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Thoreau writes in his journal:

P.M.—Got in any boat, which before I had got out and turned up on the bank. It made me sweat to wheel it home through the snow, I am so unused to the work of late.

Then walked up the railroad. The clear strawcolored grass and some weeds contrasting with the snow it rises above. Saw little in this walk . . .

As for the sensuality in Whitman‘s “Leaves of Grass,” I do not so much wish that it was not written, as that men and women were so pure that they could read it without harm.

(Journal, 9:148-149)

2 December 1857. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

I find that, according to the deed of Duncan Ingraham to John Richardson in 1797, my old bean-field on Walden Pond then belonged to George Minott. (Minott thinks he bought it off an Allen.) This was Deacon George Minott, who lived in the house next below the East Quarter schoolhouse, and was a brother of my grandfather-in-law. He was directly descended from Thomas Minott, who, according to Shattuck, was secretary of the Abbot of Walden (!) in Essex, and whose son George was born at Saffron Walden (!) and afterwards was one of the earliest settlers of Dorchester . . .

(Journal, 10:218-219)

2 December 1858. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

When I first saw that snow-cloud it stretched low along the northwest horizon, perhaps one quarter round and half a dozen times as high as the mountains, and was remarkably horizontal on its upper edge, but that edge was obviously for a part of the way very thin, composed of a dusky mist . . .

(Journal, 11:361)

2 December 1859. Concord, Mass.

A. Bronson Alcott writes in his journal:

2 P.M. Meet at Town Hall. Our townspeople present mostly, and many from the adjoining towns. Simon Brown, Chairman. Readings by Thoreau, Emerson, Bowers, Keyes, and Alcott, and Sanborn’s dirge is sung by the company, standing. The bells are not rung. I think not more than one or two of Brown’s friends wished them to be. I did not. It was more fitting to signify our sorrow in the subdued tones, and silent, then by any clamor of steeples and the awakening of angry feelings. Any conflict is needless as unamiable between neighbors, churchmen, and statesmen. The services are affecting and impressive; distinguished by modesty, simplicity, and earnestness; worthy alike of the occasion and of the man.

(The Journals of Bronson Alcott, 323)

Thoreau speaks on “The Martyrdom of John Brown.”

2 December 1860. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

P.M.—To Smith’s Hickory Hill-side. I come via Britton’s to see if I can find a seedling hickory under half a dozen years old . . . (Journal, 14:287-290).

Thoreau also writes to H. G. O. Blake:

Mr Blake,

I am going to Waterbury Ct. to lecture on the 11th inst. If you are to be at home, & it will be agreeable to you, I will spend the afternoon & night of the 10th with you & Brown.

H. D. Thoreau

(The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau, 601; MS, Henry David Thoreau papers (Series III). Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature, New York Public Library)

2 December 1861. Concord, Mass.

A. Bronson Alcott writes in his journal:

Dine at Thoreau’s with Sanborn. Thoreau is lively and entertaining, though feeble and failing. He does not conceal his impatience with the slowness of the present Administration and its disregard of honor and justice to the free sentiment of the North. We hope Congress, which assembles today, will spur the cabinet to do its duty, and better represent the demands of the country.

(The Journals of Bronson Alcott, 341)

2 February 1834. Cambridge, Mass.

Thoreau begins an Italian class taught by Pietro Bachi, which only lasts six weeks, ending with the term on 16 March (Thoreau’s Harvard Years, part 1:14).

2 February 1841. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau borrows $1.35 from his father (The Personality of Thoreau (1901), 28).

2 February 1849. Lincoln, Mass.

James Lorin Chapin writes in his journal:

I came down to Mr. Thoreau’s to see if H. D. Thoreau would come and lecture before the Lincoln Lyceum next Tuesday evening. He said if nothing occurred more than he expected he would come (Concord Saunterer vol. 17, no. 3 (December 1984), 23; MS, Miscellaneous Journals. Archives/Special Collections, Lincoln (Mass.) Public Library).

2 February 1852.

Concord, Mass. Thoreau writes in his journal:

Sir Francis Head says that in America “the moon looks larger” than in Europe. Here, then, moonshine is to be expected. Perhaps the sun larger also. Such are the advantages of the New World . . .

Sir F. Head thinks that the greater cold—equal to thirteen degrees of latitude—in this country is owing to the extensive forests, which prevent the sun and wind from melting the snows, which therefore accumulate on the ground and create a cold stratuaa of air, which, blown to warmer ones by the northwest wind, condenses the least into snow. But, in Concord woods at any rate, the snow (in the winter) melts faster, and beside is not so deep as in the fields. Not so toward spring, on the north sides of lulls and in hollows. At any rate I think he has not allowed enough for the warmth of the woods.

(Journal, 3:268-270)

Concord, Mass. Thoreau writes in his journal on 3 February:

I have been to the libraries (yesterday) at Cambridge and Boston (Journal, 3:270).

Cambridge, Mass. Thoreau checks out Linnaeus’ Philosophia botanica by Carl von Linnaeus and Voyages du Baron de La Hontan dans l’Amerique Septentrionale (volumes 1 and 2?) by Louis Armand, Baron de La Hontan from Harvard Library (Companion to Thoreau’s Correspondence, 290).

Boston, Mass. Thoreau checks out A natural system of botany by John Lindley and A synopsis of lichenes of New England, the other northern states, and British America and An enumeration of North American lichenes by Edward Tuckerman from the Boston Society of Natural History.

(Emerson Society Quarterly, no. 24 (March 1952):24)

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