Watchers at the Pond. Frankliln Russell (4).

New York: Time Incorporated. 1961.

Why read it? Nature. A study of what happens within the setting of a pond as the seasons evolve. Ponds are teeming with life, much of it hidden from most people unless observed by a naturalist. The reader will discover the unseen world of the pond in winter, spring, summer, fall and back to winter again.

Ideas:

“The lightning burned through the air and created a huge vacuum, into which the vapor-packed air hurtled…created an explosion that rocked the earth, and the concussion fled along the line of the lightning strike and ended with a crackle far beyond the marsh.” p. 179. ………. “Death was a process of reduction, and bacteria were the prime reducers.” P. 193. ………. “The blue sky was not caused by clarity but by turbidity, or countless dust particles.” P. 200. ………. “Each space of air the size of a robin’s egg contained more than a million of these particles, and they were filters that reduced the sun’s heat and cut out the reds, violets, and greens of light from space, allowing only the dominant color of blue to reach the pond.” P. 201. ………. “Later that day…male [flying] ants fell steadily from the sky, dying and dead…their lives…ended the moment they mated with the flying females….” P. 203. ………. “…more than ten thousand blue jays flooded past the pond: their massed flight…overwhelming, as though a single creature of unbelievable size had exploded into sight.” P. 209. ………. “The next day, another twenty thousand crows passed, and forty thousand the next day, and twenty thousand the next day, and then fifteen thousand and thirty thousand and fifty thousand, and black columns of birds stretched almost unbroken from horizon to horizon.” P. 210.

To be concluded.

Watchers at the Pond. Franklin Russell (3).

New York: Time Incorporated. 1961.

Why read it? Nature. A study of what happens within the setting of a pond as the seasons evolve. Ponds are teeming with life, much of it hidden from most people unless observed by a naturalist. The reader will discover the unseen world of the pond in winter, spring, summer, fall and back to winter again.

Ideas:

“The bursting green volvox, the budding youngsters of the hydras, the endless division of amoebae and  paramecia, all produced uncountable millions of new lives each day.” P. 162. ………. “The forest hummed softly with a legion of wings.” P. 169. ………. “The lungs of the pond were the leaves.” P. 170. ………. “Billions of leaves hung, rustled, whispered, gleamed, and flickered.” P. 170. ………. “…thousands of breathing valves, or stomata, through which the leaf inhaled carbon dioxide and exhaled oxygen.” P. 171. ………. “The unwanted substance of this activity, oxygen, flooded over the pond and into the lungs and lives of all creatures in an invisible shower of water expelled by the leaves.” P. 171. ………. “In one summer, the trees would release more water than was contained in the pond.” P. 171. ………. “The pond’s surface was flatly gray, and its trees were stilled, waiting for the rain…no bird called; no life stirred.” P. 175.

To be continued.

Watchers at the Pond. Franklin Russell (2)

 New York: Time Incorporated. 1961.

Why read it? Nature. A study of what happens within the setting of a pond as the seasons evolve. Ponds are teeming with life, much of it hidden from most people unless observed by a naturalist. The reader will discover the unseen world of the pond in winter, spring, summer, fall and back to winter again.

Ideas:

“The differences between plant and animal among this microlife were incomprehensible and contradictory and seemed to indicate only one fact: the origins of this life went back to a creature that was neither plant or animal.” P. 85. ………. The red-tailed hawk: His scream in the hot sky griped the senses, and the vertical fall of his body terrified the forest.” P. 87. ………. “…size was no criterion of the hunter’s skill and  power.” P. 88. ………. “All pond creatures had particular enemies who perpetually haunted their lives.” P. 103. ………. “In an hour, one bladdewort caught five hundred thousand creatures.” P. 111. ………. “The worm gulped down the rotifer, and the frog swallowed the worm; the kingfisher killed the frog, and the hunt passed endlessly from creature to creature.” P. 114. ………. “In death there was life.” P. 116. ……….. “The unknowing eye saw the stillness and missed the vortex of life within.” P. 154. ………. “The bat calls bounded off all flying insects, and the reflected sounds informed the bats of distance, directions, and speeds.” P. 156. ………. “Their [the bats’] crazy zigzagging flight branched from mosquito to moth in blind destruction of flying life.” P. 156. ………. “The bats lived in an almost completely dark world of echo.” P. 156.

To be continued. 

Watchers at the Pond. Franklin Russell (1).

 New York: Time Incorporated. 1961.

Why read it? Nature. A study of what happens within the setting of a pond as the seasons evolve. Ponds are teeming with life, much of it hidden from most people unless observed by a naturalist. The reader will discover the unseen world of the pond in winter, spring, summer, fall and back to winter again.

Ideas:

“These creatures had neither the time nor the instinct to know all the incredible pond.” P. 11. ………. “About five hundred million earthworms were asleep around the pond.” P. 15. ………. “Dense masses of ants: their metabolism was so low that their hearts were motionless, and they lived in a secret suspension puzzlingly remote form the hot activity of their waking lives.” P. 16. ………. “When the flies began emerging from their sleep, the pond would sound to the roar, rasp, whine, screech, drone and rumble of their wings.” P. 21. ………. “Nowhere did the snow disclose its real structure, which was founded on one constant mathematical fact: every particle of it was formed on some variation of six…and whatever the complexity of a flake, each was a perfectly symmetrical unit.” P. 39. ………. “In a hollow tree filled with rotten wood, thirty-eight thousand drowsy fertilized mosquitoes began stirring.” P. 55. ………. “The diversity of life in this miniature universe seemed infinite.” P. 61.

To be continued. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson: Essays and Lectures. Book Two (10).

1803 -1882. New York: Literary Classics of the United States. 1983.

Why read it? Emerson’s unit of thought is the epigrammatic sentence. Emerson writes a poetic prose. Emerson’s beliefs—that each man shares in the Over-Soul, or God, that man possesses, within himself, the means to all knowledge—expressed in his memorable sentences, are of central importance in the history of American culture. The only trouble is most of his ideas are half-truths.

Ideas:

“The English…do not respect power, but only performance; value ideas only for an economic result.” P. 887. ………. “The gospel it [English church] preaches is, ‘By taste are ye saved.’ ” P. 888. ………. “The bias of Englishmen to practical skill….” P. 903. ………. Its [The Times’] existence honors the people who dare to print all they know, dare to know all the facts, and do not wish to be flattered by hiding the extent of the public disaster.” P. 913. ………. “…England, an old land and exhausted land, must one day be contented, like other parents, to be strong only in her children.” P. 916. ………. “An Englishman shows no mercy to those below him in the social scale, as he looks for none from those above him: any forbearance from his superiors surprises him, and they suffer in his good opinion.” P. 932. ………. “…by this sacredness of individual, they [the English] have in seven hundred years evolved the principles of freedom.” P. 933.

The end of this book of essays and lectures by Emerson. Next: Watchers at the Pond by Franklin Russell.

Ralph Waldo Emerson: Essays and Lectures. Book Two (9).

1803 -1882. New York: Literary Classics of the United States. 1983.

Why read it? Emerson’s unit of thought is the epigrammatic sentence. Emerson writes a poetic prose. Emerson’s beliefs—that each man shares in the Over-Soul, or God, that man possesses, within himself, the means to all knowledge—expressed in his memorable sentences, are of central importance in the history of American culture. The only trouble is most of his ideas are half-truths.

Ideas:

“The reputation for taciturnity they [the English] have enjoyed for six or seven hundred years.” P. 837. ………. “The [English] have a great range of scale, from ferocity to exquisite refinement.” P. 841. ………. Of Baron Vere: “Had one seen him returning from a victory, he would by his silence have suspected that he had lost the day; and had he beheld him in retreat, he would have [thought] him a conqueror by the cheerfulness of his spirit.” P. 842. ………. “They [the English] wish neither to command or obey, but to be kings in their own houses.” P. 844. ………. “The English are a nation of humorists.” P. 845. ………. There is this benefit in brag, that the speaker is unconsciously expressing his own ideal.” P. 847. ………. “But a man must keep an eye on his servants, if he would not have them rule him.” P. 857. ………. “Man is a shrewd inventor, and is ever taking the hint of a new machine from his own structure, and adapting some secret of his own anatomy in iron, wood, and leather, to some required function in the work of the world.” P. 857. ………. “…the machine unmans the user.” P.  857. ………. “The new age brings new qualities into request….” P. 862. ………. “This long descent of families and this cleaving through the ages to the same spot of ground captivates the imagination.” P. 863. ………. “The upper classes have only birth, say the people here, and not thoughts.” P. 867.

To be continued.

Ralph Waldo Emerson: Essays and Lectures. Book Two (8).

1803 -1882. New York: Literary Classics of the United States. 1983.

Why read it? Emerson’s unit of thought is the epigrammatic sentence. Emerson writes a poetic prose. Emerson’s beliefs—that each man shares in the Over-Soul, or God, that man possesses, within himself, the means to all knowledge—expressed in his memorable sentences, are of central importance in the history of American culture. The only trouble is most of his ideas are half-truths.

Ideas:

“Everything English is a fusion of distant and antagonistic elements.” P. 793. ………. “[The Saxons] have the taste for toil, a distaste for pleasure or repose and the telescopic appreciation for distant gain.” P. 807. ………. “The bias of the nation [England] is a passion for utility.” P. 811. ………. “The nearer we look, the more artificial is their [the British] social system.” P. 818. ………. “The laborer is a possible lord; the lord is a possible basket-maker.” P. 820. ……… “Machinery has been applied to all work, and carried to such perfection, that little is left for the men but to mind the engines and feed the furnaces.” P. 822. ……….. “In short, every one of these islanders [the English] is an island himself, safe, tranquil, incommunicable.” P. 823. ………. “[The English]…inexorable on points of form.” P. 824. ………. “The English power resides also in their dislike of change.” P. 826. ………. “An Englishman understates, avoids the superlative, checks himself in compliments….” P. 831. ………. “The Englishman who visits Mount Etna will carry his tea kettle to the top.” P. 834. ………. “[The English]…believe that where there is no enjoyment of life, there can be no vigor and art in speech or thought: that your merry heart goes all the way, your sad one tires in a mile.” P. 836.

To be continued.