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and Other Natural History Essays |
 Henry David Thoreau American Writer  Chestnuts  Winter Tree Line  Walden Kindle Edition  The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson & Henry David Thoreau  Journal Volume 5  Wild Fruits Thoreau's Rediscovered Last Manuscript  Walden, or Life in the Woods Poster  Our Common Dwelling Henry Thoreau, Transcendentalism, and the Class Politics of Nature  An Observant Eye The Thoreau Collection at the Concord Museum  Kindle 6" Display, U.S. & International Wireless |
I
was this afternoon gathering chestnuts at Saw Mill Brook. I have
within a few weeks spent some hours thus, scraping away the leaves with
my hands and feet over some square rods, and have at least learned how
chestnuts are planted and new forests raised. First fall the chestnuts
with the severe frosts, the greater part of them at least, and then, at
length, the rains and winds bring down the leaves which cover them with
a thick coat. I have wondered sometimes how the nuts got planted which merely fell on to the surface of the earth, but already I find the nuts of the present year partially mixed with the mould, as it were, under the decaying and mouldy leaves, where is all the moisture and manure they want. A large proportion of this year's nuts are now covered loosely an inch deep under mouldy leaves, though they are themselves sound, and are moreover concealed from squirrels thus.' It is a sort of frozen rain this afternoon, which does not wet one, but makes the still bare ground slippery with a coating of ice, and stiffens your umbrella so that it cannot be shut. Will not the trees look finely in the morning? December 31, 1852 Other Entries |