkweed. See August 16, 1856 ("I find the dog's-bane (Apocynum androsoemifolium) bark not the nearly so strong as that of the A. cannabinum”).; August 5, 1856 (“At the Assabet stone bridge, apparently freshly in flower, — though it may have been out nearly as long as the androscemifolium, — apparently the Apocynum var. hypericifolium (?)”) ;  September 2, 1856 ("Some years ago I sought for Indian hemp (Apocynum cannabinum) hereabouts in vain, and concluded that it did not grow here. A month or two ago I read again, as many times before, that its blossoms were very small, scarcely a third as large as those of the common species, and for some unaccountable reason this distinction kept recurring to me, and I regarded the size of the flowers I saw, though I did not believe that it grew here; and in a day or two my eyes fell on it, aye, in three different places, and different varieties of it.")

The earliest gooseberry leaf has spread a third of an inch or more. See April 13, 1856 ("The early gooseberry leaf-buds in garden have burst, -- now like small green frilled horns); April 23, 1855 ("The currant and second gooseberry are bursting into leaf.”) See also A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Spring Leaf-Out

The epigaea on the upper edge of the bank shows a good deal of the pink. See April 4, 1859 ("The epigaea looks as if it would open in two or three days at least, — showing much color. The flower-buds are protected by the withered leaves, oak leaves, which partly cover them, so that you must look pretty sharp to detect the first flower."); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  Epigaea (mayflower or trailing arbutus)

Equisetum arvense, by path beyond second brook, probably yesterday. See April 24, 1855 ("The Equisetum arvense on the causeway sheds its green pollen .”)

Behold my hermit thrush, with one companion, flitting silently through the birches . . . Both kept up a constant jerking of the tail as they sat on their perches.   This may be HDT’s first certain, correct identification of the hermit, which is the first thrush to arrive in April. He has mistaken it for the wood thrush and the "golden-crowned” thrrush and  has been brushing up on his thrushes. See  May 7, 1852 (" A wood [sic] thrush which. . .betrayed himself by moving, like a large sparrow with ruffled feathers, and quirking his tail like a pewee,  on a low branch.”);  May 22, 1852 ("On my way to Plymouth, looked at Audubon in the State-House. The female (and male?) wood thrush spotted the whole length of belly; the hermit thrush not so.”); April 18, 1854 ("Was surprised to see a wagtail thrush, the golden-crowned, at the Assabet Spring,”); April 27, 1854 ("What a shy fellow my hermit thrush! ");May 4, 1855 ("Several larger thrushes on low limbs and on ground, with a dark eye (not the white around it of the wood thrush) and, I think, the nankeen spot on the secondaries. A hermit thrush?); April 21, 1855 ("At Cliffs, I hear at a distance a wood [sic] thrush. It affects us as a part of our unfallen selves..”); September 29, 1855 ("At Natural History Library saw Dr. Cabot, who says that he has heard either the hermit, or else the olivaceous, thrush sing,—very like a wood thrush, but softer. Is sure that the hermit thrush sometimes breeds hereabouts.”). See also June 12, 1857 ("At Natural History Rooms.. . . The wood thrush's is a slender egg, a little longer than a catbird's and uniform greenish-blue. . . . The egg of the hermit thrush [which variety?] is about as big as that of Wilson's thrush, but darker green.”); October 22, 1857 (“I see what I call a hermit thrush on the bushes by the shore of Flint’s Pond . . .”) Also see A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Early Spring: The Arrival of the Hermit Thrush

See a brown bird flit

and behold my hermit thrush

with one companion.

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The epigaea shows a good deal of the pink

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

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-560424