Thoreau’s journal entry for 29th December 1851: The sun is risen. The ground is almost entirely bare. The water is the puddles are not skimmed over – it is warm as an April morning. There is a sound as of blue birds in the air, and the cocks crow as in the spring. The steam curls up from the roofs and the ground. You walk with open cloak. It is exciting to behold the smooth glassy surface of water where the melted snow has formed large puddles and ponds … … How admirable it is that we can never foresee the weather – that that is always novel.