8 August 1853 – 14 August 1853

5 a. mM. — Up railroad. . The nabalus, which may have been out one week elsewhere. Also rough hawkweed, and that large aster- like flower Diplopappus umbellatus, a day or two. Smooth speedwell again. [Erechthites. Columbine again. The first watermelon. Aster patens and Aster levis, both a day or two.

Sedum Telephium, garden orpine or live- for-ever, in my pitcher. P. M. — To hibiscus and liatris and Beck Stow’s. The hibiscus which has escaped the mowers shows a little color. I am rather surprised that it escapes the mowers at all. The river is still much swollen by the rains and cooled, and the current is swifter; though it is quite hot this afternoon, with a close, melting heat. Isee an empty hay-team slowly crossing the river, in the shallowest place. The oxen are half concealed, but the driver rides high and dry. The cattle must enjoy the coolness of the water. They have not got more than half the hay out of the meadows yet, and now they are so wet I see but one team there. Much grass will be lost. If you carelessly grasp and let slip through your hand a blade of this cut-grass as you walk, it will often cut your fingers seriously. I forded the river and, for the experiment, tried swimming with one hand while I held up all my clothes with the other, for a short distance. The Hieractum Canadense is out and is abundant at Peter’s well. I also find one or two heads of the liatris. Perhaps I should have seen it a few days earlier, if it had not been for the mower. It has the aspect of a Canada thistle at a little distance. How fatally the sea- son is advanced toward the fall! I am not surprised now to see the small rough sunflower. There is much yellow beside now in the fields. How beautiful now the early goldenrods (Solidago stricta), rising above the wiry grass of the Great Fields in front of Peter’s where I sit (which is not worth cutting), not solid yellow like the sunflower, but little pyramidal or sheaf- like golden clouds or mists, supported by almost invis- ible leafy columns, which wave in the wind, like those elms which run up very tall and slender without a branch and fall over like a sheaf on every side! They give a very indefinite but rich, mellow, and golden aspect to the field. They are the more agreeable for the indistinctness of their outline,—these pillars of fire, clouds which glow only on one side. The nemoralis, just opening, with its one-sided, curved, and dense panicle, is more concealed by the grass. The field is ripe.

5 a. mM. —I hear a warbling vireo, golden robin, red-eye, and peawais. August, royal and rich. Green corn now, and melons have begun. That month, surely, is distinguished when melons ripen. July could not do it. What a moist, fertile heat now! I see naked viburnum berries begin- ning to turn. Their whiteness faintly blushing. Alcott spent the day with me yesterday. He spent the day before with Emerson. He observed that he had got his wine and now he had come after his venison. Such was the compliment he paid me. The question of a livelihood was troubling him. He knew of nothing which he could do for which men would pay him. He could not compete with the Irish in cradling grain. His early education had not fitted him for a clerkship. He had offered his services to the Abolition Society, to go about the country and speak for freedom as their agent, but they declined him. This is very much to their discredit; they should have been forward to se- cure him. Such a connection with him would confer unexpected dignity on their enterprise. But they can- not tolerate a man who stands by a head above them. They are as bad — Garrison and Phillips, etc.—as the overseers and faculty of Harvard College. They require a man who will train well wnder them. Consequently they have not in their employ any but small men, — trainers. P. M. — To Walden and Saw Mill Brook.

5 a.m. — Up North Branch. A considerable fog. The weeds still covered by the flood, so that we have no Bidens Beckii. B. chrysan- themovdes just out. The small, dull, lead-colored berries of the Viburnum dentatum now hang over the water. The Amphicarpea monoica appears not to have bloomed. Chickweed (Stellarta media) appears the most constant flower and most regardless of seasons. Cerastium blooms still. Button-bush and mikania now in prime, and cardinals. Lilies rather scarce (?), but methinks less infested with insects. The river sprinkled with meadow-hay afloat. P. M. — To Conantum.

9 a. m. — To Conantum by boat, berrying, with three ladies.

The last was a melting night, and a carnival for mosquitoes. Could I not write meditations under a bridge at midsummer? The last three or four days less dogdayish. We paused under each bridge yesterday, — we who had been sweltering on the quiet waves, — for the sake of a little shade and coolness, holding on by the piers with our hands. Now and then a muskrat made the water boil, which dove or came up near by. They will move so suddenly in the water when alarmed as to make quite a report. Pp. M. — To hibiscus by boat. Hibiscus just beginning to open, its large cylindrical buds, as long as your finger, fast unrolling. They look like loosely rolled pink cigars. Rowed home in haste before a black approaching storm from the northeast, which was slightly cooling the air. How grateful when, as I backed through the bridges, the breeze of the storm blew through the piers, rippling the water and slightly cooling the sultry air! How fast the black cloud came up, and passed over my head, proving all wind! Gardeners complain that their fruit is fast rotting. We have had such wet and then moist, sultry weather that apples and plums ripen and decay very fast. Sicyos well out, and probably began when I saw it before.

Sunday. 5 a. mM. — To Cliffs. The toads probably ceased about the time I last spoke of them. Bullfrogs, also, I have not heard for a long time. I perceive the scent of the earliest ripe apples in my walk. How it surpasses all their flavors! Lespedeza violacea var. angustifolia at Cliffs, a day or two. 'The bushy gerardia makes a show there now. When I came out on to the wet rock by the juniper, all green with moss and with the driving mists beneath me, — for the sun did not come out till seven, — it reminded me of mountain-tops which I have visited.