78 EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 
March 7, 1852. At 9 o’clock P. M. to the 
woods by the full moon.Going through 
the high field beyond the lone grave-yard, I see 
the track of a boy’s sled before me, and his foot¬ 
steps shining like silver between me and the 
moon; and now I come to where they have 
coasted in a hollow in the upland beanfield, and 
there are countless tracks of sleds. I forget 
that the sun shone on them in their sport as if 
I had reached the region of perpetual twilight, 
and their sports appear more significant and 
symbolical now, more earnest. For what a man 
does abroad by night requires and implies more 
deliberate energy than what he is encouraged 
to do in the sunshine. He is more spiritual, less 
animal, and vegetable, in the former case. 
This stillness is more impressive than any sound. 
The moon, the stars, the trees, the snow, the 
sand when bare, a monumental stillness whose 
void must be supplied by thought. It extracts 
thought from the beholder like the void under 
a cupping glass, raises a swelling. How much 
a silent mankind might suggest! . . . . The 
moon appears to have waned a little, yet with 
this snow on the ground I can plainly see the 
words I write. .... I do not know why such 
emphasis should be laid on certain events that 
transpire, why my news should be so trivial; 
considering what one’s dreams and expectations 
