EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 291 
thrown into the pond and wells. These may 
have been dropped out of the back window. 
March 1, 1858.I see about a dozen 
black ducks on Flint’s Pond asleep with their 
heads on their backs and drifting across the 
pond before the wind. I suspect that they are 
nocturnal in their habits and therefore require 
much rest by day. So do the seasons revolve 
and every chink is filled. While the waves toss, 
this bright day, the ducks asleep are drifting 
before the wind across the ponds. Every now 
and then one or two lift their heads and look 
about as if they watched by turns.Just 
after sundown I see a large flock of wild geese 
in a perfect harrow cleaving their way toward 
the northeast, with Napoleonic tactics splitting 
the forces of winter. 
March 31,1860. .... The small red butterfly 
in the woodpaths and sproutlands, and I hear 
at mid p. M. a very faint but positive ringing 
sound rising above the susurrus of the pines, of 
the breeze, which I think is the note of a distant 
and perhaps solitary toad, not loud and ringing 
as it will be. Toward night I hear it more dis¬ 
tinctly and am more confident about it. I hear 
this faint first reptilian sound added to the 
sound of the winds thus, each year a little in ad¬ 
vance of the unquestionable note of the toad. 
Of constant sounds in the warmer parts of warm 
