As we sat afterwards upon the piazza with our cigars, inhaling the odor of the apple blossoms, and yielding ourselves, according to our age, to the influence of the mild night, Margaret was in the high spirits which accompany the expectation of bliss, without the sobering effect of its responsibility.  Love itself is very serious, but the overture is full of freakish gayety.  And it was all gayety that night.  We all constituted ourselves a guard of honor to Miss Forsythe and Margaret when they went to their cottage, and there was a merry leave-taking in the moonlight.  To be sure, Margaret walked with Henderson, and they lagged a little behind, but I had no reason to suppose that they were speaking of the stars, or that they raised the ordinary question of their being inhabited.  I doubt if they saw the stars at all.  How one remembers little trifles, that recur like the gay bird notes of the opening scenes that are repeated in the tragedy of the opera!  I can see Margaret now, on some bantering pretext, running back, after we had said good-night, to give Henderson the blush-rose she had worn in her hair.  How charming the girl was in this freakish action!

“Do you think he is good enough for her?” asked my wife, when we were alone.

“Who is good enough for whom?” I said, a yawn revealing my want of sentiment.

“Don’t be stupid.  You are not so blind as you pretend.”

“Well, if I am not so blind as I pretend, though I did not pretend to be blind, I suppose that is mainly her concern.”

“But I wish she had cared for Lyon.”

“Perhaps Lyon did not care for her,” I suggested.

“You never see anything.  Lyon was a noble fellow.”

“I didn’t deny that.  But how was I to know about Lyon, my dear?  I never heard you say that you were glad he wasn’t your husband.”

“Don’t be silly.  I think Henderson has very serious intentions.”

“I hope he isn’t frivolous,” I said.

“Well, you are.  It isn’t a joking matter—­and you pretend to be so fond of Margaret!”

“So that is another thing I pretend?  What do you want me to do?  Which one do you want me to make my enemy by telling him or her that the other isn’t good enough?”

“I don’t want you to do anything, except to be reasonable, and sympathize.”

“Oh, I sympathize all round.  I assure you I’ve no doubt you are quite right.”  And in this way I crawled out of the discussion, as usual.

What a pretty simile it is, comparing life to a river, because rivers are so different!  There are the calm streams that flow eagerly from the youthful sources, join a kindred flood, and go placidly to the sea, only broadening and deepening and getting very muddy at times, but without a rapid or a fall.  There are others that flow carelessly in the upper sunshine, begin to ripple and dance, then run swiftly, and rush into rapids in which there is no escape (though friends stand weeping and imploring on the banks) from the awful plunge of the cataract.  Then there is the tumult and the seething, the exciting race and rage through the canon, the whirlpools and the passions of love and revelations of character, and finally, let us hope, the happy emergence into the lake of a serene life.  And the more interesting rivers are those that have tumults and experiences.