Time was, like everyone else, when she had some notion of the passing years and of the changes they bring. Like everyone else she had said, she had told herself, every winter, every spring, and every summer, “I’ve changed so much since last year.” But ever beautiful, with a somewhat varying beauty, she paid no attention to it. Today, suddenly, she did pay attention to it. Today, all at once, instead of once more peaceably realizing the seasons’ slow changes, she had just discovered and understood the minutes’ formidable flight. She had had a sudden revelation of that vanishing of the hour, of that imperceptible race, maddening when one thinks of it, of that infinite procession of little hurried seconds which nibble at the body and the life of man.