柴山的龍目井

It is remarkable how many creatures live wild and free though secret in the woods, and still sustain themselves in the neighborhood of towns, suspected by hunters only. How retired the otter manages to live here! (below: The Northern River Otter, Lontra canadensis) He grows to be four feet long, as big as a small boy, perhaps without any human being getting a glimpse of him. I formerly saw the raccoon in the woods behind where my house is built, and probably still heard their whinnering at night. Commonly I rested an hour or two in the shade at noon, after planting, and ate my lunch, and read a little by a spring which was the source of a swamp and of a brook, oozing from under Brister's Hill, half a mile from my field. The approach to this was through a succession of descending grassy hollows, full of young pitch pines, into a larger wood about the swamp. There, in a very secluded and shaded spot, under a spreading white pine, there was yet a clean, firm sward to sit on. I had dug out the spring and made a well of clear gray water, where I could dip up a pailful without roiling it, and thither I went for this purpose almost every day in midsummer, when the pond was warmest. Thither, too, the woodcock led her brood, to probe the mud for worms, flying but a foot above them down the bank, while they ran in a troop beneath; but at last, spying me, she would leave her young and circle round and round me, nearer and nearer till within four or five feet, pretending broken wings and legs, to attract my attention, and get off her young, who would already have taken up their march, with faint, wiry peep, single file through the swamp, as she directed. Or I heard the peep of the young when I could not see the parent bird. There too the turtle doves sat over the spring, or fluttered from bough to bough of the soft white pines over my head; or the red squirrel, coursing down the nearest bough, was particularly familiar and inquisitive. You only need sit still long enough in some attractive spot in the woods that all its inhabitants may exhibit themselves to you by turns.

Discover Thoreau’s white pine by Brister’s Spring

Brister's Hill 是華爾騰湖北邊約半英哩處的一個小台地。此篇部落格日誌提到 Brister's Spring 是 Mill Brook 的發源處及可靠的飲用水來源。梭羅在夏日最炎熱時，因池水太熱，會跑到這裡來汲水。部落格作者則推測華爾騰湖的池水也是冷泉水的來源之一；池水滲到地下後再由冷泉出口處冒出來。不過未經証實。目前冷泉的右側有一木製地標標示著。

在台灣，凡是從岩石裂隙中湧出的山泉，大都叫作龍目井。高雄市的北柴山龍皇寺步道入口處左側有一大水塘，水塘中的水位隨季節不同，容枯各異，其水的來源就是來自上方的一口龍目井，名曰『龍巖冽泉』。高雄市柴山會所立的一塊解說牌如此描述：「昔日柴山東麓多處礁岩裂縫有冷泉奔湧而出，汨汨不絕，孕育眾生－－平埔族、漢人、到一草一木。青翠山巒，加上山緣多處奔流的冷泉，猶如打狗血脈！清朝時將此湧泉壯觀地稱『龍巖冽泉』，而民間通常將會噴出湧泉的礁石裂縫稱『龍目井』」。過去在夏日雨季時泉水源源湧出，兒童每在此戲水，清涼無比。然而不知是原本的環境受到破壞，還是人為的過度開發，導致涵養水源的功能下降，如今的龍巖冽泉，已經是從終年不竭到雨季才有水，再變成下大雨後才有水了。 （取材自龍巖冽泉）