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5 May 1852. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  5 A.M.—Frost in night; hence the grass is wet. Hear the seringo-bird on an apple tree. I think it must be one of the species of song sparrow . . .

  A fine scarlet sunset As I sit by my window and see the clouds reflected in the meadow, I think it is important to have water, because it multiplies the heavens.

  Evening.—To the Lee place rock.

  Moon not up. The dream frog’s is such a sound as you can make with a quill on water, a bubbling sound. Behind Dodd’s. The spearers are out, their flame a bright yellow, reflected in the calm water. Without noise it is slowly carried along the shores. It reminds me of the light which Columbus saw on approaching the shores of the New World. There goes a shooting star down towards the horizon, like a rocket, appearing to describe a curve. The water sleeps with stars in its bosom . . .

(Journal, 4:17-24)
5 May 1854. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  P.M.—To Boiling Spring, Laurel Glen, and Hubbard’s Close . . .

  Heard what I should call the twitter and mew of a goldfinch . . . (Journal, 6:235-236).

5 May 1855. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  P.M.—To Beck Stow’s.  Cold weather for several days. Canada plum and cultivated cherry and Missouri currant look as if they would bloom to-morrow. The sugar maples on the Common have just begun to show their stamens peeping out of the bud, but that by Dr. Barrett’s has them an inch and a half long or more.

  The trees and shrubs which I observe to make a show now with their green, without regard to the time when they began, are (to put them in the order of their intensity and generalness):—

Gooseberry, both kinds
Raspberry
Meadow-sweet
Choke-cherry shoots
Some young trembles
Very young apples . . .

(Journal,7:357-359)
5 May 1857. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  Building fence east of house.

 Hear the tull-lull of a myrtle-bird . . . (Journal, 9:357).

5 May 1858. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  The two Rana palustris which I caught May 1st have been coupled ever since in a firkin in my chamber. They were not coupled when I caught them. Last night I heard them hopping about, for the first time, as if trying to get out . . . (Journal, 10:400-401).
5 May 1859. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  P.M.—To Melvin’s Preserve.

  Red-wings fly in flocks yet. Near the oak beyond Jarvis land, a yellow butterfly,—how hot! this meteor dancing through the air. Also see a scalloped-edge dark-colored butterfly resting on the trunk of a tree, where, both by its form and color, its wings being closed, it resembles a bit of bark, or rather a lichen. Evidently their forms and colors, especially of the under sides of their wings are designed to conceal them when at rest with their wings closed . . .

(Journal, 12:180-182)
5 May 1860. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  Cobwebs on the grass,—half green, half brown,—this morning; certainly not long, perhaps this the first time; and dews.

  2 P.M.—76º. Warm and hazy (and yesterday warm also); my single thick coat too much. Wind southeast. A fresher and cooler breeze is agreeable now . . .

(Journal, 13:277-279)
5 May 1861. Concord, Mass.

Thoreau writes in his journal:

  Hear the seringo note (Journal, 14:338).
5 May 1862. Concord, Mass.

Edmund Hosmer sits up the night with Thoreau at Thoreau’s request. The next morning, Hosmer is given Thoreau’s memorial copy of A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers with a lock of John Thoreau’s hair taped in it (Concord Saunterer, vol. 11, no. 4 (Winter 1976): 16).

5 November 1829. Concord, Mass.

Henry D. Thoreau attends a meeting of the Concord Academy Debating Society. The minutes, signed by secretary George Moore, state:

  Part of the members recited pieces. Edward Wright (affirmative) and Henry Thoreau (negative) were called to discuss: “Is a good memory preferable to a good understanding in order to be a distinguished scholar at school?” The affirmative disputant through negligence, had prepared nothing for debate, and the negative not much more. Accordingly, no other member speaking, the President decided in the Neg. His decision was confirmed by a majority of four. Such a debate, if it may be called so, as we have had, this evening, I hope never again will be witnessed in this house or recorded in this book. It is not only a waste of time, but of paper to record such proceedings, of wood and oil.
(Emerson Society Quarterly 9 (4th quarter 1957):6)

George Moore writes in his journal:

  Attended the meeting of the club at the Academy, but not a very pleasant one, as the regular disputants had not prepared themselves to speak (Ibid.).

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