Diana Tempest, Volume II by Mary Cholmondeley

"It's a deep mystery -- the way the heart of man turns to one woman out of all the rest he's seen i' the world, and makes it easier for him to work seven year for _her_, like Jacob did for Rachel, sooner than have any other woman for th' asking. " -- GEORGE ELIOT.

Life has its crystal days, its rare hours of a stainless beauty, and a joy so pure that we may dare to call in the flowers to rejoice with us, and the language of the birds ceases to be an unknown tongue. Our real life as we look back seems to have been lived in those days that memory holds so tenderly. But it is not so in reality. Fortitude, steadfastness, the makings of character, come not of rainbow-dawns and quiet evenings, and the facile attainment of small desires. More frequently they are the outcome of "the sleepless nights that mould youth; " of hopes not dead, but run to seed; of the inadequate loves and friendships that embitter early life, and warn off the young soul from any more mistaking husks for bread.