willows like quivering green jelly. The hot green swamps, how I longed to wander in them with my feet in the warm mire, feeling my strength & power as a male animal to reproduce myself!
     The long white dusty road- wilting dust covered weeds along its edges; tattered white butterflies listlessly fluttering along.
     The first evening of our arrival, that is, Tuesday evening, there was a great storm to the north. A half-moon hung low in the dark warm sky above Salem to the southwest, which lit up the great rounded tops of the clouds with a pale eerie light. For a long time, there was no thunder and the lightning had that strange mystery that goes with such silence. The sudden flashes of brilliant light from the depth of these cloud masses, revealing for an instant their many curves & contours, followed by a somber dark expanse, was inexpressively fascinating & beautiful to see. As the storm advanced, it slowly swelled upward; so imperceptible was its progress that its advance could only be noted by its approach to the fixed Big Dipper. One by one it’s (sic) stars were winked out; now the distant thunder became audible, tho the wind still continued from the southwest, the foremost clouds continued to rush towards us; they came in a great long ragged roll, and swept on until they covered most of the southern sky; the moon disappeared and there was left only a long flatly arched segment on the southern horizon which was flooded with moonlight.