midnight
Whether playing with her children -LRB- and she had two lovely ones -- the eldest six years old -RRB- , or teasing her calm and meditative husband , or pouring out extempore verses , or rattling over airs which she never finished , on the guitar or piano -- or making excursions on the lake -- or , in short , in whatever occupation she appeared as the Cynthia of the minute , she was always gay and mobile -- never out of humour , never acknowledging a single care or cross in life -- never susceptible of grief , save when her brother 's delicate health or morbid temper saddened her atmosphere of sunshine . Even then , the sanguine elasticity of her mind and constitution quickly recovered from the depression ; and she persuaded herself that Castruccio would grow stronger every year , and ripen into a celebrated and happy man . Castruccio himself lived what romantic poetasters call the `` life of a poet . '' He loved to see the sun rise over the distant Alps -- or the midnight moon sleeping on the lake . He spent half the day , and often half the night , in solitary rambles , weaving his airy rhymes , or indulging his gloomy reveries , and he thought loneliness made the element of a poet . Alas ! Dante , Alfieri , even Petrarch might have taught him , that a poet must have intimate knowledge of men as well as mountains , if he desire to become the CREATOR .