The White Way of Delight

Anne was stunned into a reverent silence by the fragrant beauty of a huge grove of blooming, wide spreading apple-trees. . . Overhead was one long canopy of snowy fragrant blooms. . . . She leaned back, . . .her face lifted rapturously to the white splendor above. . . Still with rapt face she gazed . . . She came our her reverie with a deep sigh and looked at him with the dreamy gaze of a soul that had been wandering afar, star-led . . .

“Pretty? Oh, pretty doesn’t seem the right word to use. Nor beautiful, either. They don’t go far enough. Oh, it was wonderful—wonderful. It’s the first thing I ever saw that couldn’t be improved upon by imagination. It just satisfied me here” —she put one hand on her breast— “it made a queer funny ache and yet it was a pleasant ache. Did you ever have an ache like that Mr. Cuthbert?”

“I have it lots of times—whenever I see anything royally beautiful. But they shouldn’t call that lovely place the Avenue. There is no meaning in a name like that. They should call it—let me see—the White Way of Delight.”

Identifying with Anne of Green Gables for the past week—finally today, when I noticed the blooms in our neighborhood are beginning to fade and drop, I took a few inadequate pictures.