Page:Orange Grove.djvu/304



How quickly glided by those long summer days, gone they scarcely knew whither, nor how they had been spent, yet not idly. It is not always a waste of time when the hands are unemployed. There are hours of physical repose when the soul acts most keenly, yes, demands it, in order to assert herself more strongly; not a languid inactivity, but a healthful abnegation of all labor for the time being. This is the charm of twilight. The outward eye and the inner sense hold sweet communion there, and no hour is so dear for social converse.

Then come the longer autumn evenings, and the hour of pleasant chat beside the cheerful winter fire before the usual avocations are resumed, all these being just as novel and susceptible of fresh enjoyment in every different situation of life, as if they had never come within the range of our experience before. So a newly wedded pair finds in every day's occurrence a fresh sensation of delight, so different from what they have ever known before, even as lovers, and on the real blending of their souls at that period depends much of their future happiness as