THIS DATE, FROM HENRY DAVID THOREAU'S JOURNAL

August 8, 1859

The weeds are as indispensable to the fishes as woods and shrubbery to us. I saw a perch conceal himself from my sight under a tuft of weeds at the bottom not much wider than its own length. That potamogeton (is it P. Robbinsii?) growing in dense beds under water, all immersed in shallow places, like a bed of brown and muddy ostrich-feathers, alternating with darker beds of Bidens Beckii, which show but a particle of green above the surface (I think of the latter in the South Branch), - what concealment these afford to turtles, frogs, fishes, etc.,! The potamogetons are so thick in some places in the main stream that a frog might hop quite across the river on them without getting in over his head.

August 7, 1860

There was every morning more or less solid white fog to be seen on the earth, though none on the mountain. I was struck by the localness of these fogs. For five mornings they occupied the same place and were about the same in extent. It was obvious that certain portions of New Hampshire and Massachusetts were at this season commonly invested with fog in the morning, while others, or the larger part, were free from it. The fog lay on the lower parts only. From our point of view the largest lake of fog lay in Rindge and southward; and southeast of Fitzwilliam, i. e. about Winchendon, very large there. In short, the fog lay in great spidery lakes and streams answering to the lakes, streams, and meadows beneath, especially over the sources of Miller’s River and the region of primitive wood thereabouts; but it did [not] rest on lakes always, i. e., where they were elevated, as now some in Jaffrey were quite clear. It suggested that there was an important difference, so far as the health and spirits of the inhabitants were concerned, between the town where there was this regular morning fog and that where there was none. I shall always remember the inhabitants of State Line as dwellers in the fog. The geography and statistics of fog have not been ascertained. If we awake into a fog, it does not occur to us that the inhabitants of a neighboring town which lies higher may have none, neither do they, being ignorant of this happiness, inform us of it. Yet, when you come to look down thus on the country every morning, you see that here this thick white veil of fog is spread and not there. It was often several hundred feet thick, soon rising, breaking up, and drifting off, or rather seeming to drift away, as it evaporated. There was commonly such a risen fog drifting through the interval between this mountain and Gap Monadnock.

August 6, 1858

I think that I speak impartially when I say that I have never met with a stream so suitable for boating and botanizing as the Concord, and fortunately nobody knows it. I know of reaches which a single country-seat would spoil beyond remedy, but there has not been any important change here since I can remember. The willows slumber along its shore, piled in light but low masses, even like the cumuli clouds above. We pass hay-makers in every meadow, who may think that we are idlers. But Nature takes care that every nook and crevice is explored by some one. While they look after the open meadows, we farm the tract between the river’s brinks and behold the shores from that side. We, too, are harvesting an annual crop with our eyes, and think you nature is not glad to display her beauty to us?

August 5, 1859

See many yellowed peach leaves and butternut leaves, which have fallen in the wind yesterday and the rain to-day.

The lowest dark-colored rocks near the water at the stone bridge (i. e. part of the bridge) are prettily marked with (apparently) mosses, which have adhered to them at higher water and [are] now withered and bleached on, - in fact are transferred, - and by their whitish color are seen very distinctly on the dark stone and have a very pretty effect. They are quite like sea-mosses in their delicacy, though not equally fine with many. These are very permanently and closely fastened to the rock. This is a phenomenon of low water. Also see them transferred to wood, as pieces of bridges.

August 3, 1859

A novel phenomenon of dry weather and a low stage of water is the sight of dense green beds of Eleocharis acicularis, still in bloom, which grows at the bottom of muddy pools, but now, they being dry, looks like a dense fine bed of green moss, denser than grass. I recline on such a bed, perfectly dry and clean, amid the flags and pontederia, where lately was water and mud. It covers the mud with a short dense green mat of culms fine as a hair, quite agreeable to rest on and a rather novel sight.

August 2, 1859

That fine z-ing of locusts in the grass which I have heard for three or four days is, methinks, an August sound and is very inspiriting. It is a certain maturity in the year which it suggests. My thoughts are the less crude for it. There is a certain moral and physical sluggishness and standstill at midsummer.