23 August 1852 – 29 August 1852

3 p. M.— To Assabet. The river is eight and one twelfth feet below top of truss.! Add eight and a half inches for its greatest height this year, and you have eight feet nine and a half inches for the difference. It is apparently as low now as the first week in July.?, That is, those are the limits of our river’s expansibility ; so much it may swell. Of course, the water now in it is but a small fraction of that which it contains in the highest freshets, for this additional eight and nine twelfths feet is much more than its present average depth, half as much again per- haps, beside averaging eight or ten times its present width. The ferns in low shady woods are faded. Hydro- cotyle Americana, marsh pennywort, by the Lee place path. It probably opened in June or July. Saw a new form of arrowhead leaf with lmear lobes, but the flowers apparently the same, a crystalline white. The bank at the bathing-place has now a new kind of beauty. It is spotted with bright-scarlet cardinal-flowers and bright- purple vernonias. The profuse clusters of grapes, par- tially concealed under their leaves, are turning; have got a purple tinge. Dense clusters of elder-berries, some black, some turning, are hanging drooping by their weight over the water. The glassy or bead (amethystine?) blue berries of the red osier * cornel, mixed with whitish, are as abundant as any berries here; and the dull slaty-blue and smaller berries of the Viburnum dentatum fill the remaining crevices. These things I see as I swim beneath it.

Cape Wrath, the northwest cape of Scot- land. What a good name for a cape lying far away, dark, over the water, under a lowering sky ! P. M.— To Conantum. The dandelion blooms again. One of the most noticeable wild fruits at present is the Viburnum nudum berries, their variegated cymes amid the green leaves in the swamps or low grounds, some whitish, some greenish, some red, some pink, some rose-purple and very beautiful, — not so beautiful, however, off the bush,—some dark purple or blue, and some black whose bloom is rubbed off, — a very rich sight. The silky cornel is the most common every- where, bordering the river and swamps, its drooping cymes of amethystine (?) china or glass beads mingled with whitish. ‘The fruit of the Viburnum Lentago is now very handsome, with its sessile cymes of large elliptical berries, green on one side and red with a purple bloom on the other or exposed side, not yet purple, blushing on one cheek. Many pyrus leaves are now red in the swamps, and some Viburnum nudum. Yesterday was a hot day, but oh, this dull, cloudy, breezy, thoughtful weather in which the creak of the cricket sounds louder, preparatory to a cheerful storm ! How grateful to our feelings is the approach of autumn ! We have had no serious storm since spring. What a salad to my spirits is this cooler, darker day! Of late we have had several cloudy days without rain. I hear no birds sing these days, only the plaintive note of young bluebirds, or the peep of a robin, or the scream of a jay, to whom all seasons are indifferent, the mew of a catbird, the link link of a bobolink, or the twitter of a goldfinch, all faint and rare. The great bittern is still about, but silent and shy. I see where its roost on the pitch pines is betrayed at Tupelo Cliff by the lime-like ordure on the leaves of the bushes be- neath. Or a hawk is occasionally seen, etc., etc. The linear lespedeza is out of bloom at Tupelo Cliff. Euphorbia hypericifolia there (July). Spiranthes cernua in the meadows. That earliest one I saw was either the gracilis or repens, probably the first. Again and several times I have found a low hieracium, not a foot high, with radical leaves only and not veined, few- flowered; may be one form of Gronovit. That white polygonum of the river is apparently P. hydropiperoides, but faintly perforate-spotted; but I cannot find de- scribed the smaller, rose-colored one, also perforate- dotted. Some thorn berries, to the eyes similar to the scarlet-fruited, are hard. How many kinds have we? Some are already cutting rowen, which is sweetest and best for milch cows.

Rain. Rain.

It still rains. I am struck by the ease and simplicity with which an Englishman expresses a senti- ment of reverence for the Author and Ruler of the Uni- verse. It is very manly, and appears to some extent to characterize the nation. Osborn, in his Arctic Journal, prints with much simplicity a prayer which had been prepared for the Arctic expedition. P. M. —To Walden. Storm drawing to a close. Crickets sound much louder after the rain in this cloudy weather. They are beginning to dig potatoes in earnest. Hips of the early roses are reddening. I have not seen a rose for a week or two. Lower leaves of the smooth sumach are red. Hear chic-a-day-day-day and crows; but, for music, reduced almost to the winter quire. Young partridges two thirds grown burst away. Globular galls on young oaks, green on one side, red on the other. Elatine Americana, small crypta [ ?], in Walden Pond.

Sicyos angulatus, one-seeded star-cucum- ber in Aunt’s garden, probably in July. Nepeta Gle- choma, ground ivy, or gill, probably May, now out of bloom. Bidens chrysanthemoides, perhaps a day. Poly- gonum amphibium var. terrestre with a small spike of large clear rose-colored flowers, flowers rare, probably August. What I called by this name before was not this. Now the red osier’* berries are very handsome along the river, overhanging the water, for the most part pale blue mixed with whitish, — part of the pendant jewelry of the season. The berries of the alternate- leaved cornel have dropped off mostly. The white- berried and red ? osier are in their prime. The other three kinds I have not seen. The viburnums, dentatum and nudum, arein their prime. ‘The sweet viburnum not yet purple, and the maple-leaved still yellowish. Hemp still in blossom.

A warm rain-storm in the night, with wind, and to-day it continues. The first leaves begin to fall; a few yellow ones lie in the road this morning, loosened by the rain and blown off by the wind. The ground in orchards is covered with windfalls; umperfect fruits now fall.