Though she be called "a fine woman" still, men of all ages will turn from her to dote upon an empty-headed debutante. Her comprehension and sympathy, her wit and her learning are less enthralling than the vapid babblings of red-cheeked misses just out of pinafores. Her heart is as young as ever; she knows herself capable of a finer, nobler passion and tenderness than the girl can dream of, yet the selfish, egotistic emotions of the self-confident chit awake a rapture that would be dulled by the richest warmth she could give.
"Age, I do abhor thee:
Youth, I do adore thee;
O, my love, my love is young!"
That she in her turn elbowed the preceding generation from its place comforts her not at all. Oh, for again one hour only of the splendid domination of youth—one rich instant of the power to intoxicate!...
There is nothing for it but to keep such things to one's self, and jog on quietly and respectably to the end. One has had one's turn.
That mad girl Spring has passed up this way
With a hole in her pockets,
For here lies her money all strewn in the grass—
Broad dandelion ducats.
She'll be needing this wealth ere the end of the year
For a warm winter gown,
Though now she's content with a breast-knot of buds
And a violet crown.
She heard in the green blooming depths of the wood
The voice of a dove,
And she dropped all these flowering coins as she ran
To meet summer and love.
'Twill not serve you to gather from out her wild path
All your two hands can hold—
Only youth and the Spring may buy kisses and mirth
With this frail fairy gold.