AUGUST 



25 



As you look over the pond westward you are 

 obliged to employ both your hands to defend your 

 eyes against the reflected as well as the true sun, 

 for they are equally bright ; and if, between the 

 two, you survey its surface critically, it is literally 

 as smooth as glass, except where the skater insects, 

 at equal intervals scattered over its whole extent, 

 by their motions in the sun produce the finest 

 imaginable sparkle on it, or, perchance, a duck 

 plumes itself, or ... a swallow skims so low as to 

 touch it. 



THOREAU: Walden. 



26 



The small rose -colored polygonum raised its 

 head proudly above the water on either hand, and 

 flowering at this season and in these localities, in 

 front of dense fields of the white species which 

 skirted the sides of the stream, its little streak of 

 red looked very rare and precious. The pure white 

 blossoms of the arrow-head stood in the shallower 

 parts, and a few cardinals on the margin still 

 proudly surveyed themselves reflected in the water, 

 though the latter, as well as the pickerel-weed, 

 was now nearly out of blossom. 



THOREAU : A Week on the Concord and Merrimack 

 Rivers. 



