As the years went on, Paul and Virginia grew up together in purity and
contentment. Every succeeding day was to them a day of happiness. They
were strangers to the torments of envy and ambition. By living in
solitude, so far from degenerating into savages, they had become more
humane. If the scandalous history of society did not supply them with
topics of discourse, nature filled their hearts with transports of
wonder and delight. They contemplated with rapture the power of that
Providence which, by aid of their hands, had diffused amid these barren
rocks abundance, beauty, and simple and unceasing pleasures.

When the weather was fine, the families went on Sundays to mass at the
church of Pamplemousses. When mass was over, they ministered to the sick
or gave comfort to the distressed. From these visits Virginia often
returned with her eyes bathed in tears, but her heart overflowing with
joy, for she had been blessed with an opportunity of doing good.

Paul and Virginia had no clocks nor almanacs nor books of history or
philosophy; the periods of their lives were regulated by those of
nature. They knew the hour of the day by the shadow of the trees; the
seasons by the times when the trees bore flowers or fruits; and years by
the number of the harvests.

"It is dinner-time," Virginia would say to the family; "the shadows of
the banana-trees are at their feet." Or, "Night approaches, for the
tamarinds are closing their leaves."

When asked about her age and that of Paul, "My brother," she would
answer, "is the same age with the great coconut-tree of the fountain,
and I the same age with the small one. The mango-trees have yielded
their fruit twelve times, and the orange-trees have opened their