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Julia Ward Howe.
FROM SUNSET RIDGE: POEMS OLD AND NEW. 12mo, $1.50.
REMINISCENCES. With many Portraits and other Illustrations. Crown 8vo,
$2.50.
IS POLITE SOCIETY POLITE? AND OTHER ESSAYS. With a Portrait of Mrs.
Howe. Square 8vo, $1.50.
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. BOSTON AND NEW YORK.
[Illustration: Photograph of Julia Ward Howe; signature]
REMINISCENCES
1819-1899
BY JULIA WARD HOWE
WITH PORTRAITS AND OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS
[Decorative Illustration]
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
1899
COPYRIGHT, 1899, BY JULIA WARD HOWE
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. BIRTH, PARENTAGE, CHILDHOOD 1
II. LITERARY NEW YORK 21
III. NEW YORK SOCIETY 29
IV. HOME LIFE: MY FATHER 43
V. MY STUDIES 56
VI. SAMUEL WARD AND THE ASTORS 64
VII. MARRIAGE: TOUR IN EUROPE 81
VIII. FIRST YEARS IN BOSTON 144
IX. SECOND VISIT TO EUROPE 188
X. A CHAPTER ABOUT MYSELF 205
XI. ANTI-SLAVERY ATTITUDE: LITERARY
WORK: TRIP TO CUBA 218
XII. THE CHURCH OF THE DISCIPLES: IN WAR TIME 244
XIII. THE BOSTON RADICAL CLUB: DR. F. H. HEDGE 281
XIV. MEN AND MOVEMENTS IN THE SIXTIES 304
XV. A WOMAN'S PEACE CRUSADE 327
XVI. VISITS TO SANTO DOMINGO 345
XVII. THE WOMAN SUFFRAGE MOVEMENT 372
XVIII. CERTAIN CLUBS 400
XIX. ANOTHER EUROPEAN TRIP 410
XX. FRIENDS AND WORTHIES: SOCIAL SUCCESSES 428
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
JULIA WARD HOWE _Frontispiece_
_From a photograph by Hardy, 1897._
SARAH MITCHELL, NIECE OF GENERAL FRANCIS MARION
AND GRANDMOTHER OF MRS. HOWE 4
_From a painting by Waldo and Jewett._
JULIA WARD AND HER BROTHERS, SAMUEL AND HENRY 8
_From a miniature by Anne Hall._
JULIA CUTLER WARD, MOTHER OF MRS. HOWE 12
_From a miniature by Anne Hall._
SAMUEL WARD, FATHER OF MRS. HOWE 46
_From a miniature by Anne Hall._
SAMUEL WARD, JR 68
_From a painting by Baron Vogel._
FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE 138
_From a photograph._
THE SOUTH BOSTON HOME OF MR. AND MRS. HOWE 152
_From a painting in the possession of M. Anagnos._
WENDELL PHILLIPS, AT THE AGE OF 48 158
_From a photograph lent by Francis J. Garrison, Boston._
THEODORE PARKER 166
_From a photograph by J. J. Hawes._
JULIA WARD HOWE 176
_From a painting (1847) by Joseph Ames._
SAMUEL GRIDLEY HOWE, M. D. 230
_From a photograph by Black, about 1859._
JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE 246
_From a photograph by the Notman Photographic Company._
JOHN BROWN 254
_From a photograph (about 1857) lent by Francis J.
Garrison, Boston._
JOHN A. ANDREW 262
_From a photograph by Black._
JULIA WARD HOWE 270
_From a photograph by J. J. Hawes, about 1861._
FACSIMILE OF THE FIRST DRAFT OF THE BATTLE HYMN
OF THE REPUBLIC 276
_From the original MS. in the possession of Mrs. E. P.
Whipple, Boston._
RALPH WALDO EMERSON 292
_From a photograph by Black._
FREDERIC HENRY HEDGE, D. D. 302
_From a photograph lent by his daughter, Charlotte A.
Hedge._
SAMUEL GRIDLEY HOWE, M. D. 328
_From a photograph by A. Marshall (1870), in the possession
of the Massachusetts Club._
LUCY STONE 376
_From a photograph by the Notman Photographic Company._
MARIA MITCHELL 386
_From a photograph._
THE NEWPORT HOME OF MR. AND MRS. HOWE 406
_From a photograph by Briskham and Davidson._
THOMAS GOLD APPLETON 432
_From a photograph lent by Mrs. John Murray Forbes._
JULIA ROMANA ANAGNOS 440
_From a photograph._
REMINISCENCES
CHAPTER I
BIRTH, PARENTAGE, CHILDHOOD
I have been urgently asked to put together my reminiscences. I could
wish that I had begun to do so at an earlier period of my life, because
at this time of writing the lines of the past are somewhat confused in
my memory. Yet, with God's help, I shall endeavor to do justice to the
individuals whom I have known, and to the events of which I have had
some personal knowledge.
Let me say at the very beginning that I esteem this century, now near
its close, to have eminently deserved a record among those which have
been great landmarks in human history. It has seen the culmination of
prophecies, the birth of new hopes, and a marvelous multiplication both
of the ideas which promote human happiness and of the resources which
enable man to make himself master of the world. Napoleon is said to have
forbidden his subordinates to tell him that any order of his was
impossible of fulfillment. One might think that the genius of this age
must have uttered a like injunction. To attain instantaneous
communication with our friends across oceans and through every
continent; to command locomotion whose swiftness changes the relations
of space and time; to steal from Nature her deepest secrets, and to make
disease itself the minister of cure; to compel the sun to keep for us
the record of scenes and faces, of the great shows and pageants of time,
of the perishable forms whose charm and beauty deserve to remain in the
world's possession,--these are some of the achievements of our
nineteenth century. Even more wonderful than these may we esteem the
moral progress of the race; the decline of political and religious
enmities, the growth of good-will and mutual understanding between
nations, the waning of popular superstition, the spread of civic ideas,
the recognition of the mutual obligations of classes, the advancement of
woman to dignity in the household and efficiency in the state. All this
our century has seen and approved. To the ages following it will hand on
an inestimable legacy, an imperishable record.
While my heart exults at these grandeurs of which I have seen and known
something, my contribution to their history can be but of fragmentary
and fitful interest. On the world's great scene, each of us can only
play his little part, often with poor comprehension of the mighty drama
which is going on around him. If any one of us undertakes to set this
down, he should do it with the utmost truth and simplicity; not as if
Seneca or Tacitus or St. Paul were speaking, but as he himself, plain
Hodge or Dominie or Mrs. Grundy, is moved to speak. He should not borrow
from others the sentiments which he ought to have entertained, but
relate truthfully how matters appeared to him, as they and he went on.
Thus much I can promise to do in these pages, and no more.
I was born on May 27, 1819, in the city of New York, in Marketfield
Street, near the Battery. My father was of Rhode Island birth and
descent. One of his grandmothers was the beautiful Catharine Ray to whom
are addressed some of Benjamin Franklin's published letters. His father
attained the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the war of the Revolution,
being himself the son of Governor Samuel Ward, of Rhode Island,[1]
married to a daughter of Governor Greene, of the same state. My mother
was grandniece to General Francis Marion, of Huguenot descent, known in
the Revolution as the Swamp-fox of southern campaigns. Her father was
Benjamin Clarke Cutler, whose first ancestor in this country was John De
Mesmekir, of Holland.
[Footnote 1: Governor Samuel Ward refused to enforce the Stamp Act, and
also did valuable service as a member of the First and Second
Continental Congresses. He frequently served as chairman of the
Committee of the Whole, during the secret sessions of Congress. His
death, in the spring of 1776, is said to have been due in large measure
to the fatigue caused by his incessant labors in behalf of his country.
Although he did not live to sign the Declaration of Independence, he was
one of the first men to prophesy the separation of the colonies from the
mother country.]
[Illustration: SARAH MITCHELL (MRS. HOWE'S grandmother)
_From a painting by Waldo and Jewett._]
Let me here remark that an expert in chiromancy, after making a recent
examination of my hand, exclaimed, "You inherit military blood; your
hand shows it."
My own earliest recollections are of a fine house on the Bowling Green,
a region of high fashion in those days. In the summer mornings my nurse
sometimes walked abroad with me, and showed me the young girls of our
neighborhood, engaged with their skipping ropes. Our favorite resort was
the Battery, where the flagstaff used in the Revolution was still to be
seen. The fort at Castle Garden had already been converted into a
pleasure resort, where fireworks and ices might be enjoyed.
We were six children in all, yet Wordsworth's little maid would have
reckoned us as seven, as a sister of four years had died shortly before
my birth, leaving me her name and the dignity of eldest daughter. She
was always mentioned in the family as the _first little Julia_.
My two eldest brothers, Samuel and Henry Ward, were pupils at Round Hill
School. The third, Francis Marion, named for the General, was my junior
by fifteen months, and continued to be my constant playmate until, at
the proper age, he joined the others at Round Hill School.
A few words regarding my mother may not here be out of place. Married at
sixteen, she died at the age of twenty-seven, so beloved and mourned by
all who knew her that my early years were full of the testimony borne by
surviving friends to the beauty and charm of her character. She had been
a pupil at the school of Mrs. Elizabeth Graham, of saintly memory, and
had inherited from her own mother a taste for intellectual pursuits. She
was especially fond of poetry and a few lovely poems of hers remain to
show that she was no stranger to its sacred domain. One of these was
printed in a periodical of her own time, and is preserved in Griswold's
"Female Poets of America." Another set of verses is addressed to me in
the days of my babyhood. All of these bear the imprint of her deeply
religious character.
Mrs. Margaret Armstrong Astor, of whom more will be said in these
annals, remembered my mother as prominent in the society of her youth,
and spoke of her as beautiful in countenance. An old lady, resident in
Bordentown, N. J., where Joseph, ex-king of Spain, made his home for
many years, had seen my mother arrayed for a dinner at this royal
residence, in a white dress, probably of embroidered cambric, and a
lilac turban. Her early death was a lifelong misfortune to her children,
who, although tenderly bred and carefully watched, have been forced to
pass their days without the dear refuge of a mother's heart, the wise
guidance of a mother's inspiration.
A dear old cousin of my father's, who lived to the age of one hundred
and two years, loved to talk of a visit which she had made in her youth
to my grandfather Ward, then resident in New York. She had not quite
forgiven him for not allowing her to attend an assembly on which, being
only sixteen years of age, she had set her heart. Years after this time,
when such vanities had quite gone out of her mind, she again visited
relatives in the city, and came to spend the day with my mother. Of this
occasion she said to me: "Julia, your mother's tact was remarkable, and
she showed it on that day, for, knowing me to be a young woman of
serious character, she presented me on my arrival with a plain linen
collar which she had made for me. On a table beside her lay Law's
'Serious Call to the Unconverted.' Don't you see how well she had suited
matters to my taste?"
This aged relative used to boast that she had never read a novel. She
desired to make one exception in favor of the story of the
Schoenberg-Cotta family, but, hearing that it was a work of fiction,
esteemed it safest to adhere to the rule which she had observed for so
many years.
Her son, lately deceased, once told me that when she felt called upon to
chastise him for some childish offense, she would pray over him so long
that he would cry out: "Mother, it's time to begin whipping."
Her husband was a son of General Nathanael Greene, of Revolutionary
fame.
The attention bestowed upon impressions of childhood to-day will, I
hope, justify me in recording some of the earliest points in
consciousness which I still recall. I remember when a thimble was first
given to me, some simple bit of work being at the same time placed in my
hand. Some one said, "Take the needle in this hand." I did so, and,
placing the thimble on a finger of the other hand, I began to sew
without its aid, to the amusement of my teacher. This trifle appears to
me an early indication of a want of perception as to the use of tools
which has accompanied me through life. I remember also that, being told
that I must ask pardon for some childish fault, I said to my mother,
with perfect contentment, "Oh yes, I pardon you," and was surprised to
hear that in this way I had not made the _amende honorable_.
I encountered great difficulty in acquiring the _th_ sound, when my
mother tried to teach me to call her by that name. "Muzzer, muzzer," was
all that I could manage to say. But the dear parent presently said, "If
you cannot do better than that, you will have to go back and call me
mamma." The shame of going back moved me to one last effort, and,
summoning my utmost strength of tongue, I succeeded in saying "mother,"
an achievement from which I was never obliged to recede.
A journey up the Hudson River was undertaken, when I was very young, for
the bettering of my mother's health. An older sister of hers went with
us, as well as a favorite waiting-woman, and a young physician whose
care had saved my father's life a year or more before my own birth.
After reaching Albany, we traveled in my father's carriage; the grown
persons occupying the seats, and I sitting in my little chair at their
feet. A book of short tales and poems was often resorted to for my
amusement, and I still remember how the young doctor read to me, "Pity
the sorrows of a poor old man," and how my tears came, and could not be
hidden.
[Illustration: JULIA WARD AND HER BROTHERS, SAMUEL AND HENRY
_From a miniature by Anne Hall._]
The sight of Niagara caused me much surprise. Playing on the piazza of
the hotel, one day, with only the doctor for my companion, I ventured to
ask him, "Who made that great hole where the water comes down?" He
replied, "The great Maker of all." "Who is that?" I innocently inquired;
and he said, "Do you not know? Our Father who art in heaven." I felt
that I ought to have known, and went away somewhat abashed.
Another day my mother told me that we were going to visit Red Jacket, a
great Indian chief, and that I must be very polite to him. She gave me a
twist of tobacco tied with a blue ribbon, which I was to present to him,
and bade me observe the silver medal which I should see hung on his
neck, and which, she said, had been given to him by General Washington.
We drove to the Indian encampment, of which I dimly remember the extent
and the wigwams. A tall figure advanced to the carriage. As its door was
opened, I sprang forward, clasped my arms around the neck of the noble
savage, and was astonished at his cool reception of such a greeting. I
was surprised and grieved afterwards to learn that I had not done
exactly the right thing. The Indians, in those days and long after,
occupied numerous settlements in the western part of the State of New
York, where one often saw the boys with their bows and arrows, and the
squaws carrying their papooses on their backs.
The journey here mentioned must have taken place when I was little more
than four years old. Another year and a half brought me the burden of a
great sorrow. I recall months of sweet companionship with the first and
dearest of friends, my mother. The last summer of her life was passed at
a fine country-seat in Bloomingdale, which was then a picturesque
country place, about six miles from New York, but is now incorporated in
the city.
My father was fond of fine horses, and the pets of the stable played no
unimportant part in our childish affection. The family coach was an
early institution with us, and in the days of which I now speak, its
exterior was of a delicate yellow, known as straw-color, while the
lining and cushions were of bright blue cloth. This combination of color
was effected to please my dear mother, who was accounted in her time a
woman of excellent taste.
I remember this summer as a particularly happy period. My younger
brother and I had our lessons in a lovely green bower. Our French
teacher came out at intervals in the Bloomingdale stage. My mother often
took me with her for a walk in the beautiful garden, from which she
plucked flowers that she arranged with great taste. There was much
mysterious embroidering of small caps and gowns, the purpose of which I
little guessed. The autumn came, and with it our return to town. And
then, one bitter morning, I awoke to hear the words, "Julia, your mother
is dead." Before this my father had announced to us that a little sister
had arrived. "And she can open and shut her eyes," he said, smiling.
His grief at the loss of my mother was so intense as to lay him
prostrate with illness. He told me, years after this time, that he had
welcomed the physical agony which perforce diverted his thoughts from
the cause of his mental suffering. The little sister of whose coming he
had told us so joyfully was for a long time kept from his sight. The
rest of us were gathered around him, but this feeble little creature was
not asked for. At last my dear old grandfather came to visit us, and
learned the state of my father's feelings. The old gentleman went into
the nursery, took the tiny infant from its nurse, and laid it in my
father's arms. The little one thenceforth became the object of his most
tender affection.
He regarded all his children with great solicitude, feeling, as he
afterward said to one of us, that he must now be mother as well as
father. My mother's last request had been that her unmarried sister, the
same one who had accompanied us on the journey to Niagara, should be
sent for to have charge of us, and this arrangement was speedily
effected.
This aunt of ours had long been a care-taker in her mother's household,
where she had had much to do with bringing up her younger sisters and
brothers. My mother had been accustomed to borrow her from time to time,
and my aunt had threatened to hang out a sign over the door with the
inscription, "Cheering done here by the job, by E. Cutler." She was a
person of rare honesty, entirely conscientious in character, possessed
of few accomplishments, but endowed with the keenest sense of humor. She
watched over our early years with incessant care. We little ones were
kept much in our warm nursery. We were taken out for a drive in fine
weather, but rarely went out on foot. As a consequence of this
overcherishing, we were constantly liable to suffer from colds and sore
throats. The young physician of whom I have already spoken became an
inmate of our house soon after my mother's death. He was afterward well
known in New York society as an excellent practitioner, and as a man of
a certain genius. Those were the days of mighty doses, and the slightest
indisposition was sure to call down upon us the administration of the
drugs then in favor with the faculty, but now rarely used.
[Illustration: JULIA CUTLER WARD (MRS. HOWE'S mother)
_From a miniature by Anne Hall._]
My father's affliction was such that a change of scene became necessary
for him. The beautiful house at the Bowling Green was sold, with the new
furniture which had been ordered expressly for my mother's pleasure, and
which we never saw uncovered. We removed to Bond Street, which was then
at the upper extremity of New York city. My father's friends said to
him, "Mr. Ward, you are going out of town." And so indeed it seemed at
that time. We occupied one of three white freestone houses, and saw from
our windows the gradual building up of the street, which is now in the
central part of New York. My father had purchased a large lot of land at
the corner of our street and Broadway. On a part of this he subsequently
erected a house which was considered one of the finest in the city.
My father was disposed to be extremely careful in the choice of our
associates, and intended, no doubt, that we should receive our education
at home. At a later day his plans were changed somewhat, and after some
experience of governesses and masters I was at last sent to a school in
the near neighborhood of our house. I was nine years old at this time,
somewhat precocious for my age, and endowed with a good memory. This
fact may have led to my being at once placed in a class of girls much
older than myself, especially occupied with the study of Paley's "Moral
Philosophy." I managed to commit many pages of this book to memory, in a
rather listless and perfunctory manner. I was much more interested in
the study of chemistry, although it was not illustrated by any
experiments. The system of education followed at that time consisted
largely in memorizing from the text-books then in use. Removing to
another school, I had excellent instruction in penmanship, and enjoyed a
course of lectures on history, aided by the best set of charts that I
have ever seen, the work of Professor Bostwick. In geometry I made quite
a brilliant beginning, but soon fell off from my first efforts. The
study of languages was very congenial to me; I had been accustomed to
speak French from my earliest years. To this I was enabled to add some
knowledge of Latin, and afterward of Italian and German.
The routine of my school life was varied now and then by a concert and
by Handel's oratorios, which were given at long intervals by an
association whose title I cannot now recall. I eagerly anticipated, and
yet dreaded, these occasions, for my enjoyment of them was succeeded by
a reaction of intense melancholy.
The musical "stars" of those days are probably quite out of memory in
these later times, but I remember some of them with pleasure. It is
worth noticing that, while the earliest efforts in music in Boston
produced the Handel and Haydn Society, and led to the occasional
performance of a symphony of Beethoven or of Mozart, the taste of New
York inclined more to operatic music. The brief visit of Garcia and his
troupe had brought the best works of Rossini before the public. These
performances were followed, at long intervals, by seasons of English
opera, in which Mrs. Austin was the favorite prima donna. This lady sang
also in oratorio, and I recall her rendering of the soprano solos in
Handel's "Messiah" as somewhat mannered, but on the whole quite
impressive.
A higher grade of talent came to us in the person of Mrs. Wood, famous
before her marriage as Miss Paton. I heard great things of her
performance in "La Sonnambula," which I was not allowed to see. I did
hear her, however, at concerts and in oratorios, and I particularly
remember her rendering of the famous soprano song, "To mighty kings he
gave his acts." Her voice was beautiful in quality and of considerable
extent. It possessed a liquid and fluent flexibility, quite unlike the
curious staccato and tremolo effects so much in favor to-day.
My father's views of religious duty became much more stringent after my
mother's death. I had been twice taken to the opera during the Garcia
performances, when I was scarcely more than seven years of age, and had
seen and heard the Diva Malibran, then known as Signorina Garcia, in the
roles of Cenerentola (Cinderella) and Rosina in the "Barbiere di
Seviglia." Soon after this time the doors were shut, and I knew of
theatrical matters only by hearsay. The religious people of that period
had set their faces against the drama in every form. I remember the
destruction by fire of the first Bowery Theatre, and how this was spoken
of as a "judgment" upon the wickedness of the stage and of its patrons.
A well-known theatre in Richmond, Va., took fire while a performance was
going on, and the result was a deplorable loss of life. The pulpits of
the time "improved" this event by sermons which reflected severely upon
the frequenters of such places of amusement, and the "judgment" was long
spoken of with holy horror.
My musical education, in spite of the limitations of opportunity just
mentioned, was the best that the time could afford. I had my first
lessons from a very irritable French artist, of whom I stood in such
fear that I could remember nothing that he taught me. A second teacher,
Mr. Boocock, had more patience, and soon brought me forward in my
studies. He had been a pupil of Cramer, and his taste had been formed by
hearing the best music in London, which then, as now, commanded all the
great musical talent of Europe. He gave me lessons for many years, and I
learned from him to appreciate the works of the great composers,
Beethoven, Handel, and Mozart. When I grew old enough for the training
of my voice, Mr. Boocock recommended to my father Signor Cardini, an
aged Italian, who had been an intimate of the Garcia family, and was
well acquainted with Garcia's admirable method. Under his care my voice
improved in character and in compass, and the daily exercises in holding
long notes gave strength to my lungs. I think that I have felt all my
life through the benefit of those early lessons. Signor Cardini
remembered Italy before the invasion of Napoleon I., and sometimes
entertained me with stories of the escapades of his student life. He had
resided long in London, and had known the Duke of Wellington. He related
to me that once, when he was visiting the great soldier at his
country-seat near the sea, the duke invited him to look through his
telescope, saying, "Signor Cardini, venez voir comme on travaille les
Francais." This must have had reference to some manoeuvre of the English
fleet, I suppose. Mr. Boocock thought that it would be desirable for me
to take part in concerted pieces, with other instruments. This exercise
brought me great delight in the performance of certain trios and
quartettes. The reaction from this pleasure, however, was very painful,
and induced at times a visitation of morbid melancholy which threatened
to affect my health.
While I greatly disapprove of the scope and suggestions presented by
Count Tolstoi in his "Kreutzer Sonata," I yet think that, in the
training of young persons, some regard should be had to the
sensitiveness of youthful nerves, and to the overpowering response which
they often make to the appeals of music. The dry practice of a single
instrument and the simple drill of choral exercises will not be apt to
overstimulate the currents of nerve force. On the other hand, the power
and sweep of great orchestral performances, or even the suggestive charm
of some beautiful voice, will sometimes so disturb the mental
equilibrium of the hearer as to induce in him a listless melancholy, or,
worse still, an unreasoning and unreasonable discontent.
The early years of my youth were passed in the seclusion not only of
home life, but of a home most carefully and jealously guarded from all
that might be represented in the orthodox trinity of evil, the world,
the flesh, and the devil. My father had become deeply imbued with the
religious ideas of the time. He dreaded for his children the
dissipations of fashionable society, and even the risks of general
intercourse with the unsanctified many. He early embraced the cause of
temperance, and became president of the first temperance society formed
in this country. As a result, wine was excluded from his table. This
privation gave me no trouble, but my brothers felt it, especially the
eldest, who had passed some years in Europe, where the use of wine was,
as it still is, universal. I was walking with my father one evening when
we met my two younger brothers, each with a cigar in his mouth. My
father was much troubled, and said, "Boys, you must give this up, and I
will give it up, too. From this time I forbid you to smoke, and I will
join you in relinquishing the habit." I am afraid that this sacrifice on
my father's part did not have the desired effect, but am quite certain
that he never witnessed the infringement of his command.
At the time of which I speak, my father's family all lived in our
immediate neighborhood. He had considerably distanced his brothers in
fortune, and had built for himself the beautiful house of which I have
already spoken. In the same street with us lived my music-loving uncle,
Henry, somewhat given to good cheer, and of a genial disposition. In a
house nearer to us resided my grandfather, Samuel Ward, with an
unmarried daughter and three bachelor sons, John, Richard, and William.
The outings of my young girlhood were confined to this family circle. I
went to school, indeed, but never to dancing-school, a sober little
dancing-master giving us lessons at home. I used to hear, with some
envy, of Monsieur Charnaud's classes and of his "publics," where my
schoolfellows disported themselves in their best clothes. My grandfather
was a stately old gentleman, a good deal more than six feet in height,
very mild in manner, and fond of a game of whist. With us children he
used to play a very simple game called "Tom, come tickle me." Cards were
not allowed in my father's house, and my brothers used to resort to the
grand-paternal mansion when they desired this diversion.
The eldest of my father's unmarried brothers was my uncle John, a man
more tolerant than my father, and full of kindly forethought for his
nieces and nephews. In his youth he had sustained an injury which
deprived him of speech for more than a year. His friends feared that he
would never speak again, but his mother, trying one day to render him
some small assistance, did not succeed to her mind, and said, "I am a
poor, awkward old woman." "No, you are not!" he exclaimed, and at once
recovered his power of speech. He was anxious that his nieces should be
well instructed in practical matters, and perhaps he grudged a little
the extra time which we were accustomed to devote to books and music. He
was fond of sending materials for dresses to me and my sisters, but
insisted that we should make them up for ourselves. This we managed to
do, with a good deal of help from the family seamstress. When I had
published my first literary venture, uncle John showed me in a newspaper
a favorable notice of my work, saying, "This is my little girl who knows
about books, and writes an article and has it printed, but I wish that
she knew more about housekeeping,"--a sentiment which in after years I
had occasion to echo with fervor.