From Beth:

For our purposes, I have considered that the sand foliage passages encompasses paragraphs 5 through 9 in "Spring." Its history is complicated, and writing a revision narrative is going to be fascinating.

In each section below, I've given XML IDs for the leaf involved, even if sand foliage material occurs on only one page of that leaf. In the explanation following the XML IDs, I've noted which pages contain the sand foliage material. Here's a question: if the sand foliage material occupies only part of a page, should the entire page be transcribed or only the sand foliage stuff? My thought is that having the context is helpful, so I would vote for transcribing the entire page. This is relevant to Version A, where the passage is represented first by a cross-reference on the recto of a leaf. There I think it's useful to transcribe both pages of the leaf, so the reader can see the context into which Thoreau intended to insert this material.

It's also relevant to Volume 8: there I would transcribe only the verso page — the sand foliage material starts partway down the page. HM924v1n235 in A, all of the pages in F, and all but the last page in G, which is blank, are filled with sand foliage material — no choices there.

Version A

(Late September 1846 to September 1847): First mention of sand foliage passage

XML:IDs

hm924v1n232
hm924v1n233
hm924v1n234
hm924v1n235

In version A, the sand foliage passage appears first as a pencilled cross-reference on hm924v1n233: "V end of Sand foliage At length the sun's rays". The position of the cross-reference, between material from paragraph 4b and paragraph 11 in "Spring," corresponds to the placement of the sand foliage passage in the published version, where paragraph 5 begins "At length the sun's rays." A version of paragraph 5 begins at the top of hm924v1n235, where it's followed by an early version of the description of the sand foliage in paragraph 6 that Thoreau elaborates in the Volume 8/F version.

(As an aside, if you expand hm924v1n233 you can see that Thoreau wrote something else in pencil to the left of "V end of Sand foliage At length the sun's rays". It's so faint that it seems likely he erased it: sometimes pencilled text gets rubbed away as a result of handling but this looks deliberate. I haven't been able to decipher it, but I'll keep trying.)

Volume 8

("Additional material, separate from drafts") and Version F (Late 1853 to Early 1854--but the composition dates from before this): First extant version of sand foliage passage (probably spring 1848)

Thoreau drafted the sand foliage passage in his Journal, probably in spring 1848. The earliest version is on three leaves of a manuscript volume of his Journal that survives in sixteen scattered full and partial leaves. (In Journal 2 [1984], we titled this volume "[I]" because Thoreau called the one that follows it "II." In editing [I], we conjectured that it originally consisted of 144 leaves. The paper is the same as that in the intact MS volume that precedes it chronologically, and we thought it was reasonable to assume that [I] was originally the same size as its chronological predecessor.) Most of the surviving leaves contain material that appears in or is related to Walden, but work on A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, "Ktaddn" in The Maine Woods, and the essay "A Walk to Wachusett" is also represented.

We know that Thoreau moved these three leaves of the sand foliage passage to the Walden draft as he was working. We don't know for sure when, but I think it's not unlikely Thoreau wrote that cross-reference in A during the Version B-C period (Mid 1848 to Late Summer 1849).

Shanley apparently didn't realize that all three leaves were the same type of paper or that the contents go together: he put the one on which the passage begins into what's now called volume 8, and the two on which the passage continues into F. (F is dated late 1853 to early 1854, but as I note above, I think this material came into the draft some time before that.)

Volume 8

XML:IDs

hm924v8n1300 [recto of the leaf]
hm924v8n1299 [verso of the leaf]

The passage begins just below the vertical ink line (Thoreau used the line to mark through several paragraphs of material for A Week, which he was working on at the same time--winter/spring 1848) on hm924v8n1299. Look for an ink interlineation beginning "This phenomenon must have been"; it's marked "2" in pencil in the margin.

Version F

XML:IDs

hm924v6n1008
hm924v6n1009
hm924v6n1010
hm924v6n1011

You can see that after writing the first draft, Thoreau revised it extensively: it will be interesting to code these parts!

On the verso of the last leaf, hm924v6n1011, Thoreau interlined sand foliage material within and over an abbreviated account of the route he and his companions had taken up the Penobscot River on their way to Mount Katadhin in 1846 (this appears in expanded form in "Ktaadn" in The Maine Woods).

Version F

(Late 1853 to Early 1854): Second extant version of sand foliage passage

XML:IDs

hm924v6n1012
hm924v6n1013

These two pages of the sand foliage passage may actually belong in F. Some of the revisions marked in the 8/F version above are incorporated in this one.

Version G

(February and March 1854): Final extant version of sand foliage passage

XML:IDs

hm924v7n977
hm924v7n978
hm924v7n979
hm924v7n980
hm924v7n981
hm924v7n982
hm924v7n983
hm924v7n984
hm924v7n985
hm924v7n986
hm924v7n987
hm924v7n988
hm924v7n989
hm924v7n990

The G version contains thirteen pages of the sand foliage passage whose contents are not far from what appeared in the published text. The most complicated coding in this version will involve describing the leaf that is waxed on to the first page of a bifolio, shown in hm924v7n979, hm924v7n980, and hm924v7n981. I had to print out images of hm924v7n979 through hm924v7n984, cut them up, and tape them together to make a mock-up in order to understand what's going on. I'll share a photo of that mock-up later if you're interested.

The proofsheets

(Marked from March through July? 1854: Walden was published August 9, 1854)

XML:IDs

hm925n1538
hm925n1539
hm925n1540
hm925n1541

We haven't discussed this, but I think it would be great if the module could include the marked proofsheets for the sand foliage passage. You can see Thoreau's corrections and questions in pencil and the printer's marks in ink — both of them are giving this text close attention.