an open salver truly! Those of the Asclepias Syriaca hang down. The interregnum in the blossoming of flowers being well over, many small flowers blossom now in the low grounds, having just reached their summer. It is now dry enough, and they feel the heat their tenderness required. The autumnal flowers,—goldenrods, asters, and johnswort,—though they have made demonstrations, have not yet commenced to reign. The tansy is already getting stale; it is perhaps the first conspicuous yellow flower that passes from the stage.[311]
In Hubbard’s Swamp, where the blueberries, dangleberries, and especially the pyrus or choke-berries were so abundant last summer, there is now perhaps not one (unless a blueberry) to be found. Where the choke-berries held on all last winter, the black and the red.
The common skullcap (Scutellaria galericulata), quite a handsome and middling-large blue flower. Lobelia pallida still. Pointed cleavers or clivers (Galium asprellum). Is that the naked viburnum, so common, with its white, red, then purple berries, in Hubbard’s meadow?[312]
Did I find the dwarf tree-primrose in Hubbard’s meadow to-day? Stachys aspera, hedge-nettle or woundwort, a rather handsome purplish flower. The capsules of the Iris versicolor, or blue flag, are now ready for humming [?]. Elderberries are ripe.
Aug. 25. Monday. What the little regular, rounded, light-blue flower in Heywood Brook which I make Class V, Order 1? Also the small purplish flower growing on the mud in Hubbard’s meadow, perchance C. XIV, with one pistil? What the bean vine in the garden, Class VIII, Order 1? I do not find the name of the large white polygonum of the river. Was it the filiform ranunculus which I found on Hubbard’s shore? Hypericum Virginicum, mixed yellow and purple. The black rough fruit of the skunk-cabbage, though green within, barely rising above the level of the ground; you see where it has been cut in two by the mowers in the meadows. Polygonum amphibium, red, in river. Lysimachia hybrida still. Checkerberry in bloom. Blue-eyed grass still. Rhus copallina, mountain or dwarf sumach. I now know all of the Rhus genus in Bigelow. We have all but the staghorn in Concord. What a miserable name has the Gratiola aurea, hedge hyssop! Whose hedge does it grow by, pray, in this part of the world?[313]
Aug. 26. A cool and even piercing wind blows to-day, making all shrubs to bow and trees to wave; such as we could not have had in July. I speak not of its coolness but its strength and steadiness. The wind and the coldness increased as the day advanced, and finally the wind went down with the sun. I was compelled to put on an extra coat for my walk. The ground is strewn with windfalls, and much fruit will consequently be lost.
The wind roars amid the pines like the surf. You can hardly hear the crickets for the din, or the cars. I think the last must be considerably delayed when their course is against it. Indeed it is difficult to enjoy a quiet thought. You sympathize too much with the commotion and restlessness of the elements. Such a blowing, stirring, bustling day,—what does it mean? All light things decamp; straws and loose leaves change their places. Such a blowing day is no doubt indispensable in the economy of nature. The whole country is a seashore, and the wind is the surf that breaks on it. It shows the white and silvery under sides of the leaves. Do plants and trees need to be thus tried and twisted? Is it a first intimation to the sap to cease to ascend, to thicken their stems? The Gerardia pedicularia, bushy gerardia, I find on the White Pond road.
I perceive that some farmers are cutting turf now. They require the driest season of the year. There is something agreeable to my thoughts in thus burning a part of the earth, the stock of fuel is so inexhaustible. Nature looks not mean and niggardly, but like an ample loaf. Is not he a rich man who owns a peat meadow? It is to enjoy the luxury of wealth. It must be a luxury to sit around the fire in winter days and nights and burn these dry slices of the meadow which contain roots of all herbs. You dry and burn the very earth itself. It is a fact kindred with salt-licks. The meadow is strewn with the fresh bars, bearing the marks of the fork, and the turf-cutter is wheeling them out with his barrow. To sit and see the world aglow and try to imagine how it would seem to have it so destroyed!
Woodchucks are seen tumbling into their holes on all sides.
Aug. 27. I see the volumes of smoke—not quite the blaze—from burning brush, as I suppose, far in the western horizon. I believe it is at this season of the year chiefly that you see this sight. It is always a question with some whether it is not a fire in the woods, or some building. It is an interesting feature in the scenery at this season. The farmer’s simple enterprises.