EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 217 
P. M. To Walden. I think I may say that 
the snow has not been less than a foot deep on 
a level in open land until to-day, since January 
6th, about eleven weeks. I am reassured and 
reminded that I am the heir of eternal inheri¬ 
tances which are inalienable when I feel the 
warmth reflected from this sunny bank, and see 
the yellow sand and the reddish subsoil, and 
hear some dried leaves rustle and the trickling 
of melting snow in some sluiceway. The eter¬ 
nity which I detect in nature I predicate of my¬ 
self also. How many springs I have had this 
same experience ! I am encouraged, for I rec¬ 
ognize this steady persistency and recovery of 
nature as a quality of myself. Now the steep 
south hill-sides begin to be bare, and the early 
sedge and the sere, but still fragrant, pennyroyal 
and rustling leaves are exposed, and you see 
where the mice have sheared off the sedge, and 
also made nests of its top during the winter. 
There, too, the partridges resort, and perhaps 
you hear the bark of a striped squirrel, and see 
him scratch toward his hole, rustling the leaves ; 
for all the inhabitants of nature are attracted by 
this bare and dry spot as well as you. 
The musk-rat houses were certainly very few 
and small last summer, and the river has been 
remarkably low up to this time, while the pre¬ 
vious fall they were very numerous and large, 
