It is a strange thing to read a letter after the writer is dead – a bitter-sweet thing, in which pain and comfort are strangely mingled.
Isn’t it splendid to think of all the things there are to find out about? It just makes me feel glad to be alive – it’s such an interesting world. It wouldn’t be half so interesting if we knew all about everything, would it? There’d be no scope for imagination then, would there? But am I talking too much? People are always telling me I do. Would you rather I didn’t talk? If you say so I’ll stop. I can stop when I make up my mind to it, although it’s difficult.
We resent the thought that anything can please us when someone we love is no longer here to share the pleasure with us, and we almost feel as if we were unfaithful to our sorrow when we find our interest in life returning to us.
You see – I’ve never had any real life. I’ve just – breathed.
But they had found the Tansy Patch a charming place and were glad to go again. For the rest of the vacation there was hardly a day when they did not go up to it – preferably in the long, smoky, delicious August evenings when the white moths sailed over the tansy plantation and the golden twilight faded into dusk and purple over the green slopes beyond and fireflies lighted their goblin torches by the pond.
I’ll thank you to restore yourself to yourself.
I’m not a bit changed –not really. I’m only just pruned down and branched out. The real me – back here – is just the same. It won’t make a bit of difference where I go or how much I change outwardly; at heart I shall always be your little Anne, who will love you and Matthew and dear Green Gables more and better every day of her life.
Miss Barry was a kindred spirit, after all,’ Anne confided to Marilla. ‘You wouldn’t think so to look at her, but she is. You don’t find it right out at first, as in Matthew’s case, but after a while you come to see it. Kindred spirits are not so scarce as I used to think. It’s splendid to find out there are so many of them in the world.
Welcome, New Year,” said Captain Jim, bowing low as the last stroke died away. ” I wish you all the best years of your lives, mates. I reckon taht whatever the New Year brings us will be the best the Great Captain has for us -and somehow or other we’ll all make port in a good harbour.
Olive never had to wear flannel petticoats. Olive wore ruffled silk and sheer lawn and filmy laced flounces. But Olive’s father had ‘married money’ and Olive never had Bronchitis. So there you were.
For two years she had worked earnestly and faithfully, making many mistakes and learning from them. She had had her reward. She had taught her scholars something, but she felt that they had taught her much more-lessons of tenderness, self-control, innocent wisdom, lore of childish hearts.
I wonder if, when I go to bed tonight, I’ll feel furious with myself for pulling off my mask and letting you see into my shivering soul like this.
And I’ll always be here for him to come back to,” she thought.
Marilla, isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?’ ‘I’ll warrant you’ll make plenty in it,’ said Marilla. ‘I never saw your beat for making mistakes, Anne.’ ‘Yes, and well I know it,’ admitted Anne mournfully. ‘But have you ever noticed one encouraging thing about me, Marilla? I never make the same mistake twice.’ ‘I don’t know as that’s much benefit when you’re always making new ones.
The woods were God’s first temples,” quoted Anne softly. “One can’t help feeling reverent and adoring in such a place. I always feel so near Him when I walk among the pines.
I shall always end my stories happily.
I wish it had been me. It would have been such a romantic experience to have been nearly drowned. It would be such a thrilling tale to tell.
As for Barney Snaith, the only crime he has been guilty of is living to himself and minding his own business. He can, it seems, get along without you. Which is an unpardonable sin, of course, in your little snobocracy.
Oh, what would the world be without youth? And yet it passes so quickly. We are old before we know it. We never believe it... and then some day we wake up and discover we are old.
Some folks think they are luxuries,′ I said, ’but at Ingleside we think they are necessities.
Why, because it sounds so nice and romantic, just as if I were a heroine in a book, you know. I am so fond of romantic things, and a graveyard full of buried hopes is about as romantic a thing as one can imagine, isn’t it? I’m rather glad I have one.