Thank you Cheryl for this precious note! The quotation "She learned romance as she grew older" (ch. 4) makes me think that, as it is for nature, sometimes the autumn of life can be richer and more splendid than its spring or summer. This reminds me of Keats' "To Autumn", where the season is said to "fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;/ To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells/ With a sweet kernel". So Anne, forced into an unnatural chillness in her youth, can experience the triumph of senses (the fulfilled love to Capt. Wentworth) in her more mature age.