size and richness. Houstonias are very abundant, blue-whitening some of the pastures. They are a very sociable little flower, and dwell close together in communities, — sometimes covering a space no larger than the palm of the hand, but keeping one another in cheerful heart and life, — sometimes they occupy a much larger space. Lobelia, a pink flower, growing in the woods. Columbines, of a pale red, because they have lacked sun, growing in rough and rocky places on banks in the copses, precipitating towards the lake. The leaves of the trees are not yet out, but are so apparent that the woods are getting a very decided shadow. Water-weeds on the edge of the lake, of a deep green, with roots that seem to have nothing to do with earth, but with water only.
May 23d. — I think the face of nature can never look more beautiful than now, with this so fresh and youthful green, — the trees not being fully in leaf, yet enough so to give airy shade to the woods. The sunshine fills them with green light. Monument Mountain and its brethren are green, and the lightness of the tint takes away something from their massiveness and ponderosity, and they respond with livelier effect to the shine and shade of the sky. Each tree now within sight stands out in its own individuality of line. This is a very windy day, and the light shifts with magical alternation. In a walk to the lake just now with the children, we found abundance of flowers, — wild geranium, violets of all families, red columbines, and many others known and unknown, besides innumerable blossoms of the wild strawberry, which has been in bloom for the past fortnight. The Houstonias seem quite to overspread some pastures, when viewed from a distance. Not merely the flowers, but the various shrubs which one sees, — seated, for instance, on the decayed trunk of a tree, — are well worth looking at, such a variety and such enjoyment they have of their new growth. Amid these fresh creations, we see others that have already run their course, and have done with warmth and sunshine, — the hoary periwigs, I mean, of dandelions gone to seed.
August 7th. — Fourier states that, in the progress of the world, the ocean is to lose its saltness, and acquire the taste of a peculiarly flavored lemonade.
October 13th. — How pleasant it is to see a human countenance which cannot be insincere, — in reference to baby’s smile.
The best of us being unfit to die, what an inexpressible absurdity to put the worst to death!
“Is that a burden of sunshine on Apollo’s back?” asked one of the children, — of the chlamys on our Apollo Belvedere.
October 21st. — Going to the village yesterday afternoon, I saw the face of a beautiful woman, gazing at me from a cloud. It was the full face, not the bust. It had a sort of mantle on the head, and a pleasant expression of countenance. The vision lasted while I took a few steps, and then vanished. I never before saw nearly so distinct a cloud-picture, or rather sculpture; for it came out in alto-rilievo on the body of the cloud.
October 27th. — The ground this morning is white with a thin covering of snow. The foliage has still some variety of hue. The dome of Taconic looks dark, and seems to have no snow on it, though I don’t understand how that can be. I saw, a moment ago, on the lake, a very singular spectacle. There is a high northwest-wind ruffling the lake’s surface, and making it blue, lead-colored, or bright, in stripes or at intervals; but what I saw was a boiling up of foam, which began at the right bank of the lake, and passed quite across it; and the mist flew before it, like the cloud out of a steam-engine. A fierce and narrow blast of wind must have ploughed the water in a straight line, from side to side of the lake. As fast as it went on, the foam subsided behind it, so that it looked somewhat like a sea-serpent, or other monster, swimming very rapidly.
October 29th. — On a walk to Scott’s pond, with Ellery Channing, we found a wild strawberry in the woods, not quite ripe, but beginning to redden. For a week or two, the cider-mills have been grinding apples. Immense heaps of apples lie piled near them, and the creaking of the press is heard as the horse treads on. Farmers are repairing cider-barrels; and the wayside brook is made to pour itself into the bunghole of a barrel, in order to cleanse it for the new cider.
November 3d. — The face of the country is dreary now in a cloudy day like the present. The woods on the hillsides look almost black, and the cleared spaces a kind of gray brown.
Taconic, this morning (4th), was a black purple, as dense and distinct as Monument Mountain itself. I hear the creaking of the cider-press; the patient horse going round and round, perhaps thirsty, to make the liquor which he never can enjoy.
We left Lenox Friday morning, November 21, 1851, in a storm of snow and sleet, and took the cars at Pittsfield, and arrived at West Newton that evening.
Happiness in this world, when it comes, comes incidentally. Make it the object of pursuit, and it leads us a wild-goose chase, and is never attained. Follow some other object, and very possibly we may find that we have caught happiness, without dreaming of it; but likely enough it is gone the moment we say to ourselves, “Here it is!” like the chest of gold that treasure-seekers find.
West Newton, April 13th, 1852. — One of the severest snowstorms of the winter.
April 30th. — Wrote the last page (199th MS.) of the Blithedale Romance.
May 1st. — Wrote Preface. Afterwards modified the conclusion, and lengthened it to 201 pages. First proof-sheets, May 14.
Concord, Mass., August 20th. — A piece of land contiguous to and connected with a handsome estate, to the adornment and good appearance of which it was essential. — But the owner of the strip of land was at variance with the owner of the estate, so he always refused to sell it at any price, but let it lie there, wild and ragged, in front of and near the mansion-house. When he dies, the owner of the estate, who has rejoiced at the approach of the event all through his enemy’s illness, hopes at last to buy it; but, to his infinite discomfiture, the enemy enjoined in his will that his body should be buried in the centre of this strip of land. All sorts of ugly weeds grow most luxuriantly out of the grave in poisonous rankness.
The Isles of Shoals, Monday, August 30th. — Left Concord at a quarter of nine A. M. Friday, September 3, set sail at about half past ten to the Isles of Shoals. The passengers were an old master of a vessel; a young, rather genteel man from Greenland, N. H.; two Yankees from Hamilton and Danvers; and a country trader (I should judge) from some inland town of New Hampshire. The old sea-captain, preparatory to sailing, bought a bunch of cigars (they cost ten cents), and occasionally puffed one. The two Yankees had brought guns on board, and asked questions about the fishing of the Shoals. They were young men, brothers, the youngest a shopkeeper in Danvers, the other a farmer, I imagine, at Hamilton, and both specimens of the least polished kind of Yankee, and therefore proper to those localities. They were at first full of questions, and greatly interested in whatever was going forward; but anon the shopkeeper began to grow, first a little, then very sick, till he lay along the boat, longing, as he afterwards said, for a little fresh water to be drowned in. His brother attended him in a very kindly way, but became sick himself before he reached the end of the voyage.
The young Greenlander talked politics, or rather discussed the personal character of Pierce. The New Hampshire trader said not a word, or hardly one, all the way. A Portsmouth youth (whom I forgot to mention) sat in the stern of the boat, looking very white. The skipper of the boat is a Norwegian, a good-natured fellow, not particularly intelligent, and speaking in a dialect somewhat like Irish. He had a man with him, a silent and rather sulky fellow, who, at the captain’s bidding, grimly made himself useful.
The wind not being favorable, we had to make several tacks before reaching the islands, where we arrived at about two o’clock. We landed at Appledore, on which is Laighton’s Hotel, — a large building with a piazza or promenade before it, about an hundred and twenty feet in length, or more, — yes, it must be more. It is an edifice with a centre and two wings, the central part upwards of seventy feet. At one end of the promenade is a covered veranda, thirty or forty
