the journeys of the year. Some people are virulently insistent on tell- 

 ing which season they like best. Such people vex me. I hope I may 

 be forgiven for my seeming ill-nature, but honestly, what is the need of 

 choosing? They are all ours. "All are yours." The round of the 

 seasons, glad, sunlit, sweaty, shivering, all are mine. I own the sum- 

 mer's sultry noon and winter's surly storm winds, so why choose? Who 

 owns mountain and valley need not vex himself to select between land- 

 scapes where he owns the whole. These "choosy" folks are like those 



who persist in asking which fair woman in Shakespeare is loveliest. 

 They miss the mark. Each one of Shakespeare's women is loveliest 

 in what she is and for what she is. We do not always need to select. 

 Take what comes. What call for anybody to choose one star of the 

 firmament? I love them every one. Not one can be spared from the 

 wide pasture-lands of heaven. Let each star trim his lamp and burn 

 on, and may no single light blow out, that is all we ask. We must not 

 select, but embrace (I am speaking not of women, but of stars). Or 

 why should we be driven to the wall by "Which is your favorite flower?" 

 I will not answer that question, although I know, because the asking is 

 an impertinence. Woods and meadows, both are mme, and all the 

 flowers that haunt springtime woodlands and ravines or flaunt their gold 



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