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Diary From Mch 23d, 1917 to Dec 5, 1917 Mch 24 Mild fair day. Sugar off. J's family down. 25 Still wild and fair. Sap run letting up. 27 Light sap run, sugar off again, syrup boils as if trees were budded. Run my car today, and greatly enjoy it. Put on new Firestone tire on right side fore wheel, mileage record 10176. New non-skid tire put on kind wheel late last fall. How long will they last? 28 Rain yesterday p.m. and last night. Clearing and colder this a.m. Ice all gone from river, no snow in sight from my study windows. War still the engrossing topic of my thoughts. The revolution in Russia, a great gain for humanity. God be praised for the downfall of that despotism, now if it could only come to Germany - as it must in time. 30 To N.Y. C.B. and I to attend birthday reception at Roulands in p.m. A pleasant company I see so candles big and little on a table made up to represent a huge cake. 31 To call us, Miss Ballard at Flattush, then to Floral Park. Warm and pleasant. April 1 At Mr Childs at F.P. An ideal April day, calm clear and warm - up to 79. 2 To N.Y. and then home. Cooler. 3 My 80th birthday. Cool and clear, a deluge of letters and books and flowers. I am well and enjoying the spring. The feeling of canyon in my leg, of one year ago much less. Weight about 133. We dine at Julians. Myrer C. brings me a bunch of hepaticas. Prest Wilsons greet message my best gift today - a great message to the whole world. I read it with profound emotion. I believe it will play a great part in the future political history of mankind. 4 C.B. and I write letters all morning. 5, 6, 7 Still struggling with the pile of letters; get off about 20 each day 8 Bright fine day, but windy. Drive car up to P. Ewen in p.m. 9 Bright but windy and cold. Finished letters today. Walk to S.S. in p.m. See one hermit thrush. 10 Cold, froze hand the past two nights. Wind and bright today. Crocuses in bloom under the window. The British began a great new. Drive yesterday against the German at Arrax. Catskill mts still white with snows of last week. One year ago today. Mrs B. came home from Georgia. As the train stopped at the station I saw her get up and walk along to the door and come out on the platform just as she always did. She looked and was feeble but was better than I expected to see her, I never again saw her in the train, though she reach several short R.R. journeys after that. "Her last words to me were "Good bye dear" when I went away with Mr Ford Feb 19th. The last time we slept in the same bed was on Oct 24, 1916, on our return from Roxbury. The last time we occupied the same bed in health was on the De Sota Inn in W. about Jany 4th or 5th, 1916. 11 Cold, clear and windy the past three days, freezing hard at night. Calm and cold and clear this morning. Robins all disappeared hunting for food else where, no worms near the surface now. Peepers and toads silvered, elm blossoms, frozen I think. 63 years ago today I began my school at Tongore in sight of the spot where my poor wife is to be buried on Sunday. In p.m. drive to Port Ewen with C.B. on our return about 4 1/2 I let C.B. drive the car from about 1 mile above Esopus. She did so well that I grew careless and did not keep my hand on the wheel. As we crossed Col. Paynes new bridge, going very slowly. She lost her head and drove the car diagonally up the bank. When it stopped and instantly turned turble catching me beneath it and holding the down by the legs. I heard my left arm crack as the weight of the car came down upon my right shoulder. I could breath but my chest seemed pressed close together, a few awful moments. I could hear C.B. shouting for help and so knew she was not killed. In three or four minutes workmen from Col. Paynes who were passing near by on their way home came and lifted the car off from us. I got up conscious of no hurt but in my left arm
C.B. hurt in her right leg below the knee, but bone not broken. Julian soon came with his car and took us home. Dr Freston arrived in about an hour. Could not decide that the bone of my arm was broken, a good deal of pain, also on my right side under the nipple, strapped me up with arm in sling.
12 A sleepless night from pain and shock I suffer. Dr F. comes again, makes suggestions, hopes bone is not broken but not sure. 13, 14, 15, 16 Doing well, much dull pain and a terribly black arm. Right hand lame also and neck lame, with pain in head at times. Eat well and sleep considerable. 17 Drive to Newburg with Dr F. have x-ray photo of left shoulder. The neck of the luminous fractured but in place, a fine day and enjoy the drive, nothing to be done but to keep the arm in position and be careful. I write a little and find little for new volume, "Field and study" See the April days, some of them fine ones, go by regretfully. Walk and ride a little, sleep poor most of the time but appetite good. In the "nest" most of the time. C.B. devotes herself to me and anticipates my every wish. So more than thankful that she did not kill me. Cool weather with frosty nights, maples in bloom. Plum and cherry trees trying to bloom, asparagus on April 30. Many white throats. May 7th A week of May very wet and chilly. Only grass can grow. Early peas up, for a week, but stationary, many myrtle warblers here. Arm doing well I suppose, but a dull pain much of the time. Ribs well. Right hand not quite well arm clearing up - a dirty yellow now. Heart very steady since the accident. Eat no supper but cup of ovaltine and 2 graham wafers, no sunshine for 3 or 4 days. Slept 5 or 6 hours last night. Feel well at heart. War worries me more than all eles. "The Happy Birds" a good title may stimulate me to write another bird article. My hunger for nature unabated. 8 Another day of cloud, chill an light rain not energy enough in the weather to rain or to clear or to warm up. Three or four inches of snow in Roxbury yesterday morning. Walked to the woods yesterday along the old cedar lane of Mr Mannings of my early days here - the lane where I found the golden winged warblers nest last season. My food yesterday was the nest of the turtle dove on the top of the stone wall - a [little] shallow depression in the stone, lived with dry grass stems and twigs - 2 white eggs. The blue-gray bird was well hidden on the blue gray wall. The only dove nest I remember to have found. Had she kept her place as I passed by I should not have seen her. Came home by way of Col. Paynes chicken farm and the highway. Robins nest on one porch has 3 eggs, encotation began - 4 nest on the place. Arm improving I hope - a slight gain from day to day, judging by the feeling .normal color and size coming back, nights still long and hard to bear. Sleep but little in horizontal position. C.B. very devoted and helpful - indeed indispensable. Kingfisher down the dock road deepening his old hole I think. High hole excavating a chamber in a dying button ball near by, no fox sparrows yet this season - plenty of white throats. Wood thrush on Sunday the 6th on deck road but silent. His ride clear brown intensified on his head till it fairly glowed, several hermit thrushes yesterday near the woods. Myrtle warblers still much in evidence, creeping warbler here several days ago. 9 Clearing and warmer, much sunshine. Sit in study in forenoon and read and sleep and write. In p.m. walk over to old cedar lane via Demerons meadows. See my first cat bird, hear my first cheewink. Turtle dove all ok, kept her place on nest till I had passed here and there. I hear the snap and whistle of her wings, cross the field where most is plowing a field for corn that has lain fallow for years. It looks good to see the soil laid open to the sun and air again. How friable and ready it looked - hungry for the seed, my new note today, a chipmonk just beginning a new hole in a small patch of woods on Col Paynes place. He had dug about six or eight inches. I interrupted him at his work and he scampered away to his old den, must renew my visit there today. Much overcast and windy and colder today, nothing grows but grass, maples in bloom for 10 days but make little progress. Cherry trees trying hard to bloom. Catskill white with snow, only myrtle and black and white creeping warblers here. Still a cripple with poor sleep, but think arm must be mending.
-Just finished Waldon for the 2d time. Many delicious page in it - enough to keep it alive, but a vast deal of chaff without any wheat such an exagerater! His trick always to say the contrary the unexpected thing. He writes his fractions large - enormous denominators, enormous numerators - reduce them to their simplest terms and it takes the conceit out of them a bowells in forced and false analysis, a great deal of ingenuity spent in trying to wed things that will not be wedded. Oil and water will not mix, churn them as you will. Little or no wise counsel in the book - throws no light on any of life serious problems. It is as he suggest the crowing of the cock in the morning, or in the woods - a pure piece of brag and if the cock had not had the home barn yard larder to resort to, he would have crowed a different time. If he woke his neighbors up, to what purpose did he awake them? Not to be better farmers, or better mechanics, or better tradesmen and c, he shirked all civic and social responsibility and was able to live his life in the wood off and or for two years, because other stayed at home and helped make the wheels go around.
His refusal to pay his pole tax and going to jail till a friend (probably Emerson) payed it is a sample of how petty and futile his life and his views of the state were. The act was childish and grotesque - not a great man like Emerson - not a great soul, but at times a very clever, stimulating and suggestive writer, with reference to his turns and country, he was like a snarl on a beach or birch tree - hard and fine grained but containing little available timber, about his best books, are his "Maine Woods" and "Cape Cad." About half of Walden is precious. The "Week" has little real stuff in it. 11 A cold sour forenoon; a feeling of snow in the air, only brief gleams of sunshine noticing a stream of cherry blossoms drifting down from one of my cherry trees, the Windsor, I investigated and found a half dozen purple finches snipping off the blossom, cutting out the germ or ovary I suppose. Bad business for so charming a bird to be engaged in - a serious blemish on its character. I had Hud shoot one to make sure; it was a female. I could not make out any males in the tree. The blossoms are still snowing down, greatly reducing the robins cherry crop as now they are in the early white ox heart.
-Found yesterday p.m. that the chipmonk had not worked much at his hole since the day before. May be the chilly weather caused him to knock off, a family of red squirrels in a hole in a Tamarack near the ground which Ursa had discovered were not at home, no chattering and scolding came from the hole as we looked in as there had [done] the day before when W. and her companion first looked in. Then the mother squirrel bit savagely at a stick thrust in with much scolding, a hole on the ground near by under a hickory indicated their permanent retreat. 12 Still cold and sour. Snow squalls yesterday in the Catskill and probably this morning. Purple finches, both sexes cutting the heart out of my ox heart this morning. The temptation to shoot them is very great, my "shooing" them away they seem to take as a joke. No walk yesterday only to my neighbors the Van B's. First oriole this morning in cherry tree - a bit of orange amid the white. Charley Keiler and his friend Mr Cady came at 2 p.m. and stayed till 8. Glad to see them. Mr and Mrs Elting of Highland bring me some trout 4 fine ones caught in the Neversink near Claryville. 13 Sill could, cloudy and sour - the worst side of May. The maples cant get out of the blooming stage nor into the leaf stage; grass alone grow, no sunshine today, the pink buds show in some apple trees. The plum trees a cloud of white. Arm seems better today than yesterday. Weeder a cherry tree on the road to P.O. the ground was white with cherry blossoms. "Ten thousand saw I at a glance" The wind had drifted them into the wagon nets like snow. The work of these little sinners, the purple finches. Saw two white crowned sparrows this morning, hopping along side by side in my garden. I am always on the lookout for them between the 12th and the 15th of this month and here they are on time. Have only seen these two. The white throats still here and in song. 14 Clearing this morning and warmer but wind still in N. The pesky finches still snipping the cherry blossoms. Many trees on the opposite shore outlined by their incipient yellow green foliage. Several loose flocks of jays yesterday and today, going north, as many as 50 in a band probably migrating from the south; have not seen or heard a jay here this winter. A lovely May day at last, barring the wind. In the p.m. walk up through the Gordon field by the little brook to where I have a look into the sheet in meadow of Dr Gills place under the woods; then down through West Street and over to the old Cedar Lane. My turtle dove is on her job, she eyes me a moment as I pause near her only her bright eye distinguishes her slender brown neck from a stick. Presently the flutters off on to the ground on the other side and tries to lure me away by the old confidence game of figuring lameness and paralysis. no new thing today, but the ever new May day and the mist of green of the tender foliage in the woods and trees. I should be a farm boy again now at home on the old farm, spreading manner or knocking the dried last falls droppings of the cows and listing for the first barn swallow and to the call of the high-holes. 15 Again clear, but cold, a N. wind off a snow bank. The high holes still calling and drumming all about us. In the early morning I hear the male calling and drumming on the metal roof of the tool house, or on the ridge board. His drum is unlike that of the other wood peckers, it is so much more rapid; it is a stream of blows, so that the sound is like that of a vibrator. I am quite sure the pair will decide, or have decided to nest in the cavity left by a decayed branch in the little maple near the summer house. 17 Clear, lovely day with cool wind from N. At last we set out to enter the body of my poor wife. Julian, C.B. and I start at 9 meet the undertaker with his hearse at the gate of the cemetery in K. a slow easy drive to Tongore. Reach there about 11, and I look into the open grave of her who I expected would look into my open grave. Five feet deep into an old glacier hill - the bottom into 2 feet of sand, the upper part gravel and drift. Is it a grim joke to say I never looked into a healthier grave, the drainage perfect. I hope mine will be as perfect. In the rear of her father and mother instead of beside them as I had expected. The services are soon completed and I hear the dry sandy shovel full of earth fall upon the coffin of her who was my wife for nearly sixty years, a beautiful spot a beautiful view. I could see the school house where I began my career 63 years ago and many farm houses of those whose children came to school to me. We drive up to the school and C.B. and I and Mr Chase go in, as large a school as I had, 35 or 40 pupil but half of them or more foreign born, not the bright clear rosey faces I looked upon. The little school man was very gracious; she knew of me but did not know I had preceeded her in that school by more than 60 years, no legend of me in the place it seems, though I later called upon a woman there whose father was one of the trustees who hired me and whom I remembered well, as a slim young woman older than I was. I told the staring children that I had been a teacher there 63 years ago, but that I did not see a face there that I saw them. They all looked very solemn over my attempted joke. Then we drove a mile to the farm where Wrich North, my wife and father was born and spent his youth, a rough, sorry, dilapidated place. The old house gone, but part of the old barn remaining. Here I saw the fog end of the North family - a grandson of able north - ragged, dirty one eyed snag toothed and with the mouth of an idiot. But he was not idiotic, though of inferior mentally - I should say. He thought he had heard of me, but was not sure, My wife and his father were cousins a great change for the worse had come over all the Tongore country - the homes had all lost their look of thrift and privacy and comfort - The homes I knew all had attractive door yards, roses, lilacs, maples and other shade and shrubbery, now they stand stripped and glaring with and forbidding public air. The school house yard was as bare as the middle of the highway. The great Ashokan dam or lake has been like a blight upon all this section. We drove back across the dam and had our lunch in the edge of the woods by Temples pond; reached home at 4 p.m. 18 Cloudy day, with light rain. A sleepless night. 19 A lovely day and warmer, apple trees beginning to bloom, a cape May warbler here in the plum trees and a black throated blue. Three male ruby throats in the barberry bushes under the windows an unusual sight, never saw it before. Birds appear fatigued they perch 7 or 8 minutes at a time; the blossom of the burberry seem to afford them much food as it dose the big queen bumble bees with which they hum all day. One ruby throat here a yellow cap, the pollen of some flower, probably willows. The birds are there till sundown. High holes still calling and drumming about the place, call many times per minute. That call is worn threat bare. They have decided to nest here and why not shut up? Why repeat that call ten thousand times? Why? but that he is wound up to go so long and hence must keep us till he runs down. The female does not seem to heed him at all. Rose breasted grosbeak here in song this morning. 19 Clear lovely morning, a little cooler, after our first warm night. Expect Vassar girls today and Prof De Loach in p.m. 40 Vassar girls came and I walked with them to S.S. all fine girls. De Loach came over at 12 with Hud and brought me back. In p.m. Prof. Shadock came and with the girls following me around an apple tree took a moving picture. 20 Lovely warm day, with a veil of haze in the air, another cape May warbler near the house a black throated blue, under my window. Mch hummers still here. That Jappanees Barberry under our window has a wonderful attraction for birds and bees. Some of the warbler and the hummer on there hourly and many large queen bumble bees. Saw a male hummer chasing away the bees. At 11 a.m. we start for a drive to the Ashokan dam, very warm. Reach Temples pond at 1 p.m. eat our lunch there. A pair of wood peckers have a next and young in the dry limb of a near by tree and worry and complain a good deal over our presence. Think it the yellow bellied, though it may be the three told, the note entirely new to me. The birds refuse to go near the tree that holds their nest and after half an hour of scolding on surrounding trees disappear. We drive on across the lake and dam and up to the bridge with big arch - a delightful drive. John B. at the wheel part of the way with De Loach by his side, instructing him. He drives well. We turn back at 3 1/2 and reach home at 5.15 a glorious day. De Loach leaves on 8 p.m. train. Maple leaves more than half grown. The height of the apple bloom, new saw fruit trees bloom so full. The terminal end of the apple twigs have 6 blossom, the other buds 3, 4 and 5 blossom, a swell of apple bloom on the air. 21 Cooler and partly overcast. Poor sleep last night. Warblers and hummers still in berry bushes. One white crowned sparrow yesterday. In the woods near the road saw large patches of ground purple with the fringed polygala, apple trees, cherry trees, plums and pear and peach trees all blooming together this year. Large peach orchards pink with bloom. Roosevelt and his army of 250,000 turned down by the government. The precious traditions of the army must not be violated! The govt. fiddley while Rome is burning and the Hems flourish. Still see troops of blue jays going northward, considering the numbers I see, the numbers in proportion that I do not see must be very great. What does it all mean. 22 Light rain in night and during the day. Cool, fire in study. Only walk to station today, a good sleep last night, arm slowly mending, but still painful - neuralgia - I think. Total of wife's funeral expenses $200 - stone yet to get. Grosbeak in song this morning. 23 Rain all night. Thick and stagnant this morning, no wind, mild. Julian brings me 4 yellow perch caught in Black Pond last night. He slept under the pine trees in the woods - saw an enormous black bear trying to swallow a shiner fast in his net. Hummers still hovering over and among over barberry bushes. Apple bloom dropping. Clearing in p.m. Walk but little spend an hour in summer house after supper. Two tanagers on the plowed ground in the vineyard. How they take the eye, many grosbeak, see 6 pass and hear 2 others in song. Their black and white and rose color also takes the eye. 24 Bad night, but little sleep, much colder this morning and after an hour of sunshine, overcast. Bay breasted warblers here. Thoughts of the war still engross all others. How many times a day do I say "to hell with the Prussian Hems" Thoughts of my poor wife also are not long absent from my mind. For 40 years I have been glad when she was away, or I was away from her, but to be separated by death is a far different matter. "The valley and the shadow" what gloom in its black depths! 26 Lovely warm clear day, much company. New Paltz normal girls 30, a club from Kingstone and a lot of high school girls. Dr Fisher and wife and sister from American musician of Nat. History N.Y. Prof Shattuck and wife and girls from
P. I see them all and have a fairly good time. Hud drives me over to SS. 27 Overcast and slow rain in p.m. 28 Cold and wet. I suffer much with my arm. 29 Cold and wet. 30 Still cold and wet; prevent me going to wifes grave in olive. 31 Fine day, drive to P. with Julian and Peterson in p.m. June 1st Light rain disagreeable. Warblers in ground again, get better sleep last night. Still much pain. Took drive out of sling two days ago. Strength improves, but pain worse, weather against me. 2 Still cloudy, murkey and abominable; air currents stagnant and foul. season very late, apple bloom just off the trees. Lilacs just out. The coldest, darkest May for over 30 years. The most wretched May I ever passed. The only good I got out of it was notes on the "Spring Berd Procession," part of it written, hope to make a fine paper, many warblers detained here by the cold for many days. Some die from hunger. 3 Came to Yama Farms Inn last night with Mrs Sarre and Mr Seaman. Bright lovely warm day today - had a pretty good sleep at the hut. The masseur thinks he can cure my arm. 4 Still lovely June days; the best sleep yet last night. 5 Warm but threatens rain, a heavy shower in p.m. affects my arm. This is Registration day. Pretty good sleep. 6 Cloud and sun, warm, drive to E. Arm stronger but still painful. 7 Shower last night, but got good sleep, cloudy with spirts of rain today - muggy. Tree toads calling. Signs of my old trouble today; rapid pulse and general discomfort. Took an enema at 11, ate but little dinner. Took another enema at 3. both with good results. Pulse slowed down - walked to Honk falls at 5. The dead part of 2 years ago lived again now at 5 1/2 pulse seems normal, but much pain in arm all day. Stagnant air, oppressive, ample bowel movements all the week I thought must eat less. Old lameness in muscles under my left breast, may be intercostal neuralgia. Reading Fabre on the cicada and grasshopper, wonderful book. 8 A warm showery day. I leave Yama Farms in p.m. Arm stronger but still painful. Take train to K. where Julian meets me at 5.15 Reach home 6 1/2 C.B. surprised but glad to have me back. I am glad to be here again. Yama, no place for me, simple common food hard to get there.
I sit on my porch and see the maple trees slowly clothe themselves with verdun before me and J say "what an agitated and troublesome world the leaves must think they are born into," never a moment of rest raffled and swayed and tossed by the wind at all hours, furiously tone and lashed at others the host of tender leaves driven together like the waves upon the beach making shipwreck of the whole tree-top seem imminent, hail, tempest, tornado wrecking their vengeance upon them and yet in most cases suffering no visible injury; the wind dies down and they fall into their places and spread their green palms to the air and sink and are as ready to clap them in gladness as ever they were. The [ir] flexible yielding character of the leaves and of the branches that hold their saves them. Their clashing is
like the clashing of a girl ringlets and of a willows prudent bougles. When the autumn comes and the leaves are ripe for their fall, rarely is one seen to be seriously torn or deformed by the period of storm and stress it has passed through. 9, 10, 11 Warm muggy days, no motion in nature, the day has no pulse. Leaves of the trees hang motionless most of the time - all nature nods clouds without form, a blight here and there upon the maple trees, river like glass. Leaves move a little in middle of day, seamless days with vapor lining. I try in vain to describe them. Arm troubles me a good deal but gains a little. Olive Hinman comes today, for two days. 13 Start for Gloversville at 10:25. Fair day and warm. Talbots meets us at Albany. Reach G. at 4 p.m. 14 Damp, cloudy day. Start for Speculator at 6 a.m. Reach there 42 miles before nine. After breakfast drive to Pasew - 12 miles; raining. Clearing in
p.m. C.B. and I cruise on the lake, others fish. Eat lunch on an isolet, when we see a wild ducks nest with only 5 eggs; feathered with down from her own breast, no birds. Drive back to G. after dark. 15, 16, 17 At G. cold and rainy part of the time. C.B. leaves on 16th for P.B. Arm gaining, but troublesome. On Sunday the 17, a long country drive, uncomfortable much of the time, an old man with crippled arm, better stay at home. 18 Leave for home at 6, a fair hot day. Reach home at 12 1/2. 19 Cloudy and cooler; tries to rain. The weather is just the same victim of habit that we are. The rain habit is now strong upon it and has been for over two months, no matter where the wind is it rains, a fairly good sleep last night. No grape bloom yet. How hard for us to get out of a net! How hard for the weather also. If it gets out for a day or two, it slips back in again. In dry weather it is the same. To break the drought spell is very difficult. Bright and warm in p.m. Go to P with J. 20 Clear and warm this a.m. more life in nature, a pair of cedar bird, tearing a new orioles nest to pieces for material never saw the like before. Leaves rustle and bows way this morning. 82 in shade. Write in a.m. Loaf about in p.m. 21 Clear and a little cooler a fair night sleep. C.B. did not return. Leaves rustle a little this morning. June at its best. C.B. comes at 4 1/2 p.m. A walk over back in p.m. but without results saw the emotion I felt as I passed along a waving rye field which was the main bread grain my father grew nearly all over bread was made from home grown rye and how good it was. In Sept and early Oct father would say to us boys "now you must thresh some rye today. I am going to mill tomorrow and we will have some bread from the new rye flower." Curtis and I often threshed it a few fushels, mending harvest apples out in the new barn as we paused in our labor and looking out through the big barn doors into sunlet fields and hills. Oh, what happy days, all unknown to us then. 22 Still bright and clear and hot. Ideal June weather. 23 Fine warm day near 80 each day, a sweet little quaker girl from P. Nora Waul charming, comes even without a hand bag. Did not even have a tooth brush, comes on a sudden impulse from Phila. She wins over our hearts by her simplicity and genuineness. Well read too, a Swarthmore college girl, says thee and they and those so prettily. Knows the birds well, has written and printed things about them, a fine face, clear cut regular, with sweet expression. On Sunday we go and pick a set of wild s. berries and C.B. makes a s. berry shortcake - delicious. 25 Warm and bright. Our quaker guest leaves us today. I recall a line of a poem of Brownlee Brown of long ago. "Our girlish graceful guest grew on us like the tender star increasing in the West" Mr Chase and his 6 S. school girls come and we walk to Slabsides, and back. 26 A bright hot day again. Walk a little in p.m. Write in a.m. 27 A bad night - a three hour thunder shower, incessant flashes and continuous roll of thunder and down pour of rain, a hell of a night only 2 hours sleep. Clearing and hot this morning. The sky still dirty after all last night washing. Good mess of peas today. Arm improving, but still painful at times. 28 Bright and warm again. Better sleep last nigh, but no work in me today. Col. Payne is buried today. Peace to his memory. 30 Fine warm day. Go to the Roofs. They meet us at K. Reach there at 4 p.m. The old sweetness and charm of the place comes over me again, cool. July 1st Fine warm day, fish for 2 hours in a.m. take 9 trout, enough. Lame arm does not embarrass much, a restful place. The soft murmur of the stream fills all the vale. It is like audible selwel, Frank a sumptuous, very human creature, should be bearing babies these years of her mature womanhood. Mr R. feeble, begins to totter, but puts up a brave fight. 2 A heavy rain in the early morning hours. Leave at 8 1/2 for Big Indian; roads very rough and muddy. Reach home on
12:25 train; hot. 3 Still hot and partly overcast, air currents sluggish as usual.
4 A cool enjoyable day. We make ready to go to W.C.L. Mr Van B. calls in evening. 5 As perfect a day as ever came down out of heaven, just the right temperature, clear with a few indolent innocent clouds floating across the blue sky, at 10 Julian arrives in his car and we are off for Woodchuck Lodge. Go by way of the Sawkill on a detour a nail gives us a flat tire at 11. on the Sawkill. We reach our lunch place by the road side in Shandaken at 1. Reach W.C.L. at 3. How green and fresh the country looks, a world of grass and daises and butterflies and orange hawkweed. J. starts back at 5 p.m. 6 Our first day at W.C.L. a calm bright warm summer day, up to this time (noon) perfect. The silence, the breath of outlook, the sweet grazay odors the repose of the landscape - how welcome it all is after the noise. The shut in view and the state and unprofitable Riverby. Three sick months there have nearly spoiled the place for me. Here I breath again the air of youth and drink water of purity. One song sparrow repeats his 5 songs one after the other from the old plum tree across the road. A pair of blue birds are attractive to their young in new tree stub on porch. In Frank C's meadow I hear one bobolink singing continuously - a song so different from the bobolink song of my youth. Have watched all morning for the wood chuck that are devouring my garden; have seen only one head peeping over the wall and it was too quick for me. The dryer upland meadows are orange with hawkweed, others white and yellow with daises and butter crops, a meadow smell fills all the air. 7 Warm, quiet hazy day. But little motion in nature (at this point a chuck poked his head over the wall in front of me and in a few seconds was a dead chuck.) Few birds here this year, though robins are abundant and I have seen several cuckoos, all day I hear a s. tanager singing up in the woods above me. But no warblers or views or thrushes yet. Cuckoos still call - and rain is sure to come.
-That caressing re-assuring wing gesture of the blue bird seems peculiar to it. How pretty it is accompanied by that soft affectionate warbler addressed to his mates! so many birds have little way and manner of their own. The flicker bows and bows to his mate and calls to her in a coaxing re-assuring tone, peculiarly his own, while the courtship of robins and sparrows seems attended with a certain violence as if they sought to carry the female by storm, of the bobolink the same as true. "Touch me and I am yours" the female seems to say and away she goes with her black and shite suitor in hot pursuit. I have never seen any wooing of the cuckoos, nor of meadow larks nor of the orioles.
-A good looking boy 15 or 16 has just passed with a tin pod in his hand said he was going berrying. S. berries not yet at their height.
-Saw the boy later over to John's rolling and smoking cigarettes. I spoke to him about the vicious habit. When at night he came by I asked him how many berries he got, "I did not go" he replied. I wanted to say - "no, the cigarette took the ambition all out of you - you locked the time away," which was true, a boy like that should have a strong hand laid upon him. The state should protect itself from such degenerates. 8 Eleanor and Harriett came last night. Partly cloudy this morning with mere wind - S.W. all the woods above me show the silver side of their leaves. Feel much better than when I came. 9 Light rain, cool. Profitless days to me. Both mental and physical lethargy. 10 Slow rain most of the night. Raining this morning, a gloomy day - rained a little all day. 11 Still raining from E. chilly, an overdose of wet and cold, no cheer or comfort in nature, a fire in the Franklin part of the time. Arm very troublesome, negative days in ones life. The only pleasure I have is in abusing the weather. 15 Rain nearly every day, fair today. Mr Ray from Montreal; a landscape gardener of the right sort; a fine fellow - glad he came. He made an excellent impression. We keep him to dinner and all the p.m. Will come again later of Scotish decent. Loves the men and books I do. Shower at 6 16 Fair day with much sunshine. Mr Whitehead and his friends - and the men from village - five fellows. John Shea comes at 4. Hand and arm mending. 17 Cloudy, calm, mild. Timothy grass blooming. Sleep yet much disturbed, especially in latter part of the night. Cuckoo still calls, rain probable. Drive to Edens in p.m. E and M. look well. E. looks better than last year, a fine garden while he takes pride in showing. Teases me on our approaching end - a good joke to him. "Time will soon fetch us" he says and he has loudly, streaks of light rain on the way. 18 Still cloudy from S.W. warmer, no sunshine today and no rain yet, only on bright day in a week. The whole weather system gone bad. Hand better, but arm unusually troublesome. One wood thrush singing in the woods above us last week, the only one I ever heard here, a single male bird probably. Cuckoos call every day. If I have to follow the method of the doctors I would shoot them, to ensure fair weather. The symptom for the cause.
19 Cloud and sun, with light showers here and there. John Shea leaves at noon; sorry to see him go. New car came last night, the best of its kind. When will my arm allow me to drive it? What friends I have got! 20 Clear, warm, still - the first of its kind in many weeks. I should say fair, weather had come to stay were it not for the persistent calling of the cuckoo. The tide of meadow grass is now at its height and the meadow bloom sents the air, now the hay makers will strike, but not as we did in my youth, with our scythes, but with machine. I am back in the old barn this a.m. and wondering if any thoughts will come my way.
-Later - had good luck. In p.m. ran my car for first time since the accident. An ideal summer day. 21 Warmiest at night we have had. Warm and partly cloudy this morning.
-All our weekly and monthly publications have more and more the characteristics of the street and the mart, and less and less the savor of things of the home and fireside The subjects treated are semi-political or semi-sociological, or semi-economic - less and less are they related to the disinterested subjects out of which our real culture springs .literature, art, nature and c. The outlook, for instance one might read on the train or in the station while he is waiting for his train, but certainly not in his study, or in the fields under a tree or in his summer camp. Who cares any more who signs the articles in the Atlantic - they are all of the same flavorless character, able but not literature. 22 Clear, calm, hot. July is getting hold of herself. Cuckoos still calling, 88 degrees in p.m. 23 Dense heavy fog this morning, a light shower last night at 4. Cuckoos calling more than even this morning. Very hot again. 24 Still hot, with light showers 92 degrees. 25 Hot, 88, air loaded with moisture; write in barn find 5 wats in orchard. Cedar bird, red eyed vireo, gold finch, chippie and king bird. How scared the cedar bird looked - stood up straight and stiff as a pollen with depressed crest and plumage, but made no sound. Harriett and Eleanor found the nests of cedar bird and good finch - my eye had missed them, another nest the identity of which is yet to be settled. 26 Hot with fog clouds from S.W. a white vapor fills all the air, saturating it to the limit. When litter puffs of air strike the meadow now, they carry away clouds of white smoke, the pollen of the blooming timothy, 78 at 7 1/2 a.m. a song sparrow up the road this morning sang over and over something like this "hip, hip, hip Peterson Ursa" with the accent of clear voiced cultivated woman. Cuckoos calling long and loud again this morning. 27 Still hot and muggy atmosphere like a saturated spong, yet only light sprinkles of rain. Up in the orchard this morning in bush camp, just new under the old pinnock apple tree near it. Too hot inside, just now an oven bird came in the branches over me and in a very inquisitive manner looked me over from all points and then disappeared. That soft betering motion of the hind part of her body was very pronounced. The war news depresses me .the collapse of Russia and the success of the German submarine blockade. The squabbling and delays at Washington are also depressing and disgusting. 28 A change to cooler and clearer air at last swept clear of its vapors, feels dryer wind N.W. no such change in months. Poor sleep lately. Oh to again live in a world free from the agony and suspense of war! Shall I ever see that day? I fear not the thought of it comes ever in hourly like an eclipse of the sun. It darkens everything.
-I hear the indigo bunting, singing. Singing in a remote field all the morning. He is perched on the top of some tree, the mute unlistening fields all about him, a bit of topaz amid the green and he sings as if all the world was listening. What is he singing to? His brooding little brown mate on her nest in a low bush way hear him. Does it cheer and comfort her? We are humans when we ask this question, she broods on just the same when he stops singing. 29 Cloudy, with sprinkles of rain, cool. The cuckoo is right so far. The fair weather signs do not last. "Come to me, spiddle de [spiddle de] weet" sings my song sparrow, quite a shower at 4 and 5 much thunder. C.B. and I walk down to the village and back for the Times. Tires me less than it does her. I do it easily. Rest at the lake, clearing at sun down. 30 Grew warm very fast last night at 3 a.m. the warm currents began to puff in my face. This morning bright and hot. 31 Upto 92 at one. Windy in a.m. absolutely calm in p.m. and all night over hottest day yet at 11. The Indigo bunting was singing his song 5 times per minute and had been doing so for hours. Aug 1st Perfect calm continues as does the heat. Haymakers can hardly endure it, cuckoo calling this morning. A junco nest in a mossy bank over in the Deacon woods, 4 eggs she keeps her place when I am within 5 feet of her, at 9 1/2 mercury at 92. Yesterday p.m. sat in my camp and read most of Wordsworths sonnets not all of them are great but several of them are.
What a contrast to the sonnets of G.E. Woodburg just sent me by a friend - so much more concrete and real. Woodburgs sonnets are of gossamer, his lines glint a little now and then, but they carry no burden of thought or emotion; to me his world has no reality; he takes me into a frail fanciful region that suggest dreamland. In both his prose and verse Woodburg stands withdrawn from the common universal, the realm of power, and subower himself in a feeling insubstantial region. His love poem have no blood and no intellectual content. Invariably I find that a man who does not see the greatness of Whitman has no elements of greatness himself. 2d Hot, hot, 92 to 96, with light slow shower in the p.m. and a change to cooler, mercury dropped 20 degrees in an hour or two. Every morning in my walk I call upon the junco on her nest in the little worsy bank at the threshhole of the beech woods. I see her white beak land her black shining eyes then in the small cavity, partly screened by various wild green growths. That spot seems a little different from any other. That bit of wild feathered life appeals to the imagination. I linger about, I put up some poles and brush toward off the graying cows. I sit a long time on a rock near by partly to enjoy the cool breeze and partly to be near the junco. I see the male occasionally lingering near. How interesting that he should seem to understand what keeps his mate then. This is doubtless their second brood. I fear some fox or skunk or coon or red squirrel will find her out. In the early winter or spring may be she and her broods and mate will come to me on the Hudson. 3 Bright and cool. I sit here under my apple tree with my sweater on. Air clear as spring water, but the cuckoo is calling. 4 Cool bright lovely day. Eden comes up from the train with John C. at 10 1/2. Looks and is very well. It is his 77th birthday. Health seems returning to him in his old age. Thirty years or more ago, his hold upon his life seemed very slight and precarious. The doctors told him he was near his end. It did not disturb him at all. "I shall not die till my time comes" was always his reply. He is now talkative and jolly, I greatly enjoy his visit. We walk over home in the p.m. He sees now what a fool he was to cut down the pasture lot woods. The old home I know looked good to him. Every height and mountain peak around the horizon recalls his fox hunting. It is one of his staple subjects of talk. Before his famous hound "old wilder" he shot 240 odd foxes. This was his greatest haved. I remember him well - a day of a fine breed, with a very musical bay. We drove him to Grand Gorge for 4:43 train. Took 1 1/2 gr calomel last night. (fever) 5th Fine and cool. Miss Cheuch come up to dinner. In p.m. we drive to Grand Gorge. Callers from the Lake, kill 2 chucks today, one of them as black as a cat, arm gaining but mind barren. 6 Fine and warmer. Kill 2 chucks this morning. Eye seems to be improving. I sit here under the apple tree and try to start my mind going by reading Emersons "Compensation." The air is full of the fragrance of new moon hay.
-Balfour does not say out and out that he believes in absolute and unchanging beauty, but he says we must believe that somewhere and for some being then shines an unchanging splendor of beauty of which in nature and in art, we see each of us from our own stand point only passing shame and stray reflections and c" p 66. F.B. Is this unchanging splendor of beauty, beauty of form, of color of some, or what? Or is it mere beauty of thought. To me it is only words. Absolute beauty is as unthinkable as absolute joy, or hunger or fear, or shame, no human emotion can be absolute. 7 Start for West Park in car - all four of us, a hot day. We reach Tongore church at 12 1/2 and take our lunch under the trees behind it - the church I attended 63 years ago. I visit my wifes grave in the cemetery, a low growth of rag weed covers it. We drive on through Tongore to Stone Ridge, and then to Kingston via the old Lucas Turnpike. Reach home at 4. Ada and her friends in "the nest." 8 At W.P. see Julian and call on the Van B's. I enjoy the day. 9 Cloudy; start back at 8. Detour to Woodstock and then around the Ashokan dam. Lunch at the high arch bridge. Go through the Shandakan notch to Lexington a rough road. Reach home at 5 1/2, in a shower. 10 Cool dry clear. 11 Clear, cool, callers, Mrs Childs comes at 5. Missing: Aug 13, 1917 (1011 A) about August days 12 Lovely day. Judge Talbot and wife and Mr and Mrs Parsons come in p.m. Glad to see them. 13 Warm 80 degrees on the porch. In p.m. drive out to Grand Gorge. Brain works poorly these days. 14 Cloudy, Mrs C. leaves on early train. Some interesting callers in p.m. from Mrs Shepards. Two extra fine 11 years old boys. [See other sheet] 15 Cloudy. Light shower in p.m. a small red weasel up on the hill by the road side intent on crossing the pasture lot barn, but springs back as he sees me. His boldness and activity in such a contrast to that of the chipmonk. He thrush his head and neck out and eyes me intently many times. He appears first at this opening in the wall and then at that and surveys me at different angles. He carries on a hurried investigation of this strange animal and then as hurriedly turns on his tracks and disappears. The other days a chipmonk at the same Aug 14
The Methodist minister in the village this morning asked me if I believed in God; he had been told that Edison and I were infidels or agnostics He was very cordial and expressed great admiration for my writings. I made some hasty reply as I was in a hurry and recall that [I said] I did not believe in a personal god or a personal devil, if I believed in the first I must believe in the second. I should have said something like this "Probably not in your god - not in any being who can be described in terms of man - who sees, hears, feels, loves, had plans, governs, makes, takes sides, demands worship, obedience, and c and c, - a vastly magnified man, I do not believe in Christianity [explanation] - as an explanation of the universe and our relation to it, it is childish. It is good practical religion, so is Christian science, so is elementary tribal or racial religion for the people who wanted it. I do not believe in immortality, or another world as commonly understood. The religion of our fathers with its miracles, its son of God, its scheme of salvation, its heaven and hell and c is out worn and is impossible to the thinking men of our day. Ethics, religion, the rule of right, must have a scientific basis, as they have. The Christian virtues and aspirations must rest on a solid foundation of natural truth or they fall. (But why beat this old rotten and dusty carpet. Let us walk on the ground or on the bare boards.) Aug 14 There is nothing in the universe that cares anything for us as individuals, but individuals only our fellow men have a personal interest in us. To God, as represented by nature, we do not count, nature never sends her message to us "with personal regards." Her messages are blunt "yea" "yea" and "nay" "nay" our well being is second through the cooperation of a vast complex of physical forces and our own inherent powers of adaptation, but not one atom of matter or force takes sides for or against us. The total scheme of things is on our side, but this total scheme of things, will crush or destroy us as men, the moment we antagonize it or get in its way. barway, sat motionless several minutes and eyed me and then turned and went back. Killed a wood chuck this a.m. with his mouth filled with dry grass and stubble to carry in his hole, my bullet was like a stroke of lightning; he dropped and never moved. The young cedar birds in the orchard are about ready to leave the nest. When I approach they stand and stretch their necks up in the same scared way their parents do about the nest, with their beaks pointing upward and feathers depressed. Today I am 5ft 6 1/2 inches in height and weigh about 128lbs, lightly dressed. 16 We drive to Hobart and have dinner with Eden and Mag. They are as well as I have seen them in many years, a warm day with showers in p.m. and a heavy shower at night. 17 Foggy, muggy and partly cloudy this morning. Clearing before noon. Young cedar birds just out the nest one of them came on the porch this morning.
-The lightning is so quick, the thunder is so slow! The thunder often sounds like a gigantic gun of ten pins in an empty chamber over head. How slowly and aimlessly the big ball, roll about. Is this noise all the reverberation of the first crash? I suppose so.
-President Wilsons words are nearly always equal to the occasion. How rare the men and president of whom this can be said! 18 Rouland and Mr Reed and wife come over from Onteora, I return with them. 19, 20, 21 At Roulands - a good time. Garland was by, looks sick, very lame, but full of interesting talk, a lovable man accomplished in many ways, a fine talker and reader and sings well - a delightful family. 22 Return home. Mr Elwer and wife, bring me, a fine fellow and an enthusiastic wife. His hobby is astronomy - a high house indeed. He makes me want to telescope like his. Reach home at 12, a cool fine day. 23 Warm, threatens rain, a party from Racine in auto. 24 Rained nearly all night with thunder. Ground full of water this morning. Warm with signs of more rain. 3 chucks today, and another hit. In p.m. walk down to the Shepard fields, air loaded with moisture, "Mrs Durkie" has ceased to sing. 25 Clear and cool. Climb to top of old clump in forenoon. Clara, Harriet, Eleanor and I not over fatigued by the trip, 3 or 4 years since I was there. Do the climb easier than I could have done it one year ago. Hear much steadier than last year, no birds, no wild life of any kind same wood chucks in sheep pasture on our return. 26 Clear, windy, much cooler. Wind and cold spoiled my sleep last night. Saw one barn swallow yesterday. Fewer crows here this year than in previous years, my gold finches left their nest 2 days ago. 27 Clear and cool in a.m. warming up in p.m. A record day here yesterday, over 40 people and 5 cars, many pedestrians
from the village. Leutn Nightingale of the navy among them. Dr Day from Sidney and his wife and friends here. Dr Crump and wife and son here. Mrs Shepards friends and relatives. Dr Snew and wife, Dr Russell and wife and daughter and c. 28 Warm fine day, a car load of people from Hamden, Ada comes on p.m. train. 29 Rain last night, heavy with thunder, cloudy this morning. 30 More rain. Doubt if we get off today. 31 Clear and cool. We are off at 9 for Port Byron, a fine run to Sidney, which we reach at 1 1/2 p.m. Dr Day and family glad to see us. Sept 1st Raining in early morning we get off at 8 1/2. Dr Day and family go with us in their big car to Burlington Flats, a very bad and fearfully muddy dirt road for 12 miles. Eleanor drives my car and handles id splendidly. The Days leave us here and we push on over good state road for Witco All goes well and we are in Syracuse by 5 p.m. and would have reached Port Byron at 6, had we not had two puncture. Finally get through about 7 p.m. 2 Sunday in P.B. Stopping with the Tannars - old friends and school mates of C.B. an interesting family, very genuine people. In p.m. Mr T. takes us in his motor boat on the Canal to Cayuga lake, a long sail. 2 In P.B. walk on the Drumlin and meet 4 soldiers out on a holiday; fine boys from Pa. belong to regular army. 3 Fine day. Drive to Auburn slop with Dr Hitchcock, old friends of C.B. a beautiful city - call at Mr Seward house and meet Col, Seward looks like his father. House full of many interesting things. 4 Off on return trip at 9. Clear and fine south along Owasco Lake for Ithaca, a lovely farming country. Every farm with its history and associations for some one, but we see only farm buildings and smooth fertile fields. Reach Ithaca at noon; leave at one, off for Owego, good roads and a succession of fine landscapes and well kept farms, all state roads except 7 miles. Reach Owego in due time, and press in for Binghamton, good roads, no delays; average about 20 miles per hour; go over the long hill and are again in the valley of the Susquehanna. This is the route father and mother used to take when they drove to P. to see their friends .150 miles occupying about 3 days. I think of them hourly, jogging along about 4 or 5 miles per hour, over rough roads while we spin along at about 20 miles per hour over Macadam roads - Otego, Unadilla, Bainbridge, Afton, Binghamton
-how there news haunted my imagination as I heard them in my youth. Father and mother made the last trip by train in 1854 and Olly Ann and Walker went with them. I was teaching school in Olive, and when I came back in October, they had done to Pa. The first train of cars Olly Ann ever saw, they saw near Binghamton. They were on a hill probably the big hill, and looked across a valley and saw the train. Their trip took about 3 weeks; they had much visiting to do. I make our trip 212 miles each way, - the distance the same by the two routes. We used nearly 30 gals of gas. There were about 20 extra mile, driving about P.B. and Auburn. 6 Raining in morning, clearing in p.m. We reach home about 4 p.m. glad to be back. Sept 7 Fine, cool day. 8 Raining again this morning, began in the night, ground constantly full of water. Three young women in a Hudson car from Madison Wis, call. Fine young women two of them teachers in state of Washington. 10 Cold and windy. C.B. Mrs J and I go after preferment. 11 Our first frost - froze came, cucumbers, tomatoes and other garden vegetables. Bright and cold all day. 12 Another killing frost. Bright and calm today. 60 years ago today I was married, alas! alas! 13 Warmer, clear and lovely. Ada leaves this morning, a goodly lump of christian sceince. However childish and absurd the philosophy of christian science is. It is one of the best practical religion. Good christian scientist are such before they call themselves by that name. It is a matter of temperament and disposition. The same is probably true of Methodist, Baptists, Episcopalians and c. Each joins the sect to which his disposition is the most responsive, none of them are essentially changed in character, but only in belief and practice. They keep the rules of their sect and defend its doctrines. The church organizes and directs their thoughts and feelings. Ada was always a vague, undefined
C.S. now the pattern is fully brought out. Her sister C.B. can never become one. Her intellect is too dominant and her disposition too crusty. 14 Perfect Sept days, calm clear genial near 80 degrees. How I enjoy them, many callers. 15 Still bright but cooler, a few clouds with irregular wind.
-When I casually open Whitmans. "Leaves of Grass" after the book has been long closed to me It is like coming suddenly upon the ocean after years of absence from it. I have been reading the verses in the magazine, or in the vol. of some recent poet, and opening. W. is like coming from an enameled both room to the ocean beach. Such large free ways such elemental force and simplicity, - such freedom from the subtle and the over refined, such
fundamental statements and absence of elaboration, such magnitude and at times such absolute justness of phrasing! Emerson in his journals, may well speak of it Alleghany lift and sweep. It is like the forest primeval like the great plains, like the mountains peaks, yet steeped in humanity and brotherly love. It is refined as the sky is refined as the great lakes are refined, as the rains and the dews are refined. It is not culture, or poetry, or art as we commonly use the terms. It is something greater and better. 16 Partly cloudy, cool. Julian and John came last night at 5 1/2. So glad to see them. We have a fine day together and they depart at 2 1/2. John McGrigor and Eva and Chester Lane and Hatty and her two children come in auto at 1. We have an enjoyable day together. 17 Bright and warmer a lovely morning. Educators from Albany here. (Mr and Mrs Abrams and c) 18 Lovely day, one week and 2 days without rain. Write in morning and do chores in p.m. 19 Clear and warm. Drive to the village in morning, which ruffles my temper and spirts my day. I often wish I had never seen a Ford car and any other. All such things create wants which we never knew before. Life so simpler and more satisfying without them. 21 Fine day. De Loach comes this p.m. 22 Mr Roy from Montreal comes this a.m. a lovely day. 23 Very enjoyable days. Clear and cool. 24 De Loach left yesterday. We pack up and at 3 p.m. bid farewell to dear old Woodchuck and start for home. Mr Roy driving the car. Reach home without delay at 7 1/2 p.m. 25 Clear and warm, glad to be back home. 26 Bright and cool and dry, no rain for 2 weeks.
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The waste and litter of the great out-of-doors taking such pretty shape and enclosing such pearls - a birds nest, a birds rest is always a surprise and a delight especially when placed upon the ground. Oct 15 A cool dry fall so far, but no frost here since our return from W.C.L. On Sept 29th I went to N.Y. to join Mr Ford. On the 30th we motored to Greenport to meet Edison, but E. was at sea on his job. We motored back to Port Jefferson and passed the night. On Oct 1st we crossed to Bridgeport and then motored to Boston. The 2d we passed in

B.
In p.m. De Loach and I in the ford car motored to Concord where we passed the night. Weather bright and cool. We went to Emersons grave and into his house, where I sat in his study for my photo On the 3rd we started for N.Y. Left the car at Bridgeport and took train for N.Y. Spent Thursday in N.Y. passing the night at Dr Johnson, where C.B. was staying. Friday the 4th came back to West Park. Have been here since, writing a little and over hauling. MSS. Cough letting up. Weather cool and dry.


C.B. came back for week. End on Friday the 12th. She leaves this a.m. for N.Y. Raining a little today. Toliage very brilliant. My cold began suddenly in a fit of sneezing in Sept 26 - the result of auto intoxication only a slight fever one night but coughing and blowing has persisted up to this time - nearly over now, a thorough house - clearing at once, checked it, and a dose of 1 1/2 grs of calomel, a good deal of phlegen, but only slight indisposition a few times. Eat and sleep well; gained 3 lbs with Mr Ford. No nature notes this fall. 23 Still alone here, keep well and write a little each a.m. or revise ness, only light rains past week. Leaves falling fast walk on a carpet of gold each morning as I go to P.O. woven by the wind from the maples and elms. Leaves half off, a severe frost 3 nights ago, frost nightily ever since - cold for the season. Began taking an enema daily [on] since Saturday, with marked improvement and a fine drive yesterday with Hud and his wife around through Cetreville and Lloyd, by Avchmerely Pond, and Esopus home.
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A 2 hour drive through [the] a landscape of gilded bronze and gold. Bright and mild partly cloudy today and still cool for Oct. 24 Rain nearly all day from N.E. heavy at times, much needed; fills up the wells and cisterns, strips the leaves off the trees. I am in doors nearly all day, write a little very lonely. Oh, the falling leaves, they move me. The house is like a tomb. Felt her loss afresh when I went to the kitchen door and found the leaves clustered there as if waiting for something, they were waiting for her broom. For over 40 years it had not failed them and now they lay there dulled and discouraged, oh, the unswept stones and entry way - what a tale they tell. I never could have believed I should miss her so much. Yet I do not want her back, but if I could only know she was well and happy somewhere in the land of the living. Over 40 years we two sat here and saw our days go by, saw the leaves come and go and the seasons change, now they come and go for her no more, the dust in her house, and the leaves at her door are undisturbed.

What do I mourn for? Why this loneliness? Oh, I suffer it is for my vanished days for my life buried with her. She was apart of my youth, and my manhood, of all I did and thought and though a discord in my life, I mourn her just the same. Oct 31 In N.Y. since 28, over to E. Orange with Binder on the 30. Back today. Rain yesterday. Nov 1st Bright sharp weather. Out to Floral Park to the Childs. 2 Drive to Flower Field with Mr Childs, sharp and clear, a good time. 3 Back to N.Y. today and then to Cos Cob with C.B. to visit Sheas. 4 At C.C. Fine sharp days. To Bigelows in p.m. 5 Back to N.Y. 6 Home today. Fine day; drive up to E. to vote for the women. 7, 8, 9, 10 At W.P. weather clear, dry, sharp. To S.S. on 10th with the Audubon society from Kingston High School. 11, 12, 13 At W.P. still clear and cold. Write a little. 14 Drive to Middletown in p.m. 47 miles at Mrs Canfields. 15 At M. a pleasant time. 16 Drive back this a.m. The Sheas come at 4 1/2. Cloudy. 17 Still bright, dry and sharp, a remarkable Nov. so far. Clear sharp days from the north since Oct 30th no wind and no clouds, till yesterday. Feeling pretty well, but do not get much work done. 18 The Sheas here, clear, mild. 19 Colder, clear. Extra well. 20 Colder. Snow flakes in the air. 21 Frosty nights. 22 Rain and cold. 23 Clearing: to P. in p.m. 24 Cloudy, chilly, snow flurries. So eager for war news that I go to P.O. before breakfast. British victories in France mightily good reading.

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A new path now from my study to the nest. My path to the house faded out. I kept it open for nearly 40 years. Alas, alas, no more as I pass up the drive in the morning I often see a reflection of my own farm in the kitchen window and it fairly startles me. So often has she came to that window and called to me! 21 - 11 1/2 a.m. two flocks of geese going south, so high they are only faintly etched on the clouds, two very large flock and shaped, so high I cannot hear their "hook," which Hud hears. 26 Cold and clear; down to 20. Write on the Germans. 27 Colder, down to 15. Still after the Germans. Saw and split wood in p.m. The Canada sparrow here some days ago, a feeling of snow in the air. 28 Our first white wash of snow this morning. Darkly cloudy, more snow coming probably, am giving the Germans a little rest, but am not done with the wretches yet, am off to Edens this p.m. 29 At Edens. E. looks well - good color and in good flesh, eats and sleeps well, but is getting more and more deaf and his sight eye of little values, says also his head is confused, gets the wrong word sometimes. He does his chores and usual. Mag well and the same cheerful and thrifty and helpful woman she always has been. A skim of snow on the ground. The wooded nets, have the old winter look so familiar to me in my youth, a good dinner. Willie and his wife there. Pretty cold. 30 Cloudy and cold. Walk over to Willies in morning. Back to dinner. Daul, Burroughs, the son of Eden there, 70 years of age, has a Burroughs look. Eva and John McGrigor call in p.m. Arrives in the morning. Call on Mrs Mitchel and Mr Scott. John and Blauch over to dinner. Leave on 4:20 train for home. Dec 1 At home. Pretty cold. Olive Hinman here, Mrs Webster from N.Y. in p.m. 2 Fair day, cold. Write in study. 3 Fair, cold, 24 degrees. Work in study, finish letter to N.Y. Times. 4 Cloudy, milder, a strike in p.m. Black ducks on the river finish. Is nature cruel? 5 Clear sharp, a great message from president Wilson. It will ring around the world. He is a leader of his country .focuses their thoughts and hopes on a high plane, not men rhetoric - his words are blows; they convince, no other of the allied countries has such a spokesman. I fear Roosevelt in his place would divide the country more than he would unite it. I fear so, he is so violent and partizan. In those days we must forget that we are either democrats or republicans and only remember that we are Americans. 6 Clear, sharp, down to 25 degrees. The great thing about Wilson is that he grows. Few men in political life grow under the pressure of men conditions or new demands. Wilson has grown as the occasion has demanded. He is now the


foremost man in the Allied nations, his word lead all others. All his utterances have high literary value, without posing at all as literature. They aretoo serious and earnest for that. To call them literature is almost to detract from them. Yet Lincolns Gettysburg address was literature, so is [the] Pauls letter to the Corinthians.