A screech owl sitting on the edge of a hollow hemlock stump, at the base of a large hemlock.

October 28.

As I paddle under the Hemlock bank this cloudy afternoon, about 3 o’clock, I see a screech owl sitting on the edge of a hollow hemlock stump about three feet high, at the base of a large hemlock. 

It sits with its head drawn in, eying me, with its eyes partly open, about twenty feet off. 

When it hears me move, it turns its head toward me, perhaps one eye only open, with its great glaring golden iris. You see two whitish triangular lines above the eyes meeting at the bill, with a sharp reddish-brown triangle between and a narrow curved line of black under each eye. 

At this distance and in this light, you see only a black spot where the eye is, and the question is whether the eyes are open or not. 

It sits on the lee side of the tree this raw and windy day. You would say that this was a bird without a neck. Its short bill, which rests upon its breast, scarcely projects at all, but in a state of rest the whole upper part of the bird from the wings is rounded off smoothly, excepting the horns, which stand up conspicuously or are slanted back. 

After watching it ten minutes from the boat, I land two rods above, and, stealing quietly up behind the hemlock, though from the windward, I look carefully around it, and, to my surprise, see the owl still sitting there. 

So I spring round quickly, with my arm outstretched, and catch it in my hand. 

It is so surprised that it offers no resistance at first, only glares at me in mute astonishment with eyes as big as saucers. But ere long it begins to snap its bill, making quite a noise, and, as I roll it up in my handkerchief and put it in my pocket, it bites my finger slightly. 

I soon take it out of my pocket and, tying the handkerchief, leave it on the bottom of the boat. So I carry it home and made a small cage in which to keep it, for a night.

General color of the owl a rather pale and perhaps slightly reddish brown, the feathers centred with black. Perches with two claws above and two below the perch. It is a slight body, covered with a mass of soft and light-lying feathers. Its head muffled in a great hood. It must be quite comfortable in winter.

Dropped a pellet of fur and bones in his cage. He sat, not really moping but trying to sleep, in a corner of his box all day, yet with one or both eyes slightly open all the while. Ordinarily stood rather than sat on his perch.

I never once caught him with his eyes shut. 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, October 28, 1855

A Book of the Seasons: October 28

October 28.

Suddenly the light

of the setting sun yellows

and warms the landscape.

October 28, 1852

I hear no sound but
rustling of the withered leaves
and roar of the wind.
October 28, 1852

Now the woods look bare
reflected in the water --
birches still yellow.
October 28, 1854

The reflected woods

begin to look bare –I look 

far between the trees.

Now the woods look bare

reflected in the water–

birches still yellow.

All at once pure white 

low-slanting sunlight lights up

two ducks on the pond.

October 28, 1857

All at once slanting

pure white sun light  lighting up

two ducks on the pond.

October 28, 1857

Leaves of the hemlock
now in the midst of its fall,
strew the ground like grain.
October 28, 1858

Fallen black walnuts
have a rich nutmeg fragrance,
now turning dark-brown.
October 28, 1859

We make a great noise
going through the fallen leaves
in the wood-paths now.
October 28, 1860

As if the tumult
of the waves clashing your boat
as we sail the wood.
October 28, 1860.

*****

Four months of the green leaf make all our summer . . . from June 1st to October 1st. . . and methinks there are about four months when the ground is white with snow. That would leave two months for spring and two for autumn. October 28, 1852

October the month of ripe or painted leaves; November the month of withered leaves and bare twigs and limbs. October 28, 1852

Here is an Indian-summer day. Not so warm, indeed, as the 19th and 20th, but warm enough for pleasure.  October 28, 1858

Rain in the night and this morning, preparing for winter. October 28, 1853

Just saw in the garden, in the drizzling rain, little sparrow-sized birds flitting about amid the dry corn stalks and the weeds, — one, quite slaty with black streaks and a bright-yellow crown and rump, which I think is the yellow-crowned warbler, but most of the others much more brown, with yellowish breasts and no yellow on crown to be observed, which I think the young of the same. One flew up fifteen feet and caught an insect. They uttered a faint chip. Some of the rest were sparrows. October 28, 1853 

On the causeway I see fox-colored sparrows flitting along in the willows and alders, uttering a faint cheep, and tree sparrows with them. October 28, 1857

On a black willow, a single grackle with the bright irls. October 28, 1857

See a very large flock of crows. October 28, 1860

I look up and see a male marsh hawk with his clean cut wings, that has just skimmed past above my head, – not at all disturbed, only tilting his body a little, now twenty rods off, with demi-semi-quaver of his wings. He is a very neat flyer. October 28, 1857

Again, I hear the scream of a hen-hawk, soaring and circling onward . . . What a regular figure this fellow makes on high, with his broad tail and broad wings! . . . He goes round now one full circle without a flap, tilting his wing a little; then flaps three or four times and rises higher. Now he comes on like a billow, screaming. Steady as a planet in its orbit . . . His scream is . . . a hoarse, tremulous breathing forth of his winged energy . . . The hawks are large-souled. October 28, 1857 ,


As I paddle under the Hemlock bank this cloudy afternoon, about 3 o’clock, I see a screech owl sitting on the edge of a hollow hemlock stump . . . I carried it home and made a small cage in which to keep it, for a night. October 28, 1855

Goldenrods and asters have been altogether lingering some days. October 28, 1859

How handsome the great red oak acorns now! October 28, 1858

 The boys are gathering walnuts. Their leaves are a yellowish brown.. October 28, 1852 

Walnuts commonly fall, and the black walnuts at Smith's are at least half fallen. They are of the form and size of a small lemon and — what is singular — have a rich nutmeg fragrance. They are now turning dark-brown. October 28, 1859

The woods begin to look bare, reflected in the water, and I look far in between the stems of the trees under the bank.  October 28, 1854

Swamp white oak withers apparently with the white. Some of both are still partly greenish, while others of both are bare. October 28, 1858

The majority of the white maples are bare, but others are still thickly leaved the leaves being a greenish yellow. It appears, then, that they hold their leaves longer than our other maples, or most trees.  October 28, 1858

Birches, which began to change and fall so early, are still in many places yellow.  October 28, 1854

The Populus grandidentata leaves are not all fallen yet. This, then, is late to lose its leaves, later, rather, than the sugar maple. Its leaves are large and conspicuous on the ground, and from their freshness make a great show there. It is later to fall than the tremuli formic, as it was later to bloom. October 28, 1858

The dogwood on the island is perhaps in its prime, — a distinct scarlet, with half of the leaves green in this case. Apparently none have fallen. October 28, 1858

I see yet also some Cornus sericea bushes with leaves turned a clear dark but dull red, rather handsome. October 28, 1858

Some large red oaks are still as bright as ever, and that is here a brownish yellow, with leaves partly withered; and some are already quite bare. October 28, 1858


The white pine needles on the ground are already turned considerably redder. October 28, 1857

We make a great noise going through the fallen leaves in the woods and wood-paths now, so that we cannot hear other sounds. October 28, 1860

Cattle coming down from up country.  October 28, 1858


Sunset from the Poplar Hill. A warm, moist afternoon. The clouds lift in the west, — indeed the horizon is now clear all around. Suddenly the light of the setting sun yellows and warms all the landscape. The air is filled with a remarkably vaporous haze. The shadows of the trees on the river's edge stretch straight a quarter of a mile into the level russet Great Meadows. October 28, 1852

All at once a low-slanted glade of sunlight from one of heaven’s west windows behind me fell on the bare gray maples, lighting them up with an incredibly intense and pure white light; then, going out there, it lit up some white birch stems south of the pond, then the gray rocks and the pale reddish young oaks of the lower cliffs, and then the very pale brown meadow-grass, and at last the brilliant white breasts of two ducks, tossing on the agitated surface far off on the pond. October 28, 1857

After whatever revolutions in my moods and experiences, when I come forth at evening, as if from years of confinement to the house, I see the few stars which make the constellation of the Lesser Bear in the same relative position, - the everlasting geometry of the stars.  October 28, 1852

The moon beginning to wane.  It is a quite warm but moist night. The dew in the withered grass reflects the moonlight  October 28, 1852

That star which accompanies the moon will not be her companion tomorrow  October 28, 1852

At the eleventh hour, late in the year, we have visions of the life we might have lived.  October 28, 1857

*****

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Myrtle-bird

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Tree Sparrow

 A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Fox-colored Sparrow

 A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Winter Birds

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the American Crow

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  The hen-hawk

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau,  the Marsh Hawk (Northern Harrier)

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The White Pines

A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The October Pine Fall

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Birches in Season

A Book of the Seasons,   by Henry Thoreau, the Big-toothed Aspen

 (Populus grandidentata)

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Aspens

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, October Moods

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, October Moonlight

*****

August 28, 1860 ("Just before setting, the sun comes out into a clear space in the horizon and a sudden blaze of light falls on east end of the pond and the hillside.")

September 25, 1851 ("Hawks, too, I perceive, sailing about in the clear air, looking white against the green pines, like the seeds of the milkweed. There is almost always a pair of hawks. Their shrill scream, that of the owls, and wolves are all related.")
October 10, 1851 ("You make a great noise now walking in the woods.")
October 21, 1857 ("I see many myrtle-birds now about the house this forenoon, on the advent of cooler weather. They keep flying up against the house and the window and fluttering there, as if they would come in, or alight on the wood-pile or pump. They would commonly be mistaken for sparrows, but show more white when they fly, beside the yellow on the rump and sides of breast seen near to and two white bars on the wings.")
October 22, 1855 ("I see at a distance the scattered birch-tops, like yellow flames amid the pines,");
October 22, 1857 ("As I go through the woods now, so many oak and other leaves have fallen the rustling noise somewhat disturbs my musing.”)

 October 23, 1857(“I can find no bright leaves now in the woods.”)
October 24, 1852 ("I see, far over the river, boys gathering walnuts.");
October 24, 1857 ("I hear the dull thump of heavy stones against the trees from far through the rustling wood, where boys are ranging for nuts. ")
October 26, 1860 ("This is the season of birch spangles, when you see afar a few clear-yellow leaves left on the tops of the birches.")
October 27, 1857 ("Now it is time to look out for walnuts")

October 29, 1855 ("As I pass Merrick’s pasture, I see and count about a hundred crows advancing in a great rambling flock from the southeast and crossing the river on high, and cawing")

October 29, 1857 (" A flock of about eighty crows flies ramblingly over toward the sowing, cawing and loitering and making a great ado, apparently about nothing")
November 1, 1851 ("Counted one hundred and twenty five crows in one straggling flock moving westward. ")

November 1, 1853 ("As I go up the back road, I am struck with the general stillness as far as birds are concerned.. . .I only hear some crows toward the woods. . . . As I return, I notice crows flying southwesterly in a very long straggling flock, of which I see probably neither end.")
November 2, 1853 (" A red-tailed hawk")
November 5, 1854 ("I think it is the fox-colored sparrow I see in flocks and hear sing now by wood-sides.")
November 6, 1853 ("It is surprising how little most of us are contented to know about the sparrows which drift about in the air before us just before the first snows. These little sparrows with white in tail, perhaps the prevailing bird of late, have flitted before me so many falls and springs, yet they have been strangers to me.")
November 14, 1853 (“October . . . is the sunset month of the year, when the earth is painted like the sunset 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 © 2009-2019

Wild apples

October 27. 

There are many fringed gentians, now considerably frost-bitten, in what was E. Hosmer’s meadow between his dam and the road. 

It is high time we came a-nutting, for the nuts have nearly all fallen, and you must depend on what you can find on the ground, left by the squirrels, and cannot shake down any more to speak of. 

The trees are nearly all bare of leaves as well as burs. The wind comes cold from the northwest, as if there were snow on the earth in that direction.

Larches are yellowing. 

It is remarkable that the wild apples which I praise as so spirited and racy when eaten in the fields and woods, when brought into the house have a harsh and crabbed taste. To appreciate their wild and sharp flavors, it seems necessary that you be breathing the sharp October or November air.  

They must be eaten in the fields, when your system is all aglow with exercise, the frosty weather nips your fingers (in November), the wind rattles the bare boughs and rustles the leaves, and the jay is heard screaming around.

Some of those apples might be labelled, “To be eaten in the wind.”

So there is one thought for the field, another for the house. I would have my thoughts, like wild apples, to be food for walkers, and will not warrant them to be palatable if tasted in the house.

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

It is high time we came a-nutting, for the nuts have nearly all fallen, and you must depend on what you can find on the ground, left by the squirrels, and cannot shake down any more to speak of. See note to October 27, 1853 ("Now it is time to look out for walnuts, last and hardest crop of the year?")

I would have my thoughts, like wild apples, to be food for walkers, and will not warrant them to be palatable if tasted in the house. See November 11, 1860 (“Now is the time for wild apples. . . Food for walkers.”)

A Book of the Seasons: October 27.

October 27

October 27, 202

October morning

I wake and find it snowing

unexpectedly.

October 27, 1851

The strong northwest wind

blows snow horizontally.

The birds seek shelter.

October 27, 1851

Cold numbs my fingers.

Winter, with its inwardness,

makes one sit to think.

October 27, 1851

Trees nearly all bare,
wind comes cold from the northwest
as if snow were there.
October 27, 1855

Wind comes cold from the 

northwest as if there were snow 

in that direction.

October 27, 1855 

The cool white twilights
of this season – itself the
twilight of the year.
October 27, 1858

Oak seedlings are much

more abundant under pines

than under the oaks.

October 27, 1860

 

She my morning light

now neither the morning nor 

the evening star.

The oftener we

meet the more rapid

our divergence.

Obstacles of heart

are like granite blocks that one

alone cannot move.

October 27, 1851

*****

This morning I wake and find it snowing and the ground covered with snow, quite unexpectedly, for last night it was rainy but not cold. October 27, 1851

The strong northwest wind blows the damp snow along almost horizontally. The birds fly about as if seeking shelter. The cold numbs my fingers. October 27, 1851

The trees are nearly all bare of leaves as well as burs. The wind comes cold from the northwest, as if there were snow on the earth in that direction. October 27, 1855

I hear that Sammy Hoar saw geese go over to-day. The fall (strictly speaking) is approaching an end in this probably annual northeast storm. October 27, 1857 

Winter, with its inwardness, is upon us. A man is constrained to sit down, and to think.  October 27, 1851

 6.30 a. m. — To Island by boat . . . I hear a blackbird in the air; and these, methinks, are song sparrows flitting about, with the three spots on breast. October 27, 1853

I sail swiftly, standing up and tipping my boat to make a keel of its side, though at first it is hard to keep off a lee-shore. . . . It is exciting to feel myself tossed by the dark waves and hear them surge about me. The reign of water now begins, and how it gambols and revels! Waves are its leaves, foam its blossoms. How they run and leap in great droves, deriving new excitement from each other! Schools of porpoises and blackfish are only more animated waves and have acquired the gait and game of the sea itself. The high wind and the dashing waves are very inspiriting. October 27, 1857

Saw a woodcock  feeding, probing the mud with its long bill, under the railroad bridge within two feet of me for a long time. Could not scare it far away. What a disproportionate length of bill! It is a sort of badge they [wear] as a punishment for greediness in a former state.   October 27, 1851

It is remarkable that the wild apples which I praise as so spirited and racy when eaten in the fields and woods, when brought into the house have a harsh and crabbed taste. To appreciate their wild and sharp flavors, it seems necessary that you be breathing the sharp October or November air.  They must be eaten in the fields, when your system is all aglow with exercise, the frosty weather nips your fingers (in November), the wind rattles the bare boughs and rustles the leaves, and the jay is heard screaming around. Some of those apples might be labelled, “To be eaten in the wind.”   October 27, 1855 

As I am coming out of this, looking for seedling oaks, I see a jay, which was screaming at me, fly to a white oak eight or ten rods from the wood in the pasture and directly alight on the ground, pick up an acorn, and fly back into the woods with it. This was one, perhaps the most effectual, way in which this wood was stocked with the numerous little oaks which I saw under that dense white pine grove. Where will you look for a jay sooner than in a dense pine thicket? It is there they commonly live, and build.  October 27, 1860

Some less obvious and commonly unobserved signs of the progress of the seasons interest me most, like the loose, dangling catkins of the hop-hornbeam or of the black or yellow birch. I can recall distinctly to my mind the image of these things, and that time in which they flourished is glorious as if it were before the fall of man. I see all nature for the time under this aspect.  October 27, 1853

There are many fringed gentians, now considerably frost-bitten, in what was E. Hosmer’s meadow between his dam and the road.  October 27, 1855

Larches are yellowing. October 27, 1855

The leaves of the Salix cordata are now generally withered and many more fallen. They are light-brown, and many remain on the twigs, so many that this willow and the tristis I think must be peculiar in this respect as well as its turning scarlet. October 27, 1858

Now it is time to look out for walnuts, last and hardest crop of the year? October 27, 1853

It is high time we came a-nutting, for the nuts have nearly all fallen, and you must depend on what you can find on the ground, left by the squirrels, and cannot shake down any more to speak of. October 27, 1855

The colors of the fields make haste to harmonize with the snowy mantle which is soon to invest them and with the cool, white twilights of that season which is itself the twilight of the year. October 27, 1858

They become more and more the color of the frost which rests on them. October 27, 1858

We have a cool, white sunset, Novemberish, and no redness to warm our thoughts.  October 27, 1858

October 27, 2021

October 27, 2023

October 27, 2024

*****

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau: The Fringed Gentian

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau the Yellow Birch

A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, the Larch

A Book of Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Salix cordata (heartleaf willow)

A Book of the Seasons,    by Henry Thoreau, the Song Sparrow (Fringilla melodia)

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, October Moods

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The Blue Jay

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The American Woodcock

A Book of the Seasons  by Henry Thoreau, A Season for Sailing

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Geese in Autumn

October 27, 2017

October 27, 2023

October 27, 2023

*****

October 27, 2014

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 © 2009-2015

The leaves of the oaks and hickories have begun to be browned.

October 26. 

P. M. —To Conantum. 

Another clear cold day, though not so cold as yesterday. The light and sun come to us directly and freely, as if some obstruction had been removed,—the windows of heaven had been washed.

I see some farmers now cutting up their corn. 

The sweet Viburnum leaves hang thinly on the bushes and are a dull crimsonish red. 

What apples are left out now, I presume that the farmers do not mean to gather. 

The witch-hazel is still freshly in flower, and near it I see a houstonia in bloom. 

The hillside is slippery with new-fallen white pine leaves. 

The leaves of the oaks and hickories have begun to be browned, — lost their brilliancy.

I return by way of the mocker-nut trees. The squirrels have already begun on them, though the trees are still covered with yellow and brown leaves, and the nuts do not fall.

A little this side I see a red squirrel dash out from the wall, snatch an apple from amid many on the ground, and, running swiftly up the tree with it, proceed to eat it, sitting on a smooth dead limb, with its back to the wind and its tail curled close over its back.

The song sparrow still sings on a button-bush.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, October 26, 1855

What apples are left out now, I presume that the farmers do not mean to gather. See October 25, 1855 (“Now gather all your apples, if you have not before, or the frost will have them.”)

The song sparrow still sings on a button-bush.  See October 16, 1855 ("Then, nearer home, I hear two or three song sparrows on the button-bushes sing as in spring, — that memorable tinkle, — as if it would be last as it was first."); October 27, 1853 ("Song sparrows flitting about, with the three spots on breast.")

October 26. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, October 26

A Book of the Seasons: October 26.

October 26.

At this season we

seek to warm ourselves in the

sun as by a fire.

October 26, 1852

The blue-stemmed and white

goldenrod survive – push up

and blossom anew.

October 26, 1852

Now leaves are off we

notice the buds prepared for

another season.

October 26, 1853

As woods grow silent

we attend to the cheerful

notes of chickadees.

October 26, 1854

Seasons are in me.

My moods periodical --

no two days alike.

October 26, 1857

This is the season

when leaves of the fall whirl

through the air like birds.

October 26, 1860

This is the season

of clear-yellow leaves left on

the tops of birches.

October 26, 1860

October 26, 2019

Spring is brown; summer, green; autumn, yellow; winter, white; November, gray. October 26, 1857 

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. October 26, 1857

The seasons and all their changes are in me. October 26, 1857

Almost I believe the Concord would not rise and overflow its banks again, were I not here. October 26, 1857

After a while I learn what my moods and seasons are. I would have nothing subtracted. I can imagine nothing added. October 26, 1857 See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Moods and Seasons of the Mind.

My moods are thus periodical, not two days in my year alike. October 26, 1857

The perfect correspondence of Nature to man, so that he is at home in her! October 26, 1857

It is surprising how any reminiscence of a different season of the year affects us. October 26, 1853

You only need to make a faithful record of an average summer day's experience and summer mood, and read it in the winter, and it will carry you back to more than that summer day alone could show.October 26, 1853

When I meet with any such in my Journal, it affects me as poetry. I appreciate that other season and that particular phenomenon more than at the time. Only the rarest flower, the purest melody, of the season thus comes down to us. October 26, 1853

The world so seen is all one spring, and full of beauty. October 26, 1853

*****

March 22, 1859 ("The great scarlet oak has now lost almost every leaf, while the white oak near it still retains them.");
April 24, 1854 ( I hear the loud and distinct pump-a-gor of a stake-driver. Thus he announces himself.")
April, 25 1858 ("Goodwin says he heard a stake-driver several days ago.")May 9, 1853 ("The pump-like note of a stake-driver from the fenny place across the Lee meadow. ");
May 10, 1852 ("We remember autumn to best advantage in the spring; the finest aroma of it reaches us then.")
May 17, 1852 ("The birch leaves are so small that you see the landscape through the tree, and they are like silvery and green spangles in the sun, fluttering about the tree.")
May 20, 1856 ("See and hear a stake-driver in the swamp. It took one short pull at its pump and stopped.")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. ”)
June 11, 1851 (“Hardly two nights are alike. . . .No one, to my knowledge, has observed the minute differences in the seasons.”)
June 11, 1860 ("Just as we are shoving away from this isle, I hear a sound just like a small dog barking hoarsely, and, looking up, see it was made by a bittern (Ardea minor), a pair of which flap over the meadows and probably nest in some tussock thereabouts.");
June 15, 1857 ("as I passed a swamp, a bittern boomed.")
June 15, 1851 ("The sound of the stake-driver at a distance, — like that made by a man pumping in a neighboring farmyard,. . ., and I can imagine like driving a stake in a meadow. The pumper. . . .before I was further off than I thought, so now I was nearer than I thought")
July 22, 1859 ("Heard from a bittern, a peculiar hoarse, grating note, lazily uttered as it flew over the meadows. A bittern's croak: a sound perfectly becoming the bird, as far as possible from music.")
August 7, 1853("The objects I behold correspond to my mood")
August 14, 1856 ("All the Flint's Pond wood-paths are strewn with these gay-spotted chestnut leaves")

October 6, 1858 ("Only one of the large maples on the Common is yet on fire. ");
October 10, 1856 ("This afternoon it is 80°, . . . I lie with window wide open under a single sheet most of the night").
October 10, 1851 ("The chickadee, sounding all alone, now that birds are getting scarce, reminds me of the winter, in which it almost alone is heard.")
October 12, 1858 ("The leaves of the azaleas are falling, mostly fallen, and revealing the large blossom-buds, so prepared are they for another year. ")
October 13, 1857 ("I am obliged to sit with my window wide open all the evening as well as all day. It is the earlier Indian summer.")
October 13, 1859 ("The chickadee seems to lisp a sweeter note")
October 13, 1860 ("Now, as soon as the frost strips the maples, and their leaves strew the swamp floor and conceal the pools, the note of the chickadee sounds cheerfully winteryish.")

October 15, 1857 ("The ten days — at least — before this were plainly Indian summer. They were remarkably pleasant and warm. The latter half I sat and slept with an open window,")

October 18, 1856 ("The sugar maples are now in their glory, all aglow with yellow, red, and green.”);
October 18, 1858 ("The large sugar maples on the Common are now at the height of their beauty. “);
October 18, 1856 ("A-chestnutting down Turnpike and across to Britton's, thinking that the rain now added to the frosts would relax the burs which were open and let the nuts drop.")

October 20, 1856 ("Thus, of late, when the season is declining, many birds have departed, and our thoughts are turned towards winter . . . we hear the jay again more frequently, and the chickadees are more numerous and lively and familiar and utter their phebe note,")

October 21, 1855 ("The scarlet oak is very bright and conspicuous. How finely its leaves are out against the sky with sharp points, especially near the top of the tree! ")
October 21, 1855 ("I sit with an open window, it is so warm.")

October 21, 1858 ("The large sugar maples on the Common are in the midst of their fall to-day. ")

October 22, 1855 ("I see at a distance the scattered birch-tops, like yellow flames amid the pines,")
October 22, 1857("Chestnut trees are almost bare. Now is just the time for chestnuts.")
October 22, 1855 ("I see at a distance the scattered birch-tops, like yellow flames amid the pines,")
October 23, 1855 ("Now is the time for chestnuts. A stone cast against the trees shakes them down in showers upon one’s head and shoulders."
October 24, 1853 ("Red maples and elms alone very conspicuously bare in our landscape")

October 24, 1857 ("The sugar maple leaves are now falling fast.")
October 24, 1855 ("The rich yellow and scarlet leaves of the sugar maple on the Common now thickly cover the grass in great circles about the trees, and, half having fallen, look like the reflection of the trees in water lighting up the Common, reflecting light even to the surrounding houses.")
October 24, 1858 ("The Populus grandidentata and sugar maple . . .have lost the greater part of their leaves.")
October 24, 1858 ("The scarlet oak. . . is now completely scarlet and apparently has been so a few days. This alone of our indigenous deciduous trees . . .is now in its glory. ")

October 25, 1853 ("The white maples are completely bare. ");

October 25, 1855 ("The willows along the river now begin to look faded and somewhat bare and wintry.")

 October 25, 1858 ("I see some alders about bare. Aspens (tremuliformis) generally bare. . . .At the pond the black birches are bare");
October 25, 1853 ("The white maples are completely bare. ")
October 25, 1855 ("The willows along the river now begin to look faded and somewhat bare and wintry.")
October 25, 1858 ("I see some alders about bare. Aspens (tremuliformis) generally bare. . . .At the pond the black birches are bare")
October 25, 1858 ("Now that the leaves are fallen (for a few days), the long yellow buds (often red-pointed) which sleep along the twigs of the S. discolor are very conspicuous and quite interesting, already even carrying our thoughts for ward to spring. I noticed them first on the 22d. They may be put with the azalea buds already noticed. Even bleak and barren November wears these gems on her breast in sign of the coming year.")

October 30, 1853 ("Now, now is the time to look at the buds.”);

October 30, 1855 ("Going to the new cemetery, I see that the scarlet oak leaves have still some brightness; perhaps the latest of the oaks.")
October 30, 1853 ("Now, now is the time to look at the buds.”)
October 31, 1854 ("Sat with open window for a week.”)
October 31, 1854 ("[W]e have had remarkably warm and pleasant Indian summer, with frequent frosts")
November 1, 1858 ("If you wish to count the scarlet oaks. do it now. Stand on a hilltop in the woods, when the sun is an hour high and the sky is clear, and every one within range of your vision will be revealed. ")
November 6, 1857 ("seventy years ago . . .there was a large old chestnut by the roadside there, which being cut, two sprouts came up which have become the largest chestnut trees by the wall now.")
November 8, 1855 ("I can sit with my window open and no fire. Much warmer than this time last year.")
November 11, 1859 ("October 24th, riding home from Acton, I saw the withered leaves blown from an oak by the roadside dashing off, gyrating, and surging upward into the air, so exactly like a flock of birds sporting with one another that, for a minute at least, I could not be sure they were not birds.")
December 1, 1852 ("At this season I observe the form of the buds which are prepared for spring.");
December 11, 1858 ("The large scarlet oak in the cemetery has leaves on the lower limbs near the trunk just like the large white oaks now.")
December 22, 1859 ("I see in the chestnut woods near Flint's Pond where squirrels have collected the small chestnut burs left the trunks on the snow.")

January 10, 1856 ("The great yellow and red forward-looking buds of the azalea")
January 19, 1859 {"Our largest scarlet oak (by the Hollow), some three feet diameter at three feet from ground, has more leaves than the large white oak close by.")
January 25, 1858 ("What a rich book might be made about buds,")

October 26,, 2018

 

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 © 2009-2016