Oak: symbol of strength and endurance. Roger Deakin remarked that his house was once an acorn.

old man's beard – wild clematis - scrambling in the woods

It's a good sloe year this year, they are plentiful and full of sour juice. They say that to make the best sloe gin you must prick each sloe with a silver fork before covering with gin (and a few whole unpeeled almonds) and leave to mature for at least two years.

The last of the blackberries: they were late this year, and folklore advises not to eat them after October 10th, the anniversary of when Satan was cast out of Heaven by the Archangel Michael. He was banished because of his pride: he loved himself more than anybody else in the world and cared nothing about anything else. He crashed to Earth like a meteor, falling into the thorns of a bramble, cursing. The impact blasted a conical crater reaching to the centre of the Earth. He tumbled into the pit at the bottom where he’s been ever since, trapped and furious, accusing everyone but himself for his misfortunes.

Walking across from Meesden to Scales Park wood – about six miles in all – I saw two buzzards and disturbed a few fieldfares near where I saw my first flock last Friday, schack-schacking startled out of the hedgerow. Lovely to hear them again and see them back for the winter.

The "wilderness" of man's spirit is not totally hostile to all spiritual life. On the contrary, its silence is still a healing silence. He who tries to evade solitude and confrontation with the unknown God may eventually be destroyed in the meaningless chaotic atomized solitariness of mass society. 

Thomas Merton