Page:Winter - from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau.djvu/28

14 the departed may be nearer to us than when they were present. At death, our friends and relatives either draw nearer to us, and are found out, or depart farther from us, and are forgotten. Friends are as often brought nearer together as separated by death.

Dec. 24, 1853. Walden almost entirely open again. Skated across Flint's Pond, for the most part smooth, but with rough spots where the rain had not melted the snow. From the hill beyond I get an arctic view N. W. The mountains are of a cold slate color. It is as if they bounded the continent toward Behring's Straits.

In Weston's field in springy land on the edge of a swamp I counted thirty-three or four of those large silvery brown cocoons within a rod or two, and probably there are many more; about a foot from the ground, commonly on the main stem, though sometimes on a branch close to the stem, of the alder, sweet fern, brake, etc. The largest are four inches long by two and one half wide, bag-shaped and wrinkled, and partly concealed by dry leaves, alder, fern, etc., attached, as if sprinkled over them. This evidence of cunning in so humble a creature is affecting, for I am not ready to refer it to an intelligence which the creature does not share, as much as we do the prerogative of reason. This radiation of the brain! The bare silvery