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  We are glad to hear that you are in the neighborhood, and shall be much disappointed if we do not see you & Caleb.

  Come up any day that is most convenient to you—or, if you stay so long, perhaps you will spend Thanksgiving (the 21st) with us.

Yrs, in haste,
Henry D. Thoreau

  (But first a neighbor sent in a girl to inquire if I knew where worm-seed grew, otherwise called “Jerusalem-oak” (so said the recipe which she brought cut out of a newspaper), for her mistress’s hen had the “gapes.” But I answered that this was a Southern plant and [I] knew not where it was to be had. Referred her to the poultry book. Also the next proprietor commenced stoning and settling down the stone for a new well, an operation which I wished to witness, purely beautiful, simple, and necessary. The stones laid on a wheel, and continually added to above as it is settled down by digging under the wheel. Also Goodwin, with a partridge and a stout mess of large pickerel, applied to me to dispose of a mud turtle which he had found moving the mud in a ditch. Some men will be in the way to see such movements.) . . .

  Cut three white pine boughs opposite Fair Haven, and set there up in the bow of our boat for a sail. It was pleasant [to] hear the water begin to ripple under the prow, telling of our easy progress. We thus without a tack made the south side of Fair Haven, then threw our sails overboard, and the moment after mistook them for green bushes or weeds which had sprung from the bottom unusually far from shore. Then to hear the wind sough in your sail,—that is to be a sailor and hear a land sound. The grayish-whitish mikania, all fuzzy, covers the endless button-bushes, which are now bare of leaves . . .

  In some places in the meadows opposite Bound Rock, the river seemed to have come to an end, it was so narrow suddenly. After getting in sight of Sherman’s Bridge, counted nineteen birches on the right-hand shore in one whirl.

  Now commenced the remarkable meandering of the river, so that we seemed for some [time] to be now running up, then running down parallel with a long, low hill, tacking over the meadow in spite of ourselves. Landed at Sherman’s Bridge. An apple tree, made scrubby by being browsed by cows . . .

  Rowed about twenty-four miles, going and coming. In a straight line it would be fifteen and one half.

  P.M.—Walden.

  The water of Walden is a light green next the shore, apparently because of the light rays reflected from the sandy bottom mingling with the rays which the water reflects . . .

  A smart frost, which even injured plants in house. Ground stiffened in morning; ice seen.

  River lower than for some months. Banks begin to wear almost a Novemberish aspect. The black willow almost completely bare; many quite so. It loses its leaves about same time with the maples . . .

  The ten days—at least—before this were plainly Indian summer. They were remarkably pleasant and warm. The latter half I sat and slept with an open window, though the first part of the time I had a little fire in the morning. These succeeded to days when you had worn thick clothing and sat by fires for some time . . .

  The colors of the oaks are far more distinct now than they were before. See that white and that black oak, side by side, young trees, the first that peculiar dull crimson (or salmon) red, with crisped edges, the second a brownish and greenish yellow, much sun still in its leaves.