Henry Thoreau, Bachelor of Nature by Léon Bazalgette

Early in the month it was delightfully warm: one saw the little yellow butterflies fluttering about, encouraged by this smiling Indian Summer. And then it turned cold after the middle of November; it was necessary to pull up the last turnips in the garden to save them from the frost. What joyous walks one had during the days when the first crust of ice resisted the sun! But it was December now. The winter was driving down as brutally as a wedge. Over the fields the crows flocked together in vast protesting flocks. A heavy snow covered the countryside. It was a beautiful soft mantle that you trampled down in silence, carrying the feathers on your boots and leaving behind you a long chain of footprints.

Just one year, day for day, after he had taken that young lunatic to the station, Henry had gone out for his walk and stopped for a long time before some old stumps, to count the concentric rings that marked their age. He liked to know how old his friends the trees were, even when they were no more. Was it there he caught his cold, in spite of his overcoat? No one will ever know. That same day, as the day before had been the anniversary of John Brown's death, he was talking about the old man with two fellows who maintained that he had no right to risk his life. But how about Jesus then? Would he have hesitated if he had foreseen Calvary? That is what people always say when a man has made such a simple sacrifice of his life. But this evil cough persisted. Henry had certainly made a mistake in paying no attention to his bronchitis and going off to deliver a promised lecture in the neighbourhood. He was taking some care of himself, but without any great results. There was nothing to do but to let the illness wear itself out. He had had bad times before and pulled through.