6th of April, about nine o'clock in the morning
She had no motive for deceiving us ; she had refused all offerings of money , and her whole visit had evidently been made under an overflow of the most grateful feelings for the attentions shown to her child . We acquitted her , therefore , of sinister intentions ; and with our feelings of jealousy , feelings in which we had been educated , towards everything that tended to superstition , we soon agreed to think her some gentle maniac or sad enthusiast , suffering under some form of morbid melancholy . Forty-eight hours , with two nights ' sleep , sufficed to restore the wonted equilibrium of our spirits ; and that interval brought us onwards to the 6th of April -- the day on which , as I have already said , my story properly commences . On that day , on that lovely 6th of April , such as I have described it , that 6th of April , about nine o'clock in the morning , we were seated at breakfast near the open window -- we , that is , Agnes , myself , and little Francis ; the freshness of morning spirits rested upon us ; the golden light of the morning sun illuminated the room ; incense was floating through the air from the gorgeous flowers within and without the house ; there in youthful happiness we sat gathered together , a family of love , and there we never sat again . Never again were we three gathered together , nor ever shall be , so long as the sun and its golden light -- the morning and the evening -- the earth and its flowers endure . Often have I occupied myself in recalling every circumstance the most trivial of this the final morning of what merits to be called my life . Eleven o'clock , I remember , was striking when Agnes came into my study , and said that she would go into the city , -LRB- for we lived in a quite rural suburb , -RRB- that she would execute some trifling commissions which she had received from a friend in the country , and would be at home again between one and two for a stroll which we had agreed to take in the neighboring meadows .