But a man must be a
blockhead, indeed, to expect the moon to remain one minute after it is
full, as every night clips a little bit off, till there is a
considerable junk gone by the time the week is out, and what is worse,
every night there is more and more darkness afore it rises. It comes
reluctant, and when it does arrive it hante long to stay, for the last
quarter takes its turn at the lantern. That only rises a little afore
the sun, as if it was ashamed to be caught napping at that hour--that
quarter therefore is nearly as dark as ink. So you see the new and
last quarter go for nothing; that everybody will admit. The first
ain't much better, but the last half of that quarter and the first of
the full, make a very decent respectable week.
Well, then, what's all this when it's fried? Why, it amounts to this,
that if there is any resemblance between a lunar and a lunatic month,
that the honeymoon lasts only one good week.
Don't be skeared, Sophy, when you read this, because we must look
things in the face and call them by their right name.
Well, then, let us call it the honey-week. Now if it takes a whole
month to make one honey-week, it must cut to waste terribly, mustn't
it? But then you know a man can't wive and thrive the same year. Now
wastin' so much of that precious month is terrible, ain't it? But oh
me, bad as it is, it ain't the worst of it.
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