AUTUMN
which begins this year (as usual) when, or then, or thereabouts, the time the Summer quarter ends—namely, when the nights begin to grow longer and the days shorter: this is the time when the barns are filled with wheat, which soon must be thrashed out, in order to be sowed again. This also is the time when the orchards abound with fruits of the kind, and consequently the properest time to make cider.
Lamentable now must be the case of those poor women who, in this quarter, happen to long for green pease or strawberries; for I dare assure them, upon the honest word of an astrologer, that they can get none on this side of next Easter. Some now-abouts under the notion of soldiers, shall sally out at night upon Pullen, or perhaps lie in embuscade for a rope of onions, as if they were Welsh freebooters. Loss of time and money may be recovered by industry: but to be a fool-born, or a rogue in nature, are diseases incurable.
Remember that in any quarter of the year, this is almost always a certain presage of a wedding, when all parties are agreed, and the parson in readiness; and then you must be sure to have money in readiness too, or your intended marriage may happen to prove a miscarriage. But those who are able to pay for tying the knot, when it is fairly tied, may go home to dinner and be merry; go to the tavern and be merry; go to supper and be merry; rise next morning and be merry: and let the world know, that a married life is a plentiful life, when people have good estates; a fruitful life when they have many children; and an happy life, when man and wife love each other as they ought to do, and never quarrel nor disagree.