in Thoreau’s Journal:

I look S from the Cliff— The westering sun just out of sight behind the hill. Its rays from those bare twigs across the pond are bread & cheese to me. So many oak leaves have fallen that the white birch stems are more distinct amid the young oaks—  I see to the bone. See those bare birches prepared to stand the winter through on the hill sides— They never owing what is this dull town to me? The maples skirting the meadows— in dense phalanxes — look like light infantry advanced for a swamp flight.  Ah Dear November ye must be sacred to the Nine surely. The only willow catkins already peep out 1/4 of an inch.  Early crowfoot is reddened at Lee’s.