“And when the spring breezes blow up the valley; when the spring sun shines on last year's withered grass on the river banks; and on the lake; and on the lake's two white swans; and coaxes the new grass out of the spongy soil in the marshes - who could believe on such a day that this peaceful, grassy valley brooded over the story of our past; and over its spectres?”

“Dicey looked out over the tall marsh grasses, blowing in the wind. If the wind blew, the grasses had to bend with it.”

“Ah! gay the day with shine of sun,and bright the breeze, and blithe thethrongMet on the River-bank to play,when I was young, when I was young”

“Into the air, over the valleys, under the stars, above a river, a pond, a road, flew Cecy. Invisible as new spring winds, fresh as the breath of clover rising from twilight fields, she flew.”

“To Your eyes a thousand years are like yesterday come and gone, no more than a watch in the night.You sweep men away like a dream, like grass which springs up in the morning.In the morning it springs up and flowers, by evening it withers and fades.So we are destroyed in Your anger, struck with terror in Your fury.Our guilt lies open before You; our secrets in the light of Your face.All our days pass away in Your anger. Our life is over like a sigh.Our span is seventy years or eighty for those who are strong. And most of these are emptiness and pain, they pass swiftly and we are gone.”

“What idiocy, to racing into this story and its labyrinths, sprinting away from our happiness among the fresh spring grasses by the oak.”