in Thoreau’s Journal:

I mark again the sound of the crickets or locusts about alders &c about this time when the first asters open––which makes you fruitfully meditative–– Helps condense your thoughts–like meldews in the afternoon– This the afternoon of the year. How apt we are to be reminded of lateness–even before the year is half spent. Such little objects check the diffuse tide of our thoughts & bring it to a head–which thrills us– They are such fruits as music, poetry, love which humanity bears. Saw one of the common wild roses R. lucida (?) The swamp-black berry ripe X in open ground. The rhus copallina is not yet quite out, though the glabra is in fruit. The smaller purple-fringed orchis has not quite filled out its spike– What a surprise to detect under the dark damp cavernous copes––where some wild beast might fitly prowl this splendid flower silently standing with all its eyes on you. It has a rich fragrance withal. Rain in the evening.

 in Thoreau’s Journal:

It is a rare music the earliest bee’s hum amid the flowers––revisiting the flower bells just after sunrise.

 in Thoreau’s Journal:

The Cardinal flower probably open today.

July 22, 2017 

in Thoreau’s Journal:

A comfortable breeze blowing. Methinks I can write better in the afternoon, for the novelty of it— if I should go abroad this morning— My genius makes distinctions which my understanding cannot— and which my senses do not report. If I should reverse the usual— go forth & saunter in the fields all the forenoon then sit down in my chamber in the afternoon, which it is so unusual for me to do—it would be like a new season to me & the novelty of it inspire me. The wind has fairly blown me out doors—the elements were so lively & active— & I so sympathized with them that I could not sit while the wind went by. And I am reminded that we should especially improve the summer to live out of doors— When we may so easily it behoves us to break up this custom of sitting in the house. for it is but a custom—and I am not sure that it has the sanction of common sense. A man no sooner gets up than he sits down again….Is the literary man to live always or chiefly sitting in a chamber—through which Nature enters by a window only? What is the use of the summer?

….but here outdoors is the place to store up influences.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

All things –– grass, etc. –– are peculiarly fresh this season on account of the copious rains.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

Nature is beautiful only as a place where a life is to be lived. It is not beautiful to him who has not resolved on a beautiful life.

July 20, 2017 

in Thoreau’s Journal:

A muttering thunder cloud in NW––gradually rising ––& with its advanced guard hiding the sun–– & now & then darting forked lightning–– The wind rising ominously also drives me home again.

At length down it comes upon the thirsty herbage beating down the leaves with grateful tender violence. & slightly cooling the air.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

In the maple swamp at Hubbards Close the great cinnamon ferns are very handsome…

Clintonia berries in a day or 2.

 in Thoreau’s Journal:

Methinks the asters & golden rods begin–like the early ripening leaves, with mid-summer heats.

Now look out for these children of the sun. When already the fall of some of the very earliest spring flowers has commenced.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

A thick fog began last night & lasts till late this morning, first of the kind methinks…

in Thoreau’s Journal:

I go to observe the lilies.

I see a rail lodged in the weeds with 7 tortoises on it––and another with 10––another with 11 all in a row sunning now at midday hot as it is. ––They are mostly the painted tortoise. Apparently no weather is too hot for them thus to bask in the sun.

The pontederia is in its prime alive with butterflies yellow & others– I See its tall blue spikes reflected beneath the edge of the pads on each side–pointing down to a heaven beneath as well as above–

in Thoreau’s Journal:

Rained still in forenoon, now cloudy

Fields comparatively deserted today & yesterday –hay stands cocked in them on all sides––Some being shorn are clear for the walker. It is but a short time that he has to dodge the haymakers– This cooler-–still cloudy weather after the rain is very autumnal & restorative to our spirits– The robin sings–still–but the goldfinch twitters over oftener–& I hear the link link of the bobolink (one perfect strain!) and the crickets creak more as in the fall– All these sounds dispose our minds to serenity– Perhaps the mosquitoes are most troublesome such days in the woods if it is warm enough. We seem to be passing or to have passed a dividing line between spring & autumn–& begin to descend the long slope toward winter….

….the meadow is the broad dark green rank of pickerel weeds &c &c (polygonum &c) then the light reflecting edging of pads–& then the smooth still cloud reflecting water. My thoughts are driven inward–even as clouds and trees are reflected in the still smooth water– There is an inwardness even in the mosquitoes hum–while I am picking blueberries in the dank wood.

Rhexia near the R. Copallina [winged sumac]–ap yesterday XXX….

Rexia virginica

in Thoreau’s Journal:

awake to a day of gentle rain––very much needed—none to speak of for nearly a month methinks. The cooler & stiller day has a valuable effect on my spirits….It holds up from time & then a fine misty rain falls. It lies on the fine reddish tops of some grasses thick & whitish like morning cobwebs. The stillness is very soothing. This is a summer rain. The earth is being bedewed. There is no storm or violence to it.

Health is a sound relation to nature.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

A Journal.–– a book that shall contain a record of all your joy––your extacy….

The dark purple amelanchier are the sweetest berries I have tasted yet.

One who walks the woods & hills daily—expecting to see the first berry that turns—will be surprised at last to find them ripe & thick before he is aware of it—ripened he cannot tell how long before—in some favorable situation. It is impossible to say what day almost what week the huckleberries begin to be ripe unless you are acquainted with & daily visit every huckleberry bush in the town—at least every place where they grow.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

What art can surpass the rows of maples & elms and swamp white oaks which the water plants along the river––I mean the variety & gracefulness––conforming to the curves of the river–

 in Thoreau’s Journal:

Now is the time for meadow walking (I am in the meadow north of Hubbards Bridge.) You go dry shod now through meadows which were comparatively impassable before. Those western reserves which you had not explored. We are thankful that the water has preserved them inviolate so long. There is a cheerful light reflected from undersides of the ferns in the dryer meadows now––and has been for some time––especially in breezy weather. It was so in June. The dusty roads & roadsides begin to show the effects of drought–– The corn rolls. The bass on Conantum is now well in blossom. It probably commenced about the 9th. Its flowers are conspicuous for a tree & a rather agreeable odor fills the air. The tree resounds with the hum of bees on the flowers. On the whole it is a rich sight. Is it not later than the Chestnut? The elder is a very conspicuous & prevalent flower now––with its large flat cymes. Pogonias & Calopogons are very abundant in the meadows.

July 10, 2017 (Pogonia)

in Thoreau’s Journal:

The rye-fields are now quite yellow and ready for the sickle. Already there are many flavous colors in the landscape––much maturity of small seeds. The nodding heads of the rye make an agreeable maze to the eye….The robin methinks is oftener heard of late–even at noon.

in Thoreau’s Journal:

An aurora fading into a general saffron color. At length the redness travels over partly from east to west, before sunrise, and there is little color in the east. The birds all unite to make the morning hour, sing rather faintly, not prolonging their strains. The crickets appear to have received a reinforcement during the sultry night.

There is no name for the evening red corresponding to aurora. It is the blushing foam about the prow of the sun’s boat, and at eve, the same in its wake. ––I do not often hear the bluebird now except at dawn. ––I think we have had no clear winter skies, no skies the color of a robin’s egg and pure amber….for some months. ––

“The flower opens, and lo! another year.” [ancient Chinese saying]

There is something sublime in the fact that some of the oldest written sentences should thus celebrate the coming in of spring. How many times have the flowers opened and a new year begun! Hardly a more cheering sentence could have come down to us. How old is spring, a phenomenon still so fresh! Do we perceive any decay in Nature? How much evidence is contained in this short and simple sentence respecting the former inhabitants of this globe! It is a sentence to be inscribed on vessels of porcelain, suggesting that so many years had gone before, in observation as fit then as now.

 in Thoreau’s Journal:

Who can write the history of these fields?

in Thoreau’s Journal:

4 AM.  The first really foggy morning yet before I rise I hear the song of the birds from out it––like the bursting of its bubbles with music–the head on liquids just uncorked. The song gilds thus the frost work of the morning–  As if the fog were a great sweet froth on the surface of land and water–whose fixed air escaped–whose bubbles burst with music.  The sound of its evaporation–the fixed air of the morning just brought from the cellars of the night escaping.–  The morning twittering of birds in perfect harmony with it. I came near awaking this morning. I am older than last year     the mornings are further between–  The days are fewer­–  Any excess is fatal to the morning’s clarity­­–– but in health the sound of a cow bell is celestial music. O might I always wake to thought & poetry––regenerated.

July 7, 1851 in Thoreau’s Journal:

Be ever so little distracted, your thoughts so little confused, your engagements so few, your attention so free, your existence so mundane, that in all places and in all hours, you can hear the sound of crickets in those seasons when they are to be heard.