Page:Winter - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/207

Rh Here, also, is the symbol of the triumph which succeeds to a grief that has tried us to our advantage, so that at last we can smile through our tears. It is the aspect with which we come out of the house of mourning. We have found our relief in tears.—As the skies appear to a man, so is his mind. Some see only clouds there, some prodigies and portents; some scarce look up at all, their heads, like those of the brutes, are directed towards earth. Some behold there serenity, purity, beauty ineffable.—The world run to see the panorama, while there is a panorama in the sky which few go out to see.

There might be a chapter, when I speak of hens in the thawy days and spring weather on the chips, called Chickweed or Plantain.

Those western vistas through clouds to the sky show the clearest heavens, clearer and more elysian than when the whole sky is comparatively free from clouds, for then there is wont to be a vapor more generally diffused, especially near the horizon, which in cloudy days is absorbed, as it were, or collected into masses, and the vistas are clearer than the unobstructed cope of heaven.

What endless variety in the form and texture of the clouds, some fine, some coarse-grained! I saw to-night what looked like the back bone with portions of the ribs of a fossil monster.