JULY 



13 



A bittern leaves the shore at my approach. A 

 nighthawk squeaks and booms before sunrise. . . . 

 I hear the blackbird's conqueree, and the kingfisher 

 darts away with his alarum and outstretched neck. 



THOREAU: Summer. 



When the yellow lily flowers in the meadows, 

 and the red in dry lands and by woodpaths, then, 

 methinks, the flowering season has reached its 

 height. They surprise me as perhaps no more 

 can. Now I am prepared for anything. 



THOREAU: Summer. 



14 



As we come in sight of the lilies, where they 

 cover the water at the outlet of the lake, a brisk 

 gust of wind, as if it had been waiting to surprise 

 us, sweeps down and causes every leaf to leap from 

 the water and show its pink underside. Was it a 

 fluttering of hundreds of wings, or the clapping 

 of a multitude of hands? But there rocked the 

 lilies with their golden hearts open to the sun, and 

 their tender white petals as fresh as crystals of 

 snow. What a queenly flower, indeed, the type 

 of unsullied purity and sweetness ! Its root, like 

 a black, corrugated, ugly reptile, clinging to the 

 slime, but its flower in purity and whiteness like a 



star. 



BURROUGHS: Riverby. 



