XLVII
From May 5th, 1916 to Nov 27th, 1916 1916 May 8, Fine clear morning. Light thunder shower last night. Start for Roxbury this morning on early train. John meets me at station with his car. Country wonderfully green. The deep snows or winter have kept the earth comparatively warm and the grass starts vigorously. No foliage yet in R. only a yellow green mist of swelling bulls in the woods at Wood Chuck Lodge in p.m. quite warm. Wear my straw hat. Few birds here, and no chipmonks, plenty of wood chucks. 9 Bright and cooler; got up in night for more bed cover. Walk over to John's for my meals. In the p.m. Irving T. plows my garden. Four big snow banks yet on the side hill above the old home. One of them as high as the wall. Walk up through the sap bush in morning and commune a bit with the venerable old maples and linger about the site of the old boiling place with long, long thoughts. Boiling sap in a sap house would not attract me. I must have the open air and the view of the distant farms and mountains. Walk over through the woods on the knoll, or what we used to call the clover lot woods. On the eastern slope above the meadow a great display of early wild flowers - hepatica spring beauty, squirrel corn, trillium yellow and white violets, miterwort crinkle root (dentaria) blue cohosh, fawn lily - all in great profusion, never saw this slope with its jutting rocky brows, so bedecked in my youth.
-Probably never struck it at just this time at the foot of a ledge the heel of the last snow bank lingered; within 4 feet of it the hepaticas were opening; all these early and later flower, blooming together as the result of the delay caused by the lingering snow banks. It was indeed a pretty sight. Bunches of snow white hepaticas nearly as large as the top of my hat. 10 Begin planting the garden in the p.m.
-Corn, peas, beets, onions, carrots, spinach, very windy and cold. 11 Clear with tremendous wind a strange white opacity to the air, like a little milk mixed in of pail of water. Walking over to Johns for my breakfast required all my strength, the push of the wind often brought me to a standstill. I had to sit down and rest over on the hill. Still the curious white dry mist in the air; the wind has no effect upon it after breakfast I walk up the side hill above the house to the lingering snow banks. How dirty they were leaving a deposit of soil on the stones and ground where they had melted, a border of dripping ground a few feet wide all around their lower margins. Prairie homed larks were feeding about them close up to their margins, evidently picking up the seeds of grasses and weeds that the wind had brought over the hill from the other side. They were very busy. On the top of the hill. when I could look over into West settlement, the wind blew so hard that I could not stand it long. I crouched behind the stone wall a while. Then made my way across the hill to the upper snow banks and standing up slid swiftly down one of them for 30 or 40 feet. Then by the head of the spring out of which a big volume of water was rushing and cut my initials in the bark of the old beech tree that stands there. The initials that were there in my youth are all obliterated. This spring was a vital part of the home. How many times has father said to me "John you must go up to the head the spring and clean the leaves off the strainer. The little elm sapling that then stood in the corner of the walls is now a large superb tree, 3 ft through. Three times did I see the "pump logs" that bring the water to the house renewed in my youth - once with poplar, once with hemlock and once with pine. Some old fellow from Mooresville used to come with his long anger and bore them. It was to me an interesting proceeding. It was quite a trick to bore a log 15 ft long and keep near the centre of the log. The poplar logs proved a failure - soon delayed as did the hemlocks - pine lasted well, now for many years an iron pipe conveys the water, but does not keep it so cool and fresh in summer. In the p.m. I plant cucumber and squash and repair the blue-bird house and shoot my only woodchuck on the wall in front of the house. Quite warm, how lovely the country looked. The nature green of the grass, the fresh brown of the woods, the blue of the sky. Wind still violent in p.m. Every lone tree in the fields like a cataract and the woods resounded like the multihedenous seas. At 4 p.m. I walk down across the fields to the station, see my first bobolinks in Caswells meadow, and hear a match of his song. Take train for Hobart, Eden meets me at station. His large amber colored glasses make him look strange. Fairly well, face full with some color, one eye nearly blind, but other serves him. Mag well, spend the night and enjoy the visit. Change to colder in the night. 12 Feels like a frost this morning. I leave on early train for home. Gets much warmer as we come down out the
mountains. Clear and warm at West Park. The gold finches having their animal music festival in the trees from the station to the main road - hundreds of them filling the tree tops with a fine sibilant chorus very pretty. Find Mrs B. a triple better, but still a sufferer and very weak. Apple, pear, and late cherry trees in bloom, lilacs also. Foliage half out. 13 Bright lovely day. Castle school girls and Miss Masen and her teachers come to Slabsides. I drive over in my car in
p.m. a pleasant time. Day perfect. 14 Fine in morning, cloudy in p.m. Gold finches here in great members, hundreds if not thousands of them; a grand reunion; how festive and happy they seem, males predominating, many of them looking a little smutty yet in their half restored yellow suit. The gold finches of a large area must have assembled here, by appointment or mutual understanding community of mind or how? They fill a dozen tree tops at a time along the road. They feed on the half natural elm seed, rifling the winged dist of its germ very skillfully, sand of them make little excursions into the vineyards and gardens for the green seeds of the chickweed. This morning a large number of them came down around my study and attacked the closed dandelion heads and dug out their green seeds. They are evidently hard put for food. They made no provision in advance of the gathering of the claw. But they evidently get few out of it all and laugh and sing the day through. They have been here several days, not a harsh note is heard nor an unfriendly gesture seen now and then a male pursues a female swiftly through or about the trees, but it is as a suitor and not as an enemy, most birds make love on the wing - "catch me if you can" the female seems to say, "and I am yours." I cannot make out whether it is the males alone that do the singing, or shall I call it a subdued musical chatter and rehearsal. It has an air of privacy and screened seclusion - just the bursting buds of song. I visualize it as matching the half unfolded elm and maple leaves. Probably the passers along the road under the trees do not notice it at all. It is a mist or fine spray of song coming from no particular point but from everywhere in and about the trees. One has to look long and intently to make out any individual bird. How contented and confiding the tones are! expressing only joy and affection. Few birds have such pretty ways as the gold finch. 15 Rain in the night and mist and cloud this morning. The gold finch festival seems over. 17 Heavy rain all last night and part of today, nearly 3 inches of water. Breaking in p.m. Mrs B. gains, very, very slowly if at all - fear she will never be any better. 18 Cool overcast with sprinkles of rain. Write in morning; walk in p.m. Apple trees dropping their bloom. 19 Very cool, near a frost. Cloud and sun.
-How much live natural history goes to waste everyday upon every farm - even on our door yards and gardens. There are at this moment (May 19, 1916) 12 or 14 robins nests in my lot of 18 acres, a wren nest, two blue-birds nests, one song sparrow nest that I have found, 2 wood thrushes nests, one phoebe nest, and the chippies and vireos and warblers and orioles have not yet began to build. On a large farm how many more nests there must be. Think of the interesting natural history incidents that occur in a whole township in a single day, or in the country, or in the state - and during the whole season, not one in ten thousand is ever witnessed or recorded. How fee [of them] I myself witness or make note of, of those on my own few acres. If I spent all my time in the open air on the alert, how many more I would see. The drama of wild life about us is played quickly, the actors are on and off the stage before we fairly know it, and the play shifts to another field. 20 Lovely day. Gangs of school children and grown ups at SS. New Paltz normal and Kingston High School. I walk over in morning and drive over in p.m. 21 Bright and sharp. Frost over by station. Walk up to Wallheads in morning. Saw and heard very thrush. Several of them here near house. Drive Mrs B. out in p.m. 22 Fine day, but cool. Ruth Drake comes - on her way to Cincinnati.. Drives her to SS. a fine girl. See many Bay breasted warblers every day. Drive to H. in p.m. the road bordered with dandelion gold. 23 Rain nearly all night, and still raining at 10 a.m. Cold.
-A universal intelligence pervades organic nature, one manifestation of it in the vegetable, another in the animal the highest of all in man.
-What is it for? A tree flight comes and destroys all the trees of a certain species and then the blight itself perishes; what was it all for? When life on the earth has run its course and all forms of it disappeared, and the globe becomes a dead world may we ask what was it all for? Where is the gain? What was the end? Apparently there is no namable purpose in these things. To ask to what end, is like looking for the end or beginning of the circle or the sphere. There is none. Life is its own excuse for being. It seeks myriad forms of expression but rests with none. There is no finality in the universe. On and on or around and around with no stoppage. The rivers to the sea; is that their end? No, through the air they flow back to the land and begin the circuit again forever and ever. The creek that flows through your fields or past your house - what an individuality it has! None other just like it, though the waters of all are just the same. The meadow brook, the pasture brook the forest brook, the mountain brook - how they all differ, what a distinct impression each of them make and yet all of one identical element. The conditions, the environment are what makes the difference. They each have a different body, so to speak. Rocks give one character, sand and gravel another, silt and loam another. The music of the brook is evoked by the obstacles in its way. If there no friction then is no sound. Does the brook make the valley or the valley make the brook? In a world of clashing seismic forces, valleys result, and then water carves and enlarges them. The rains carve the clay bank into ridges and valleys. Physical laws rule it. The serpentine course of a stream through a plain - is inevitable. 24 Fog and cloud in a.m. Clear and lovely in p.m. and warmer. Drive to Highland with C.B. and Mrs B. Walk in woods on my return. Ladies slipper and shiny orches in bloom. 25 Lovely day, fairly hot, the hottest so far, an ideal May day. Drive to S.S. at 10, no birds there, a birdless solitude compared with this place. 26 Lovely day, a little cooler. Ideal May weather. Mrs B. on deep thought fear she is not really mending. Writing this on C.B's porch; hear the indigo bird below the hill. Cat birds building in honey suckle against the sleeping porch - very shy about it. How the cat bird is associated in my mind with what in my boyhood we called the "bush lot" - mothers black berry patch, now a pasture. Our seed of it was a tangle of sumach wild pigeon cherry purple flowering raspberry bushes and black berry bushes, and a great hermit of the cat birds. I probably first heard them here while berrying with mother. Their calls and meowings were always in our ears. Or I may have heard them earlier in the season while going through the lot down to File sendders to see Henry, or to go fishing. I think they do not sing in blackberry time. Oh, the days of our youth - what is the secret of their magic! How commonplace and often vulgar is the life of all farm boys, yet in memory its dross or puter turns to gold. To go in August with mother to the Bush Lot for these long luscious black berries, or earlier farther off over on Hixes hill in the old bark peeling for black and red raspberries or still earlier in the hill meadows for wild strawberries, wading through the daises and clover and timothy grass the fragrant breath of the meadow filling the warm air - is something almost sacred to look back to. May 30 Warm fine day, partly overcast. Drive up to Eds grave in p.m. 31 Cooler, fine day. Drive to H. with C.B. and children in p.m. June 1st Bright cool day. Probably a frost in some places last night. Writing a little on birds these days. Lucy Stanton and Mrs B. come in p.m. 2 Fine cool day. Drive to H. 3 Stay at SS. last night. Raining this morning - rained nearly all day. News of the great sea fight - much disturbed by it. If England fails upon the sea as she has upon the land the Kaiser will have her as sure as the devil. 4 Bright and warm this morning. Promises a fine day. Locust trees in bloom. Drive to Port Ewen with Lucy Stanton and Miss Bragier. 5 Warmer, partly cloudy, threatens rain.
-The tree nesting bird that most often comes to grief is the chippy 5th Start for Detroit this p.m. Leave Albany at 8:10. 6 In D. this morning. Mr Ford meets me with a car. Cloudy. 7 At the Fords at Dearborn, new house very large and fine, a house one could live in I have the river room, where I can hear the murmur of the water. Rain all day. 8 Clearing and a little sunshine. We walk and drive about - drive in the 400 acre meadow to hear and see the bobolinks. Grass and clover keen high, plenty of bobolinks. 9 Fair day. In p.m. I lay the corner stone of the bird fountain in which I have cut my name, the fountain the walks to it, and the terraces above it all made of stone from Wood chuck Lodge - stone that I helped my brothers pick up for a wall in my youth. Leave on 7:10 train for home. 10 Reach home via Pokeepsie on 10:25 train. Mrs B. gaining. 17 A rainy cold week; two rainless days. Grapes not yet in bloom. Work on my new bird article, "The Familiar Birds." Cherries rotting on tree. Go strawberrying in p.m. and enjoy it greatly. Chat beginning to hatch. Boat races today, a company of teachers from Beacon on morning train. Paul, Douglass, John and Eleanor and Harriet drive to races with
my car. Have adventure. 18 Clearing this morning, but everything very wet. My good day yesterday, my poor day today - sleep poor last night. But much stronger than in May, though have lost 3 or 4 lbs. Thunder shower at noon. Clear in p.m. and warm. 19 Cloudy this morning and cooler, a curse of wetness.
-Rained nearly all day not heavy. The coldest wettest June I can remember - breaks the record 7 months of snow and rain - over 8 feet of snow last winter. 20 Clearing and cool. Grapes not yet in bloom. 29 An ideal June day at last, perfect in every way, following two bright days nearly as perfect. Warm and calm and wooing. Miss Doolittle here, she, C.B. and I drive to Brookman woods and walk to Sunset rock, a glorious view. 30 A warm lovely day, even hot. Drive to S.S. Cut weeds and c. July 1st Warm day with some cloud. Mrs B. gaining. 2 Warm day, shower at night. 3 Drive to Kingston, Harriet off for home. Brisk shower at noon. 4 Overcast and cooler, health good. Thin but spirit good. Terrible fighting Europe. I pray for the success of the Allies crush and crush the damed Germans. 5 Cloudy, cold, N.E. wind. Cat birds building 2d nest near south window at "the nest" Touch John Kalleys grandson and his wife and son, from Syracuse call at 7 p.m. son of Edmund Kelly. Glad to see them, a big powerful man, weighs 275 lbs. 6 Fine, hot day. Drive car to E. and then to H. to be fixed. Maj Pitcher and brother and wife and daughter call, while I am away. 7 Clear, hazy, hot, an ideal summer day. War news pretty good. Russia is doing things, and the allies in France are battering the Germans well. Let them give their hell. The Allies are now making good use of the lessons in warfare that the Germans have given them. May they improve upon their teachers. 8, 9, 10, 11 Warm, much rain, great humidity. 13 To Yama Farms Inn. J. drives, me up to Chain Ferry. 14 At Yama, warm, moist. enjoy being here again. 15 Drive to Roofs this p.m. Spend day and night there, as lovely as ever. 16 Limit myself to 5 trout this morning, nearly 2 hours in catching them. Then car brings me to Big Indian in p.m. Home at 6 by auto from Chain Ferry. 17 Rainy and hot. Start for Roxbury at 10 alone in my car. Mrs B. and Eliza take 4 p.m. train. Am at W.C.L. at 4 p.m. the others come on 6:15 train. 18 Glorious day; very warm. The place looks as good as ever. Sleep on the porch, at 4 a.m. a sparrow sang, "very peaceful, peaceful" and so it was, no disturbing sights or sounds - only the disquieting thoughts of the war, which one cannot escape from. a world of grass; never saw [st] such meadows and pastures before. The air is sweet with the perfume of meadow and pasture. The foliage of the woods and field trees as rank as if it had some special fertilization - as if the blood spilled in Europe had soaked through and fertilized the roots of all vegetation. 19 Lovely hot fragrant day, walk and loaf and shoot woodchucks. 20 Great, shining, perfumed summer day - a luxury to live. 21 Threat of rain past. Clearing and hot. Writing in "bush camp." Write to Lyman Abbott thanking him for his knoll paper on my book. 8 wood chucks leave fallen to my rifle since I came. 25 Heat continues, go down in the village, no rain, but great humidity the air reaks with moisture. This is the 10th day of it, a white vapor fills the air; no wind but but oppressive heat. Writing a little each day in bush camp. 9 1/2 a.m. just heard the tinkle tinkle of a bobolink in Caswell's meadow, when the morning machines are at work. 26 Rained all night and part of today about 3 inches of water, hot. 27 Clearing and hot - no breeze air about 2 parts air and one part water. Heavy rains in the south; floods in the seat of war in France and in Russia and Austria - a year of unparalleled precipitation nearly everywhere. Feel well these days .better than last year. Heat stimulates me. 31 Heat continues and the humidity. Write a little each day. Yesterday (Sunday) walked to the big rock in the upper end of the old sheep lot. Reclined upon it a long time - had not been to it - for 50 years. Shot a chuck near it. came home through the woods. Saw only a black throated blue warbler, very warm. Saw two phoebes nest under ledges. Aug 1st Clear lovely, cooler. Change came last night. In p.m. drive to Pratsville on joy ride with Miss Barbone and
Wilson, made the round trip in 2 hours. Mrs B. looks bad today. Sunday night was a bad night for her. 2 Clear, ideal August days, very cool last night - three blanket night. Yesterday morning at 4 1/2 shot a crow - one of a gang that have been destroying my morning nap ever since I came. This morning the cawing was much farther away. My 15th chuck this morning. Birds suddenly very abundant. The June plums attract many robins, an oven bird has just looked in enquiringly upon me in my camp, from a near apple tree. Chipmonk, checking as in the fall. Perfect hay weather at last. [Aug 2] For 2 years now the one keen expectation of each day - the one event to look forward to with eagerness and pleasure, has been the arrival of the morning paper. What good news from armageddon will it bring today? Have the Hems yet been chuckled or hurled back? Have the allies yet profited by the lessons in the art of war which the Hems have given them? My first thought in the morning is of the probable days news, and my main thought when I waken in the middle of the night is of the unholy war, notely for the Hems, holy for the allies. When the paper comes, I want to run away to some secluded spot and read it undisturbed, as I would a love letter. First I skim the headings hurriedly to get the impact of the big print; then read the details of the more important events, then the less important impatient of all spread out account of our own local and home news. That does not count, only the news from the war is of vital and world wide and age wide importance, over Mexican trouble. I brush it aside as I do the fly that tickles my scalp. The state of the world and of civilization is in the European conflict. If the Hems triumph woe, be into us, a robber nation will again overrun the world. After dinner I go over the news again and glean when I reaped before, or I get bold of another daily and read its version; the change in type and heading freshens the news up. By lamp light I often glance over the news again. In magazines and [other] the weekly periodicals I look only for war news or war discussions. When I was ill last winter I kept saying to myself I must live to see the end of this war and see Germany adequately punished. I did not say if she is to triumph let me die now, but such a possibility made life far less desirable. Aug 3d Cool last night and today, but good hay weather. Drove with wife and Miss B. down to the village and a couple of miles down the state road. Mrs B. stood the trip well, about 2 car loads of callers each day lately - through one day. 4 Bright hot day. I write in a.m. 5 Bright hot day. I write in a.m.
-I never cease to wonder at the incessant cawing of the crows - at all house of the day from all points of the compass, their voices reach me. Are they so truly social, are they always calling to each other for company, signaling back and forth to keep touch? Or what is the reason? What purpose does all this endless caw-cawing serve? They caw from tree tops, form the ground, while on the wing while alone, while in company in the spring, in the summer, in the fall. He is more silent in the winter, apparently because life is more serious then. In beating his way home to his rooking at sunset against a cold winter wind, he has nothing to say. Hence I infer that his ceaseless cawing is only the expression of his festive and social nature, he has a good time, he loves his fellows, he knows his enemies and life is sweet.
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The 4th was one of there summer days where the slow moving clouds pile their snowy peaks high in the blue depths of the sky - the alps and andes of cloud land, as I sat over by the woods feasting my eyes upon them a red headed wood pecker climbed up high in the air and overtook some bug as other insect (I could faintly see it) and picked it out of the air easily and returned to dead branch in the woods. The same hour I saw cedar birds doing the same thing lower down. They moved slowly and here and there seized some winged insect. This is a common practice of cedar birds in late summer. They do the thing rather [do] awkwardly and deliberately as we do [a feat] slowly a feat which a professional does with a quick stroke. With the professional fly catcher it is a flash and a snap and the bug is gone. 6th Julian and Peterson came yesterday p.m. in the big car - here in 3 hours. Very glad to see them. They shoot woodchucks till 7 p.m. a hot day - the hottest yet.

J.
and P. hunt wood chuck again all forenoon; kill 5 or 6. A great comfort to have them here, at 2 p.m. they are off for home. I watch them disappear around the bend of the road by Caswells in a cloud of red dust. Was very lonely after they had gone. 7 Hot with mere wind. 12 Miss Barbone off today. 13 A change to cool, after rain, clear, windy, cold. 14 A four blanket night last night, near a frost moon full [Aug 14, 1916] and sky clear.


The wind blew down a dead maple in Tim Silvers woods yesterday and Caswells boys happened along with their dog a few moments afterward. The dog drone the old one up a tree. The young eyes not yet open were creeping around on the ground. The boys said the mother tried to carry them away as a cat does her kittens. They made a nest for them at the foot of a tree, and came and told me. I went over there at once and found the place, but the young were gone. Did not know that any squirrels had young at this time of year.
-It is as when you try to kill a fly with your hand - the wind from your hand helps the fly escape. See the wise behavior of flies, when it is cold and they are stiff and sluggish then wits are more on guard - you cannot approach them so closely with your hand; they are wilder as if they knew they were more at your mercy. See also how much more a "blow-fly" knows about more things than a bird. Nothing is easier than to catch a bird on the window, or a bee; but try to catch a big fly; he tries the window pane and at once discovers they he cannot penetrate it and so darts away about the room and maybe tries another window pane, but is off again before you can close upon him, but the bird persists and will not be convinced that it cannot escape through it till your hand closes upon it.
-An interesting thing about the burdock is the ease with which the burr is detached from the parent stem. Even while yet in bloom its hooks will seize you coat and the burr let go its hold on the stem The hocks are not attached to their seperate seeds, but are for the burr as a whole, nature seems partial to certain weeds. The burdock is one of them; it is a great success. How far it travels in cows tails, sheeps wool, dogs hair, mens coats and c. Nothing eats it as far as I know, and nothing appears to seek its seeds. Birds have been found imprisoned by its hooks it serves no creature that I know of as does the thistle and the nettle, [all] the animals scatter its seeds against their will, man makes war upon it everywhere, and yet it thrives. What a pleasure it is to invade a stand of it with ones knife or ones scythe and lay them low. While on are cutting they they seize upon you and [fall] go with you to the next field. They die hard; they are full of original sin; their juice is bitter and their fibre coarse. Last years dead stalks stand defiantly amid the new growth of this year, cut it close to the ground in July and in August, it has new shoots loaded with burrs; cut these off and in last Sept. It evolves burrs, directly form stub of the old stalk determined to perpetuate itself till the last gasp. By hook or by crook it is bound to get on in the world. Aug 15 Bright, clear, warmer, calmer. Write in camp. See [the] a pair of yellow butterflies go waltzing up in the air, a hundred feet or more up and then they separate and drop back to earth. Is it love or war? Yesterday p.m. I went to the woods to look after the flying squirrels again, found no sign of them, only the nesting material had all been removed. Aug 15 Clear, fine. Julian and Miss Larsen and her sisters come at 12. Lunch up above my rock by the wood, a happy afternoon. 16 Fine day, getting warmer. We drive to Hobart in forenoon. Mrs B. stands the trip well. Eden and Mag well. Willie also. Mr Scott calls, something has gone out of him these last few years. Leave at 3. Car runs well. Farmers stacking their great surplus of hay. Barns overflowing never remember such a crop of hay. Barns on this farm inadequate - two stacks at least. 17 Calm, warm, clear Aug morning. Valley [full] a lake of fog, at 7 it begins to get restless and send out its moist ghostly feelers in all directions. They reach us here and come nosing in the windows and doors, they they draw back. At 8 1/2 the fog appears to have turned to blue vapor. It cannot long stand the rays of the sun. But the laws of its ebbing and flowing I do not understand. It seems like a thing alive of course it is the warmth of the sun that starts the currents, but why does it flow back? The mood and complexion of the day suggests dry weather. 19 The lovely Aug. days continue, moonlight, one blanket nights, hot, still, smoky days, getting dry. Walked yesterday
p.m. over the hill and through the woods looking for our school boy trees and path, all gone, "the ledges" now in an open field, grandfathers old place looking so lonely and deserted. 75 years since he walked these fields - a tough of burdocks and raspberry bushes where his house stood; wood chucks burrow in it and wild birds nest there. Only wet spongy ground where his spring was and only a heap of stone where his barn stood. I am beginning to feel uncomfortable when I hear an auto coming. So many of them stop here. Why does one come back and sigh over the scenes of his youth? How they move him and yet here stale they seem. It is his dead post, it attracts him and yet it repels him - it is sicklied over with his dead self. Sept 29 S long break in my record. Aug. passed well. I gained in strength and did some writing. It was a very warm Aug. C.B. came near the [seed] 25. Mrs B. gained very slowly. De Loach came about the 23rd. The sight of him cheered me. Julian and his friends came on bright day and picnicked up under the woods. I lived from day to day on the war news as usual. Plenty of rain in Aug, but a very warm month. Aug 29th came Edison and his party to take me with them
on a motor trip. They camp in my orchard - an unwanted sight - a campers extemporized village under my old apple trees - 4 tents, a large dining tent and at night electric lights, and the man Edison the centre around which it all revolved. Mr Firestone comes in the house and uses the bath room but E. will not. They stay till Wednesday p.m. when we start for Albany .reach there in early evening, next day off to the Adirondacks by way of Saratoga and Lake George. Reach Elizabeth town at 6 p.m. on Saturday Sept 2d. First frost at night, all are cold. Sept 3 Drive up to Ausable Chasm - a deep gash in the old Potsdam sand stone, then to Ausable Forks, where we camp by the river. 4 Off for Lake Placid and Lake Saravack. Camp at Indian Lake 5 To Blue Mt Lake, and Long Lake and Paul Smiths. Camp before we reach Malone. 6 To Malone and then to Plattsburgh. Camp near P. 7 Off for Manchester. Camp near Red Mt. 8 Off to Bennington. Camp near there. Weather warm and fine. 9 Off for Poughkeepsie Reach Highland ferry at 6. Camp below Highland. Hot. 10 Julian comes down and takes me back to W.P. A fine day. Off for Roxbury in p.m. Home at night. Mrs B. improved. 11 Fine day, motor to Hubble. Feel 25 percent stronger than when I left with Edison 13 Take car down to the garage. Walk up as easily as ever I did. 16 Hendricks come for weekend. I enjoy their visit. 17, 18, 19, 20 Pleasant busy days, with callers nearly every day. 21 Colgate come for me. Promise to go Saturday. 23 Off with the Colgates for Onteora, stay till Monday - an enjoyable time. 24 Cold and windy. 25 Cold, go to Roulands. 26 At R. warm fine day. 27 The Colgates bring me back home in p.m. Warm and fine. 28 Warm and clear. Drive to Hubbles in p.m. with Mrs B. 29 Colder, rain all day and wind. 30 Cold clear day; freezes quite hard at night, our first freeze. Oct 1 A day of great clearness, beauty, cold. 2 Another great bright still day out of the blue heavens. Wonderful, still cool, not a film in the sky. White frost - our first air full of bird voices and autumn sounds. I stand a long time up on the hill gazing upon the scene. Mrs B. weeping like a child this morning with pain. But when I tell her I shall have to go away she keeps that up, she gradually stops, no words can tell here I pity her. She is so unheroic and querulous. 3d Another lustrous day, clear as spring water. Go to Shepards to lunch. Mrs Sarre and friends from Yama Farms. The smouldering fires of autumn are now visible [on] in the maples on all the mountain sides. In a few days the winds of autumn will fan them into a glow, and then soon the flame will appear. 4 Mild, still overcast, not a leaf stirs. Saw my last wood chuck on my morning walk a vesper sparrow rehearsing from a bush by the road side. Probably a young bird - just the rudiments of the vespers song. The voice of crows everywhere in the landscape. What a heavy common place flyer the crow is! No poetry in any of his motions, no grace, no airiness no mastery as with the hawks, only when he walks is he graceful and Walking up the road this Monday at 7. I saw where the birds had been wallowing in the dry earth. There were the prints of their wing quills and the prints of their slender feet. How curious, I thought, that there dainty creature of the air should want an earth bath - should face the need of sifting the soil through their plumage - of charging every feather for a moment with this earth dust. Does it strengthen and renew them? How suggestive it is! To come to earth again often your [flight] life in the air, to hug it close for a few moments, to interpenetrate yourself with it, how sanitary and renewing, for [men] birds or [birds] men. Here nearly all the animals love to get back to the earth. Behold the delight of the horse in rolling on the ground. The bull loves to tear up this soil with his horns and then paw the earth over his back. The dog, the pig, the cat love the contact of the soil, so do children. Is it only the scratchers among birds that earth their wings? I do not know [as] that birds of prey, or crows or woodpeckers do so, or water birds. The latter seem to find the water and mud sufficient. I suppose the intellectual man gets from a walk in the country in some degree, the equivalent of the birds earth bath. What he gets is very intangible but it refreshes and heals him. It is partly physical from the exercise in the open and
partly mental and spiritual from the play of his senses upon the objects around him. W.W. says "I recruit myself as I go," as we all do. The mist completely earthy animal we have is the wood chuck. He spends more than 4/5 of their time in the ground. From last of Sept to early or late March he is dead to all that is going on above the ground. And during the spring and summer months he spends 4/5 of his time deep in his hole. He lives only to lay up a store of fat to carry him over the winter. How he severe of the soil. His flesh is rank with the earth flavors, he is stupid in them. The ground mole is still more of the earth in its habits, so much so that it has only rudimentary eyes and ears, but of the flavor of its flesh I knew not. Its fur is like silk plush. (Write an essay on the under ground creatures Oct 3, 1916) Nature reborn in man becomes art- music, painting, poetry, sculpture, architecture. Property, shall it be abolished? The thrush that preempted one of my apple trees and drove all other birds out of it seems to have had a sense of proprietorship. The store of mute and seeds which the chipmonk lay up is hi property. He does not share it with another (?) The honey in the hive is the property of the swarm, and not of the individual bees. Other swarm try to rob them. 5 Another great blue domed day, not a cloud, hardy a breeze warm. Walk up to "Scotland" C.B. and I in p.m. 6 All sun and sky again and warm. The old sugar bush is beginning to boil and foam with color. Great Britain is of course arrogant, arrogance is a part of the British constitution. Her conduct upon the sea has always been high handed; natural enough. She is an island empire and her existence as such depends upon her supremacy upon the sea. Let her have it. Why should the elephant be jealous of the whales. Let the continental empires go their way. Germany wants both the sea and the land, to the exclusion of England. 7 Another glorious day, a little cooler, yesterday walked across the hill to Tom Smiths, a pleasure to see two of my old school mates again. But Tom seems more aged than I do. The animal his row saw last fall and that came near him where he was plowing, was yellow and had a short tail. The creature whose screams I heard 3 years ago, and this has been heard about here for 7 or 8 year past, was a Canada Lynx no doubt, and young Smith saw it.
-I am quite certain I have settled the mystery of the chipmonks hole, without its pile of earth. There can be no magic or miracle about it. That hole must have another end, and at that other end there must be or have been a pile of dirt. So much is certain, I am convinced that the pile less holes are old holes - several years old and that the pile of earth has settled down and become grassed over. Such a one is in front of my camp. For years ago there was an obscene pile of earth there and a hole near it. This year a new hole has appeared and is occupied 8 feet away but I am sure it leads to the old chamber of the first hole. The earth removed in digging it could not have been packed away under the ground, of the 4 dens I have under observation a new entrance hole has appeared this season. I do not know just what it means. 8 Another perfect day, and warmer. To know how abundant certain forms of life are at this time turn over the stores by the roadside or in the fields or left up these on the top of the wall. Spiders and spiders and spiders in their silk cocoons, bands of black crickets that scamper away caterpillars in their cocoons masses of pink spiders eggs in silken receptials, wasps clinging to a small bit of comb and c. I could get silk enough from these spiders cocoons to twist a rope to hang me with. One spider under my pocket glass had a head like a woodchuck except that its blunt nose was jawed with many eyes that looked like jewells. But the shape, color and eyes of the top head were strangely like these of a wood chunk. Its back was gray, with an iridescent streak down its middle. It is the spider where legs seem so closely bunched together, about 1/3 inch long. I find that the editing of my MSS. tires me more than the writing of them. There is something exhilarating in original writing, but editing is drudgery. 9 and 10 Glorious days, but cool. On the 10th Lady Russell, author of Elizabeth and her German Garder with her beautiful daughter called. The Whiteheads brought them. Lady R. is a very beautiful woman, small in stature with very regular features, with the fresh youthful English complexion. I divined something about her that was unusual before she got out the car and before I heard her name. It was her manner. She had manner, not put on manner, but something bred in the flood, a low gentle easy tone and bearing. It was a rare treat, manners are an old world aristocratic product. They do not flourish in a democracy like ours. I myself have none. I am natural, unaffected but my naturalness has never been touched with this something extra, - this perfume of manners. The same is true of her daughter - tall, darker and very beautiful - she had manners. We sat before the open fire and Lady R. ate one of my strawberry apples and told me of reading my books in Berlin and c. She is a woman of genius. Her books are charming - nature and art and society happily mingled.
11 Lovely day, Mr Shepard calls. 12 Warmer, clear, glorious. John and Eva McGruder come. 13 Mild but windy and overcast.
-Roosevelt loads his gun too heavy. The recoil hurts him more than the shot does his enemy. He is bound to make a big noise but the kick of the gun is so much power taken from the force of the bullet. People react vigorously against him as they always do to this surplus verbal energy. It is poor politics to say the least. He has made me take Wilsons side. His is a case where the half is more than the whole. I do not believe that the people of this country can be bullied and brow beated into supporting any man. I believe they will resent the course of an ex-president, who on all occasions, pours out upon the president a flood of what saver of vindication personal abuse. R. would be a really great man if he could be shorn of that look of his hair in which that strong dash of the bully resides. He looks up to Lincoln, why can he not copy a little of his humility and modesty? His fierce attacks upon the president on humiliating of the whole country. Is our chief public man then entitled to no respect? Is the country the victim of a fraud and a humbug? If so they have R. to thank for it. I venture the predication that Roosevelt will never again be president. He does not deserve to be. The desire to be has poisoned his blood. 14 Julian and Betty and John came in p.m. Cold and windy, but bright. Glad to see them, all well. 15 Cold but bright, a great pleasure to have J. and the children here. They leave at 1 1/2 p.m. and reach home at 6. via Catskill. 20 Pretty cold week till last night, when a thunder shower brought warmth, a hard freeze a few nights back. Light rain yesterday from S.W. Warm today and cloudy. Leaves off the trees on mountain tops. In my walk Wednesday p.m. down over the Shepard improvements. I came upon a large garter snake on the new seeded ground. He was quite sluggish, the chill in the air slowed down his vital machinery. I stirred him up with my cane, but could not make him try to escape. I do not know the species, nearly 2 feet long, dark mottled gray and black, as I teased him he flattened himself out so that he was a half round opened his mouth threateningly but would not seize or strike my stick, he coiled beautifully and when I turned him in his back, he righted himself quickly and easily by a movement the whole length of his body after a while I noticed that his body began to constrict about 1/3 the way from his tail, then presently he folded his body back from that point and twisted the lower part around the upper, like a vine doubling upon itself. If he thought my stick was another snake trying to swallow him, this was good tactics - it would have made the problem much more difficult. I left him where I found him and unharmed, his lower half twined about the upper. 23 Last day at Wood chuck, a bright cool day. Tops of the mts, naked of their leaves. 24 Leave for home at 10 1/2. C.B. and I in the car. Mrs B. and Eliza go by train. A good drive; day calm but cloudy. Reach home at 3 p.m. Take train for N.Y. at 4:35 to meet Mr Ford. He picks me up on Madison Ave at 8, as I making for the Ritz Carlton, saw me coming and block away he said, and that I was hitting up lively. Spend the night with him and Mrs F. 25 Go with Mr F. to democratic head quarters. Meet McCormick and other politicians. At 11 go to Roulands. Back for lunch with the Fords at 2. Leave for home at 4 p.m. Mr F. goes with me to station. 26 Home again. Golden days, golden trees, lucid skies not tired by my run to N.Y. 27 Drive to H. in morning with C.B. Down to freezing this morning, a golden day. 28 Mild, clear, lovely day. Weigh 137 with summer clothes on.
-Hydrogen burns and oxygen supports combustion and yet the two gasses chemically combined put out fire - one of the many apparent contradictions in nature. 29, 30, 31 Fine wild days. Write in my study. C.B. left for N.Y. Sunday night the 29th. Niv 1st Fine mild day. Health pretty good save a slight cold 2d Fine day - a little cooler, only light frosts so far. The leaves of the mulberry and of the cherry and apple trees still on maples mostly off. Down to 135 lbs. Mrs B. goes to Middletown Sanitarium tomorrow Saturday. 3 Fine day, C.B. comes at night. 4 Fine day, partly cloudy. Mrs B. goes to Middletown Sanitarium at 12 1/2. Seemed as strong as any time since her return from Ga. in April. Dr B. goes with her. Shall I ever see her again in her own house? A sad sad thought,I stay and shall continue alone in the house for sometime. The solitude will be sweet to me. 5 Cold light rain from N.E. Very dark and gloomy, but I feel well.
6 Mild fine day. Weigh 135. 7 Ideal election day. Fog lifts at 10. In p.m. I walk up to vote for Wilson, but do not expect he will be elected. This may be my last presidential vote and I vote on principles.
-Only a revenue tariff and for the war the Pro Germans dont want. But Wilson is a much stronger man than Hughes. But their pictures side and side and see the difference - good humor and a fine sensibility in one, and strength of will and of character in the other. But the masses never want the best. Ride back in car with some Kingston visitors. 8 Fine day again; write in a.m. and walk to the woods in p.m. Woods deserted - the only live thing one chickadee that flew across the road in front of me, no thoughts on the trees today. Much saddened by thoughts of Mrs B. growing weaker at the Sanitarium. Black creek paved and choked with brown leaves. I visit the falls again and walk back along the R.R. at 4 p.m. 9 Indian summer days continue. Smoky, mild, still.
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The magazine writer has a new problem - how to address himself to the moving picture bran.

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The bran that does not want to read or think, but only to use its eager shallow eyes - eyes that prefer the shadows and ghosts of things to the things themselves - that rather see the ghosts of people flitting around on the stage than to see real flesh and blood. How audible dialogue would tire them, it [would] might compell them to use their minds a little .horrible thought. For my own part I am sure I cannot interest this


moving picture brain and do not want to. It is the shallow brain that has yet appeared in the world. What is to be the upshot of this craze over this mere wash of reality which the "movies" (horrible word) offer our young people? 9 Go to Middletown at 12 1/2. Fine day. Find Mrs B. discontented and very tired; they had been applying the x-ray, looked bad. The diagnosis from the revelation of the x-ray very bad - a cancerous state of the colon. I had long ago made up my mind that she could not get well, but when they told me what they saw and that she could probably not live more than a month or 6 weeks it came like a fresh blow, it cut me through and through. I return on 4.20 train from M.
10 Little sleep last night in the cold lonely house on a cot at the foot of her bed. What can I do? No one will miss her or mourn her but me. How pitiful, oh, how pitiful. We have lived here 43 years. I return to M. in p.m. Find Mrs B. easier and more contented. I plan to stay with her till Monday the 13th. She has less pain and is willing to stay a week longer. I take a reason. Bright day. 11 Fine day, a good sleep last night, wife easy. Walk about M. when I lived in 1873 - to 75. In p.m. go up to Canfields and stay to supper. 12 Cloudy. Mrs B. still easy and contented. She does not know how serious her case is.
I stay with her till 12 1/2 when I go to Canfields to dinner. She urges me to go - to accept all such invitations. I fear she grows weaker, keeps her bed but walks to the toilet, dozes a good deal. I come back at 4 and sit in her room and do all I can for her. Oh, how emaciated she is, wants to talk with the doctors about her case, but I tell her part of what they say .that it is very serious and that the chances are against her. I tell her to will to get well. She says she will do all she can. 13 Wife had a good night, sleep well and is easy. I also had a good night. I leave at 8.16 for home. Cloudy chilly day. I feel well, but am greatly depressed 14 Cold with light rain from north. Slept in study and had a good night. Phone from M. that wife is comfortable and bowells less troublesome. 16 To N.Y. to academy meeting, a fine day. Roosevelt reads a paper and makes a speech. Fine - a wonderful man. Mabie there glad to see him - a little broken. 17 To academy meeting again. The gold medal is conferred upon me for excellence in Belle Letres, mainly my essays I think, a great surprise. But near so it means little to me. 18 To Middletown. Mrs B. comfortable but really no better. 19 I dine with Mrs Canfield. Clear cold days. 20 Back home. 21 Bring Mrs B. to Vassar Hospital. She wants to change. Julian and Mrs Covert go over for her. She stands the journey very well. 22 Down to see wife. Really no better, slowly failing I think. But she is comfortable. Clear windy cold day. 23 Warmer, rain all day. Write in study. 24 Clearing, cooler. Write in study. By mistake took 3 grs of calomel last night instead of 1/2 that amount. Feel pretty good. Wife to J's for dinner. Walk home. 25 Bright windy day, a cold wave. Wife has visibly failed since last visit.
Oh, it is all so pitiful. 26 To J's to dinner, walk home. Pretty well. 27 Clear soft day warmer. Write [do not occupy the same deer] Nov 27 1916 in study. Walk up to the Creek and about the new barn in p.m. and back. Legs a little weak, but head clear, an Indian summer day.