in Thoreau’s Journal:

There are some fine large clusters of lambkill close to the shore of Walden under the Peak, fronting the south. They are early, too, and large apparently, both on account of the warmth and the vicinity of the water.

These flowers are in perfect cylinders, sometimes six inches long by two wide, and three such raying out or upward from one centre, that is, three branches clustered together. Examined close by, I think this handsomer than the mountain laurel. the color is richer, but it does not show so well at a little distance, and the corymbs are somewhat concealed by the green shoot and leaves rising above them, and also by the dry remains of last year’s flowers.