in Thoreau’s Journal:

When it snowed yesterday very large flakes, an inch in diameter, Aunt said, “They are picking geese.” This, it seems, is an old saying.

Measure your health by your sympathy with morning and spring. If there is no response in you to the awakening of nature, if the prospect of an early morning walk does not banish sleep, if the warble of the first bluebird does not thrill you, know that the morning and spring of your life are past.  Thus you may feel your pulse.