Henry David Thoreau’s diary, 1851

Saw at Clinton last night a room at the gingham-mills which covers one and seven-eighths acres and contains 578 looms, not to speak of spindles, both throttle and…

The longest silence is the most pertinent question most pertinently put. Emphatically silent. The most important question, whose answers concern us more than any,…

The catkins of the alders are now frozen stiff!! Almost all that my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad. If I repent of anything, it is of my good…

The snow is sixteen inches deep at least, but [it] is a mild and genial afternoon, as if it were the beginning of a January thaw. Take away the snow and it would…

The smilax (green-briar) berries still hang on like small grapes. The thorn of this vine is very perfect, like a straight dagger. The light of the setting sun…

The snow shows how much of the mountains in the horizon are covered with forest. I can also see plainer as I stand on a hill what proportion of the township is in…

The last half of January was warm and thawy. The swift streams were open, and the muskrats were seen swimming and diving and bringing up clams, leaving their shells…

A beautiful day, with but little snow or ice on the ground. Though the air is sharp, as the earth is half bare the hens have strayed to some distance from the…

Skated to Sudbury. A beautiful, summer-like day. The meadows were frozen just enough to bear. Examined now the fleets of ice-flakes close at hand. They are a very…

Consider the farmer, who is commonly regarded as the healthiest man. He may be the toughest, but he is not the healthiest. He has lost his elasticity; he can…

Fatal is the discovery that our friend is fallible, that he has prejudices. He is, then, only prejudiced in our favor. What is the value of his esteem who does not…

Do we call this the land of the free? What is it to be free from King George the Fourth and continue the slaves of prejudice? What is it [to] be born free and…

Ground nearly bare of snow. Pleasant day with a strong south wind. Skated, though the ice was soft in spots. Saw the skunk-cabbage in flower. Gathered nuts and…

A very windy day. A slight snow which fell last night was melted at noon. A strong, gusty wind; the waves on the meadows make a fine show. I saw at Hubbard’s Bridge…

Examined the floating meadow again to-day. It is more than a foot thick, the under part much mixed with ice,—ice and muck. It appeared to me that the meadow surface…

Saw to-day on Pine Hill behind Mr. Joseph Merriam’s house a Norway pine, the first I have seen in Concord. Mr. Gleason pointed it out to me as a singular pine which…

The ice in the pond is now soft and will not bear a heavy stone thrown from the bank. It is melted for a rod from the shore. The ground has been bare of snow for…

For a week past the elm buds have been swollen. The willow catkins have put out. The ice still remains in Walden, though it will not bear. Mather Howard saw a large…

Walden is two-thirds broken up. It will probably be quite open by to-morrow night.

Spring is already upon us. I see the tortoises, or rather I hear them drop from the bank into the brooks at my approach. The catkins of the alders have blossomed.…

Had mouse-ear in blossom for a week. Observed the crowfoot on the Cliffs in abundance, and the saxifrage. The wind last Wednesday, April 16th, blew down a hundred…

The judge whose words seal the fate of a man for the longest time and furthest into eternity is not he who merely pronounces the verdict of the law, but he, whoever…

Every man, perhaps, is inclined to think his own situation singular in relation to friendship. Our thoughts would imply that other men have friends, though we have…

What is a chamber to which the sun does not rise in the morning? What is a chamber to which the sun does not set at evening? Such are often the chambers of the…

Observed the Nuphar advena, yellow water-lily, in blossom; also the Laurus Benzoin, or fever-bush, spice-wood, near William Wheeler’s in Lincoln, resembling the…

The Harivansa describes a “substance called Poroucha, a spiritual substance known also under the name of Mahat, spirit united to the five elements, soul of being,…

Heard the snipe over the meadows this evening.

Heard the golden robin and the bobolink. But where she has her seat,—whether in Westford or in Boxboro,—not even the assessors know. Inquire perchance of that dusky…

Heard the whip-poor-will this evening. A splendid full moon to-night. Walked from 6.30 to 10 P. M. Lay on a rock near a meadow, which had absorbed and retained much…

Lady’s-slipper almost fully blossomed. The log of a canoe birch on Fair Haven, cut down the last winter, more than a foot in diameter at the stump; one foot in…

Found the Arum triphyllum and the nodding trillium, or wake-robin, in Conant’s Swamp. An ash also in bloom there, and the sassafras quite striking. Also the fringed…

There is, no doubt, a perfect analogy between the life of the human being and that of the vegetable, both of the body and the mind. The botanist Gray says:— “The…

Yesterday I made out the black and the white ashes. A double male white ash in Miles’s Swamp, and two black ashes with sessile leaflets. A female white ash near…

And wilder still there grows elsewhere, I hear, a native and aboriginal crab-apple, Malus (as Michaux, or, as Emerson has it, Pyrus) coronaria in Southern States,…

Our most glorious experiences are a kind of regret. Our regret is so sublime that we may mistake it for triumph. It is the painful, plaintively sad surprise of our…

A fine, freshening air, a little hazy, that bathes and washes everything, saving the day from extreme heat. Walked to the hills south of Wayland by the road by…

I saw an organ-grinder this morning before a rich man’s house, thrilling the street with harmony, loosening the very paving-stones and tearing the routine of life…

The trees now begin to shade the streets. When the sun gets high in the sky the trees give shade. With oppressive heats come refreshing shadows. The buttercups spot…

It is evident that the virtues of plants are almost completely unknown to us, and we esteem the few with which we are better acquainted unreasonably above the many…

There was a Concord man once who had a foxhound named Burgoyne. He called him Bugīne. A good name.

Pedestrium solatium in apricis locis; nodosa.

Lectured in Worcester last Saturday, and walked to As- or Hasnebumskit Hill in Paxton the next day. Said to be the highest land in Worcester County except…

Gathered last night the strong, rank, penetrating-scented angelica. Under the head of the Cicuta maculata, or American hemlock,—“It is a rule sanctioned by the…

My practicalness is not to be trusted to the last. To be sure, I go upon my legs for the most part, but, being hard-pushed and dogged by a superficial common sense…

In F. A. Michaux’s, i. e. the younger Michaux’s, “Voyage à l’ouest des Monts Alléghanys, 1802,” printed at Paris, 1808:— He says the common inquiry in the newly…

James Wood, Senior, told me to-day that Asa (?) Melvin’s father told him that he had seen alewives caught (many of them) in the meadow which we were crossing, on…

Last night a beautiful summer night, not too warm, moon not quite full, after two or three rainy days. Walked to Fair Haven by railroad, returning by Potter’s…

Listen to music religiously, as if it were the last strain you might hear. There would be this advantage in travelling in your own country, even in your own…

Walked to Walden last night (moon not quite full) by railroad and upland wood-path, returning by Wayland road. Last full moon the elms had not leaved out,—cast no…

Full moon last night. Set out on a walk to Conantum at 7 P. M. A serene evening, the sun going down behind clouds, a few white or slightly shaded piles of clouds…

Darwin still:— Finds runaway sailors on the Chonos Archipelago, who he thought “had kept a very good reckoning of time,” having lost only four days in fifteen…

Is the shrub with yellow blossoms which I found last week near the Lincoln road while surveying for E. Hosmer and thought to be Xylosteum ciliatum, or fly…

It is a pleasant sound to me, the squeaking and the booming of nighthawks flying over high open fields in the woods. They fly like butterflies, not to avoid birds…

The slight reddish-topped grass (red-top?) now gives a reddish tinge to some fields, like sorrel. Visited a menagerie this afternoon. I am always surprised to see…

There is a great deal of white clover this year. In many fields where there has been no clover seed sown for many years at least, it is more abundant than the red,…

Haying has commenced. I see the farmers in distant fields cocking their hay now at six o’clock. The day has been so oppressively warm that some workmen have lain by…

It is a fresh, cool summer morning. From the road at N. Barrett’s, on my way to P. Blood’s at 8.30 A. M., the Great Meadows have a slight bluish misty tinge in…

The vetch-like flower by the Marlborough road, the Tephrosia Virginica, is in blossom, with mixed red and yellowish blossoms. Also the white fine-flowered Jersey…

I walked by night last moon, and saw its disk reflected in Walden Pond, the broken disk, now here, now there, a pure and memorable flame unearthly bright, like a…

The intimations of the night are divine, methinks. Men might meet in the morning and report the news of the night,—what divine suggestions have been made to them. I…

Walked along the Clamshell bank after sundown. A cloudy sky. The heads of the grass in the pasture behind Dennis’s have a reddish cast, but another grass, with a…

When I got out of the cars at Porter’s, Cambridge, this morning, I was pleased to see the handsome blue flowers of the succory or endive (Cichorium Intybus), which…

A gorgeous sunset after rain, with horizontal bars of clouds, red sashes to the western window, barry clouds hanging like a curtain over the window of the west,…

At 7.15 P. M. with W. E. C. go forth to see the moon, the glimpses of the moon. We think she is not quite full; we can detect a little flatness on the eastern side.…

8 P. M.—Now at least the moon is full, and I walk alone, which is best by night, if not by day always. Your companion must sympathize with the present mood. The…

Observed yesterday, while surveying near Gordon’s, a bittern flying over near Gordon’s, with moderate flight and outstretched neck, its breast-bone sticking out…

Passing over the Great Fields (where I have been surveying a road) this forenoon, where were some early turnips, the county commissioners plucked and pared them…

Methinks my present experience is nothing; my past experience is all in all. I think that no experience which I have to-day comes up to, or is comparable with, the…

It is a test question affecting the youth of a person,—Have you knowledge of the morning? Do you sympathize with that season of nature? Are you abroad early,…

Here I am thirty-four years old, and yet my life is almost wholly unexpanded. How much is in the germ! There is such an interval between my ideal and the actual in…

A thunder-shower in the night. Thunder near at hand, though louder, is a more trivial and earthly sound than at a distance; likened to sounds of men. The clap which…

8 A. M.—The forenoon is fuller of light. The butterflies on the flowers look like other and frequently larger flowers themselves. Now I yearn for one of those old,…

The season of morning fogs has arrived. I think it is connected with dog-days. Perhaps it is owing to the greater contrast between the night and the day, the nights…

I remember the last moon, shining through a creamy atmosphere, with a tear in the eye of Nature and her tresses dishevelled and drooping, sliding up the sky, the…

5 A. M.—The street and fields betray the drought and look more parched than at noon; they look as I feel,—languid and thin and feeling my nerves. The potatoes and…

Started for Clark’s Island at 7 A. M. At 9 A. M. took the Hingham boat and was landed at Hull. There was a pleasure party on board, apparently boys and girls…

At Cohasset.—Called on Captain Snow, who remembered hearing fishermen say that they “fitted out at Thoreau’s;” remembered him. He had commanded a packet between…

Walked from Cohasset to Duxbury and sailed thence to Clark’s Island. Visited the large tupelo tree (Nyssa multiflora) in Scituate, whose rounded and open top, like…

Sailed [to] the Gurnet, which runs down seven miles into the bay from Marshfield. Heard the peep of the beach-bird. Saw some ring-necks in company with peeps. They…

A northeast wind with rain, but the sea is the wilder for it. I heard the surf roar on the Gurnet [in] the night, which, as Uncle Ned and Freeman said, showed that…

The house here stands within a grove of balm-of-Gileads, horse-chestnuts, cherries, apples, and plums, etc. Uncle Bill, who lives in his schooner,—not turned up…

Those same round shells (Scutella parma (placenta) ?) on the sand as at Cape Cod, the live ones reddish, the dead white. Went off early this morning with Uncle Ned…

Now the hardhack and meadow-sweet reign, the former one of our handsomest flowers, I think. The mayweed, too, dusty by the roadside, and in the fields I scent the…

7.30 P. M.—Moon half full. I sit beside Hubbard’s Grove. A few level red bars above the horizon; a dark, irregular bank beneath them, with a streak of red sky…

The motions of circus horses are not so expressive of music, do not harmonize so well with a strain of music, as those of animals of the cat kind. An Italian has…

7.30 P. M.—To Conantum. The moon has not yet quite filled her horns. I perceive why we so often remark a dark cloud in the west at and after sunset. It is because…

Tansy now in bloom and the fresh white clethra. Among the pines and birches I hear the invisible locust. As I am going to the pond to bathe, I see a black cloud in…

1.30 A. M.—Full moon. Arose and went to the river and bathed, stepping very carefully not to disturb the household, and still carefully in the street not to disturb…

Hypericum Canadense, Canadian St. John’s-wort, distinguished by its red capsules. The petals shine under the microscope, as if they had a golden dew on them. Cnicus…

Agrimonia Eupatoria, small-flowered (yellow) plant with hispid fruit, two or three feet high, Turnpike, at Tuttle’s peat meadow. Hemp (Cannabis sativa), said by…

For a day or two it has been quite cool, a coolness that was felt even when sitting by an open window in a thin coat on the west side of the house in the morning,…

It plainly makes men sad to think. Hence pensiveness is akin to sadness. Some dogs, I have noticed, have a propensity to worry cows. They go off by themselves to…

Clematis Virginiana; calamint; Lycopus Europeus, water horehound. This is a world where there are flowers. Now, at 5 A. M., the fog, which in the west looks like a…

2 P. M.—To Lee’s Bridge via Hubbard’s Wood, Potter’s field, Conantum, returning by Abel Minott’s house, Clematis Brook, Baker’s pine plain, and railroad. I hear a…

To a great extent the feudal system still prevails there (in Canada), and I saw that I should be a bad citizen, that any man who thought for himself and was only…

I found last winter that it was expected by my townsmen that I would give some account of Canada because I had visited it, and because many of them had, and so felt…

To Walden to bathe at 5.30 A. M. Traces of the heavy rains in the night. The sand and gravel are beaten hard by them. Three or four showers in succession. But the…

Mollugo verticillata, carpet-weed, flat, whorl-leaved weed in gardens, with small white flowers. Portulaca oleracea, purslane, with its yellow blossoms. Chelone…

What the little regular, rounded, light-blue flower in Heywood Brook which I make Class V, Order 1? Also the small purplish flower growing on the mud in Hubbard’s…

A cool and even piercing wind blows to-day, making all shrubs to bow and trees to wave; such as we could not have had in July. I speak not of its coolness but its…

I see the volumes of smoke—not quite the blaze—from burning brush, as I suppose, far in the western horizon. I believe it is at this season of the year chiefly that…

The pretty little blue flower in the Heywood Brook, Class V, Order 1. Corolla about one sixth of an inch in diameter, with five rounded segments; stamens and pistil…

Though it is early, my neighbor’s hens have strayed far into the fog toward the river. I find a wasp in my window, which already appears to be taking refuge from…

I perceive in the Norway cinquefoil (Potentilla Norvegica), now nearly out of blossom, that the alternate five leaves of the calyx are closing over the seeds to…

Proserpinaca palustris, spear-leaved proserpinaca, mermaid-weed. (This in Hubbard’s Grove on my way to Conantum.) A hornets’ (?) nest in a rather tall huckleberry…

Mikania scandens, with its purplish white flowers, now covering the button-bushes and willows by the side of the stream. Bidens chrysanthemoides, large-flowered…

The dense fog came into my chamber early this morning, freighted with light, and woke me. It was, no doubt, lighter at that hour than if there had been no fog. Not…

Why was there never a poem on the cricket? Its creak seems to me to be one of the most prominent and obvious facts in the world, and the least heeded. In the report…

8 A. M.—A clear and pleasant day after the rain. Start for Boon’s Pond in Stow with C. Every sight and sound was the more interesting for the clear atmosphere. When…

No doubt, like plants, we are fed through the atmosphere, and the varying atmospheres of various seasons of the year feed us variously. How often we are sensible of…

The other afternoon I met Sam H—— walking on the railroad between the depot and the back road. It was something quite novel to see him there, though the railroad…

We sometimes experience a mere fullness of life, which does not find any channels to flow into. We are stimulated, but to no obvious purpose. I feel myself…

No fog this morning. Shall I not have words as fresh as my thoughts? Shall I use any other man’s word? A genuine thought or feeling can find expression for itself,…

2 A. M.—The moon not quite full. To Conantum via road. There is a low vapor in the meadows beyond the depot, dense and white, though scarcely higher than a man’s…

As I watch the groves on the meadow opposite our house, I see how differently they look at different hours of the day, i. e. in different lights, when the sun…

Every artisan learns positively something by his trade. Each craft is familiar with a few simple, well-known, well-established facts, not requiring any genius to…

Not till after 8 A. M. does the fog clear off so much that I see the sun shining in patches on Nawshawtuct. This is the season of fogs. Like knight, like esquire.…

Railroad causeway, before sunrise. Here is a morning after a warm, clear, moonlight night almost entirely without dew or fog. It has been a little breezy through…

A great change in the weather from sultry to cold, from one thin coat to a thick coat or two thin ones. 2 P. M.—To Cliffs. The dry grass yields a crisped sound to…

Ice in the pail under the pump, and quite a frost. Commenced perambulating the town bounds. At 7.30 A. M. rode in company with —— and Mr. —— to the bound between…

Met the selectmen of Sudbury, and . I trust that towns will remember that they are supposed to be fairly represented by their select men. From the specimen which…

Perambulated the Lincoln line. Was it the small rough sunflower which I saw this morning at the brook near Lee’s Bridge ?? Saw at James Baker’s a buttonwood tree…

Perambulated Bedford line.

Perambulated Carlisle line. Large-flowered bidens, or beggar-ticks, or bur-mari- gold, now abundant by riverside. Found the bound- stones on Carlisle by the river…

3 p. mM. —To Cliffs via Bear Hill. As I go through the fields, endeavoring to recover my tone and sanity and to perceive things truly and simply again, after having…

Sunday. It is remarkably dry weather. The neighbors’ wells are failing. The watering-places for cattle in pastures, though they have been freshly scooped out, are…

To the Three Friends’ Hill over Bear Hill. Yesterday and to-day the stronger winds of autumn have begun to blow, and the telegraph harp has sounded loudly. I heard…

Notwithstanding the fog, the fences this morning are covered with so thick a frost that you can write your name anywhere with your nail. The partridge and the…

Returning over the causeway from Flint’s Pond the other evening (22d), just at sunset, I observed that while the west was of a bright golden color under a bank of…

I was struck by the fitness of the expression chosen by the Irishman yesterday, — “I let the day’s work praise itself.” It was more pertinent than a scholar could…

Since I perambulated the bounds of the town, I find that I have in some degree confined myself, —my vision and my walks. On whatever side I look off I am reminded…

Here is a cloudy day, and now the fisher- man is out. Some tall, many-flowered, bluish-white asters are still abundant by the brook-sides. I never found a…

A considerable part of the last two nights and yesterday, a steady and rather warm rain, such as we have not had for a long time. This morning it is still…

Wan der Donck says of the water-beech (buttonwood), “This tree retains the leaves later than any other tree of the woods.” P. M.— To Goose Pond via E. Hosmer’s;…

To powder-mills, and set an intermediate bound-stone on the new road there. Saw them making hoops for powder-casks, of alder and the sprouts of the white birch,…

5 p. M. — Just put a fugitive slave, who has taken the name of Henry Williams, into the cars for Canada. He escaped from Stafford County, Virginia, to Boston last…

p. mM. —Some of the white pines on Fair Haven Hill have just reached the acme of their fall; others have almost entirely shed their leaves, and they are scattered…

Saturday. 'The emigrant has for weeks been tossing on the Atlantic and perchance as long ascend- ing the St. Lawrence with contrary winds, conversant as yet in the…

Sunday. I noticed on Friday, October 3d, that the willows generally were green and unchanged. The red maples varied from green through yellow to bright red. The…

Monday. 12 m.— To Bedford line to set a stone by river on Bedford line. The reach of the river between Bedford and Carlisle, seen from a distance in the road…

This morning the fog over the river and the brooks and meadows running into it has risen to the height of forty or fifty feet. 1 p. m.— To river; by boat to Corner…

Wednesday. A slight wind now fills the air with elm leaves. The nights have been cool of late, so that a fire has been comfortable, but the last was quite warm. 2…

Heard two screech owls in the night. Boiled a quart of acorns for breakfast, but found them not so palatable as raw, having acquired a bitterish taste, per- chance…

The air this morning is full of bluebirds, and again it is spring. There are many things to indicate the renewing of spring at this season. The blossoming of spring…

Sunday. Yesterday afternoon, saw by the brook-side above Emerson’s the dwarf primrose in blos- som, the Norway cinquefoil and fall dandelions which are now drying…

Down the railroad before sunrise. A freight-train in the Deep Cut. The sun rising over the woods. When the vapor from the engine rose above the woods, the level…

Wednesday. 8.30 a. mM. — Up the river in a boat to Pelham’s Pond with W. E. C. (But first a neighbor sent in a girl to inquire if knew where worm-seed grew,…

The new moon, seen by day, reminds me of a poet’s cheese. Surveying for Loring to-day. Saw the Indian Ditch, so called. A plant newly leaving out, a shrub; looks…

Surveying for Loring. A severe frost this morning, which puts [us] one remove further from summer.

The Indian (?) Ditch crosses the road be- yond Loring’s, running south seven and one half west, or within about two and a half degrees of the true me- ridian.…

The pines, both white and pitch, have now shed their leaves, and the ground in the pine woods is strewn with the newly fallen needles. The fragrant life-…

It is never too late to learn. I observed to-day the Inshman who helped me survey twisting the branch of a birch for a withe, and before he cut it off; and also,…

I awoke this morning to infinite regret. In my dream I had been riding, but the horses bit each other and occasioned endless trouble and anxiety, and it was my…

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. The obstacles which the…

The wild apples are now getting palatable. I find a few left on distant trees, which the farmer thinks it not worth his while to gather. He thinks that he has…

Saturday. R. W. E. says that Channing calls [ ]‘ ‘“‘seven feet of sandstone with a spoonful of wit.” It is a rare qualification to be able to state a fact sim- ply…

Sunday. The muskrat-houses are mostly covered by the rise of the river! — not a very unex- pected one either. Old wells as well as walls must be among the oldest…

To Saw Mill Brook by Turnpike; return by Walden. | I see why the checkerberry was so called, — Mitch- ella repens (we call it falsely partridge-berry), — for its…

I had on my “bad-weather clothes” Quebec like Olaf Trygvesson, the N eRe when a went to ‘Thing in England.’

8 a. M.— To Long Pond with W. E. C. [Four fifths of a page missing. ] From there we looked over the lower land and west- ward to the Jenkins house and Wachusett;…

The dark spruce tree at Sherman’s; its vicin- ity the site for a house. Ah, those sun-sparkles on Dudley Pond in this Novem- ber air! what a heaven to live in!…

The boat which we paddled that elysian day, Oct. 7th, was made of three distinct boxes shaped like bread-troughs, excepting the bow piece, which was rounded, (~f |…

This morning the ground is once more whit- ened with snow, but it will apparently be gone in an hour or two. I live where the Pinus rigida grows, with its firm…

When, pointing toward Cap Tourmente, I asked the name of a habitant whom we met, he haz- arded[?] the name of Belange, or fair angel, — or per- chance he referred…

Write often, write upon a thousand themes, rather than long at a time, not trying to turn too many feeble somersets in the air, — and so come down upon your head at…

To Fair Haven Hill. A coldand dark afternoon, thesun being behind clouds in the west. The landscape is barren of objects, the trees being leafless, and so little…

Friday. Surveying the Ministerial Lot in the southwestern part of the town. Unexpectedly find Hey- wood’s Pond frozen over thinly, it being shallow and coldly…

Here is a rainy day, which keeps me in the house. Asked Therien this afternoon if he had got a new idea this summer. “Good Lord!” says he, “‘a man that has to work…

Sunday. It is remarkable that the highest intellectual mood which the world tolerates is the per- ception of the truth of the most ancient revelations, now in some…

All things tend to flow to him who can make the best use of them, even away from their legal owner. A thief, finding with the property of the Italian natural- ist…

Surveying these days the Ministerial Lot. Now at sundown I hear the hooting of anowl, — hoo hoo hoo, hoorer hoo.* It sounds like the hooting of an idiot or a maniac…

Old Mr. Joseph Hosmer, who helped me to-day, said that he used to know all about the lots, but since they ’ve chopped off so much, and the woods have grown up, he…

It is often said that melody can be heard farther than noise, and the finest melody farther than the coarsest. I think there is truth in this, and that ac-…

The milkweed pods by the roadside are yet but half emptied of their silky contents. For months the gales are dispersing their seeds, though we have had snow. Saw E.…

Sunday. The trees (counting all three inches in diameter) in Conantum Swamp are: — OSs .. yaaa cee 6 Black ash .......... 8 as 16 (See if all are really elms.) Red…

Setting stakes in the swamp (Ministerial). Saw seven black ducks fly out of the peat-hole. Saw there also a tortoise still stirring, the painted tortoise, I…

This morning the ground is again covered with snow, deeper than before. In the afternoon walked to the east part of Lincoln. Saw a tree on the turnpike full of…

Sunday. A rather cold and windy after- noon, with some snow not yet melted on the ground. Under the south side of the hill between Brown’s and Tarbell’s, in a warm…

In regard to my friends, I feel that I know and have communion with a finer and subtler part of themselves which does not put me off when they put me off, which is…

Saturday. While surveying to-day, saw much mountain laurel for this neighborhood in Mason’s pas- ture, just over the line in Carlisle. Its bright yellowish- green…

'The boys have been skating for a week, but I have had no time to skate for surveying. I have hardly realized that there was ice, though I have walked over it about…

The pitch pine woods on the right of the Corner road. A piercing cold afternoon, wading in the snow. R. Rice was going to Sudbury to put his bees into the cellar…

In all woods is heard now far and near the sound of the woodchopper’s axe, a twilight sound, now in the night of the year, men having come out for fuel to the…

Saturday. 2 p. Ms —To Fair Haven Hill and plain below. Saw a large hawk circling over a pine wood below me, ‘and screaming, apparently that he might discover his…

Sunday. My difficulties with my friends are such as no frankness will settle. ‘There is no precept in the New Testament that will assist me. My nature, it may [be],…

If I am thus seemingly cold compared with my companion’s warm, who knows but mine is a less transient glow, a steadier and more equable heat, like that of the earth…

It would give me such joy to know that a friend had come to see me, and yet that pleasure I sel- dom if ever experience. It is a record of the mellow and ripe…

It spits snow this afternoon. Saw a flock of snowbirds on the Walden road. I see them so commonly when it is beginning to snow that I am inclined to regard them as…

Thursday. Via spruce swamp on Conan- tum to hilltop, returning across river over shrub oak plain to Cliffs. A wind is now blowing the light snow which fell a day or…

I observed this afternoon that when Ed- mund Hosmer came home from sledding wood and un- yoked his oxen, they made a business of stretching and scratching…

Saturday. Sunset from Fair Haven Hill. This evening there are many clouds in the west into which the sun goes down so that we have our visible or apparent sunset…

All day a drizzling rain, ever and anon holding up with driving mists. A January thaw. The snow rapidly dissolving; in all hollows a pond form- ing; unfathomable…

‘The sun just risen. The ground is almost entirely bare. ‘The puddles are not skimmed over. It is warm as an April morning. There-is a sound as of bluebirds in the…

Tuesday. Mem.: Go to the Deep Cut.! The flies now crawl forth from the crevices all covered with dust, dreaming of summer, without life or energy enough to clean…

The third warm day; now overcast and be- ginning to drizzle. Stil it is inspiriting as the brightest weather. Though the sun surely is not a-going to shine, there…