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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Transcriber(s): Hausam, Josephine
Descriptor(s): Ditkoff, Andrea
Date: 1870-1877
Text: PLEASE NOTE: Blank pages are omitted, and pages with text are presented in the order in which they were Written (in the original, the diarist left every other page blank from the beginning, and upon reaching the end of the book, began working her way back, Writing upside down on pages that had been left blank). From "The Checkered Scene"-- Dansville, N.Y. 1878 "Mr. Little has been telling me how he went home last night, after our little talk up in Paradise Gate, and had a dream...
Show morePLEASE NOTE: Blank pages are omitted, and pages with text are presented in the order in which they were Written (in the original, the diarist left every other page blank from the beginning, and upon reaching the end of the book, began working her way back, Writing upside down on pages that had been left blank). From "The Checkered Scene"-- Dansville, N.Y. 1878 "Mr. Little has been telling me how he went home last night, after our little talk up in Paradise Gate, and had a dream about me. He did not dream that I got well, he said, but that I became helpless. That I was placed where scarcely anything about me was as I would like it to be - in a hard place - where nothing fitted - and the people about me were uncomfortable people - and little to my taste - but that amidst it all I was sucha happiness to others; which was so much better than getting well." "A little talk with Mrs. Evans tonight. I leave her feeling that there is a blessedness greater than any sadness in knowing that the Master is even now at the gate." "Dr. McLean said to me: 'My wife and I have remarked ever so many times that we would give anything if we could always look as bright as you do.' Blessed be the help that comes to do it! The Master remembers.""Pet's letter came today; and her "why nots" are so full of the unselfishness and heroism that I love so in her that I feel an uplifting. But, O, how it makes my heart ache!" "In due order breakfast. We might pass this over were it not that it gains in importance unspeakably the nearer one comes to not having any!"Sabbath evening- Oct. 9" 1870- A log-book! and mine! I said I'd have a log-book - said it long ago - said it every time I had a peep into Sue's upper, unstratified, bureau drawer, where hers lay nestled - comfortable and un-searchable. I'd like to be born such a night as this if I could be born to live and not grope. day times these mountains make us toil - climb - drag on! "To the heights" is what they say. Tonight they let us look at them and rest. "As the mountains are round about Jerusalem so the Lord is round about his people." Does that mean Hewouldn't miss us if we died? Not even a sparrow falleth to the ground without your Father__Christ said that. He came down from the singing and the glory to tell us that. He cried for us, too. Oct. 16"- Blue and black_all wool! Pretty thing to run in one's head when the minister's text is "consider the lilies". I know the prayers and the metre_Long and common! Doctor told the Lord that "yesterday the icy streams dissolved." I did not know it. Then came the intense heat of summer, and the growing crops, and now the fading leaf reminds us of ourfrailty. It doesn't me! When I see the royalty of everything I remember that I'm born a queen, and longing for my kingdom possesses me, and never a thought that 'tis frail to be royal, or sorrowful for " the king to come to his own." Oct. 23" 1870 "And while he was yet a great way off the Father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck and kissed him." As long as those words read just so i shall never be afraid to die. i shall dream of the Father's house, .. as I dare dream of nothing else. I get so tired of myself. I want to run away from myself and be pleased andhappy just a little while. Nov. 4" 1870 - God can make a beautiful life even out of mine. I pray for it as I pray for nothing else. Twenty two years blossoming in frost flowers - only frost flowers - no pansies, no myrtle, no goldenrod. Nov.13" -- I want to see Paul - I want to know him. It is one of the dear dreams that are to be worked out in Heaven-and Heaven is a great many years long. I could sing tonight. I could talk to Christ. I can't always. Will there be any great blanks up there-can there be? Will I ever say when I have gone to Him and seen Him, "My vacant days go on-go on"?Dec.11"_ My thoughts tonight are organic & inorganic! The way of life is plain.._but tell me-Is there anything else that is plain? When do I pray & not feel the first heart throb those old words-"Friend of sinners! we are in the dark, and bewildered and sick at heart"? I've done a heap of thinking since Wednesday, or dreaming which is only prismatic thinking... A great deal of it is Castleton, but the space between and the way thither is full of shrinking and dread. It seems so hard to stop here - break off the little plans and comforts, and live through shrinking and desolation again! How I amlearning to love "being led" thoughts. Rain day-Jan. 15"_ Doleful! I kept away from myself all day. Blank verse - blank verse - will it ever be anything but blank verse? Aug 8- There's good natured little breeze frisking around here like curly-headed children in a hay mow._________ We touch lives at all angles that seem so satisfied, and I renounce such as I do the world, the flesh, and the devil. I grasp eagerly at any thought that makes the infinite distance between my life here and my life after some great change, called death, grow less and not so terrible. My child! my chicken! More help! more love! more light! .... Senior Editor has fled. The editorials, compositions, printing presses, type, ink, proof sheets, galvanic batteries, reviews, exchances, masculine tone, spurts, printing office, Willow St. & all the chicanery is left on my hands - two poor, bony hands! Life is span- I'm in a stew- Now will you help? Write an editorial-..I'll thank you someday. Prayer meetings may make some people think of tabernacles & Mt. Tabors and whatever's the pural of "good to be here" - but from some of them I couldrun and not be weary. That's the most orthodox way I can find to tell it. Blessed are they that ask for bread and do not receive a stone. The feeling of a great need is grateful to me for it is the precursor of a great pity and great fullness not far away. Castleton -- I feel to strange and lost for anything - I'm afraid to look in the glass for fear it isn't me.... I'm pretty well but tired. It doesn't pay to be tired but what's a man to do? Normal School - Mar-ch-ch-ch-sh-sh! +++ We have more prayers than provender. We have solemn roasts, solemn potatoes, serious pie, & a realizing sense of concocted rice. What will becomeof me in such a frame as this? Laughs are my vital breath.... Soon the bell will ring for supper - not to be eaten but served. Our conversatoin will be heaven, our bread emblematical, our digestion ritualistic. .... My doctor tell me..I must rest or die. Which is the biggest? I don't know which to take. .... These are days of heaven upon Earth, and I rejoice through & through. I'd blossom in purple & red if I knew how. Do you? - Mar. 14" 1871 - Patmos without the vision! Sunday, Mar. 19" 1871 - Mr. ___ is an exminister. I'vespanned him with Montgomery's measuring line wherewith he sounded the ocean's depths and pierced to either pole & his height is seventy six inches. His brain is the seat of sensation. ++++ He prays in minor scale-very minor-and is a very Jeremiah.++++ Mrs.___ you've read about. don't say you haven't for I know better. She abounds in S.S. books and religious memoirs. I never saw a live one before. ++++ I haven't made up my mind whether to be very much afraid of her or make a gasp or two toward "appreciating her worth"! The "Normals" here are awfully old. One of them has taught 37terms! but I find her docile+++ Imagine me before the old, the married, the big - to teach without a book! To be infallible, judicial, celestial, didactic four times a day! Sunday, April 16, 1871 -- I've written the date - anybody could do that. I wonder why we have to live such days. There is discipline in "so as by fire"- discipline even in vacancy - but to have no heart in anything and be simply stupid - where is the help in this? I don't believe I ever felt so utterly cut off from human help beforeAnything that makes me talk to Mr.___ is a terror to me - all his way are. But I believe God is going to help me through. +++ If I never why I was sent to Castleton God has known it all the time. If I could be necessary! - to you - to just a few as i would love to be - as I long to be just once and for always - it would not seem so often, "My vacant days go on - go on". +++I cannot be just a little to any one. I must be a great deal or nothing. "The heart to be all to" will not come to my life. It is one of thebeautiful things that is left out. Love calls to most. It called to me years ago and I Passed it by. It will not call again. ++++ Goodbye. I am very, very tired and only Fanny at that. "half of heaven is the not parting". Why the thought is half heaven! What won't it be to be there and say to each other "Always-always!" And Susie will let you come into her garden and mine where the glorified sumachs [sumacs] and firs are to be. There have been reasons for things, hours for things, andthings and things without hours for them. I used to wonder nights when I went for the milk, and used to [do] up much of my thinking, how it would seem to be twenty three. Now I wonder how it would seems to be a little girl and go for the milk. +++++++++ More than anything I am longing for the woods and hills. Does anyone love a wide stretch of sky and meadow more than I? +++ I thank God for anything that roots and grounds my faith in others. Living & working in thisworld is such a tearing down, pulling away process. My window opens on the grass-plot, which to be truthful must be further limited by the statement that some of it is brick plot! I am thankful for the little bit of green & the little bit of sky bending over it. All around is a high board fence +++ how much of my life lies before me in the pent up struggling grass. How it does fight! "Walled in", I say to myself, remembering how much of me is walled in. "All about ++ everything"! How very modest! Where shall Ibegin? When shall I stop? Would you have any objection to my taking a little bit of the time up in Heaven to finish? I'm afraid I shall hardly be able to get it all in this side. My experience has been that I never seem to get any father than Mr. W. in this world. Castleton--Jan. 18-1872. Something sent Miss H.__ up after school to kiss me & say somehow they all liked me very much. After she had gone one tho't was in my heart. It came rolling up from where the tears are, & the springs of life: "I don't believe I shall every be cross to my girls again."Sunday-Jan. 21--- Something must be done. I am all adrift. For days & days & days I have just gone on; and I must stop a little while & rest & think Tues. 23"- Spoiled another day for my girls, & wish-O yes-yes-yes- that there was help for it! Monday-29".--One thing I lay down for Frances-she must listen to me. "Don't let me hear one cross word this week! Love your girls too well-please do! My life opens into such large wide ways-&&the work makes me so happy && it is like giving the little ones the kingdom. Feb. 24"-- Our friend, philosopher & guide R.G.W. surprised everybody by rising to remark that he had nothing to say on the subject of grammar, butwould introduce to the association Miss Bromley. Nothing less than me - I might say "me less than nothing"! I remember one distinct thrill - from the rest I shall never rally. Monday, Feb. 26"-- What is macaroni? Who first harrowed mankind with it? Why must it be set before me & not desert [dessert] but gingersnaps? A gingersnap is a desert [dessert] but macaroni is dead men's bones. Tues. 27"-- The best thing we have set before our hungriness is rice pudding. How it came to be so good doth not appear but it possesses many saintly qualities. We always have it with beefsteak. Those days do not smile on butter. Thurs. 29-- Again the big noise in our house was me. 'Twasn't bringinga trunk down nor taking a trunk up, but talking Mr. Williams down & bringing life, liberty & the pursuit of happiness up. ++ You mustn't scold a man unless you want to ease your mind, or see what you can do, or show him you are not afraid, or give him an idea of his meanness - but to carry a point-never! Take a silken shuttle & silken thread & spin a man into anything you want - but don't scold him. Tues. March 5"-- Mr. Williams is on a perfect rampage. Stands primed & ready to go off any minute, usually: lately, he runs round to find things to go off about. hawk-like in his nature he looks for achicken & finds one. ++ I've heard of four-footed beasts, & creeping things, & fowls of the air: don't remember to have seen them combined before. +++ Do I get cross any? Not much. There is untold sunshine at the heart of things & it touches me. Thurs. 7"-- Annie A. looks like an untimely frost--bluely dreadful! Sat.9"-- The right proportion, said Miss G., is an ounce of serpent to a pound of love. She was in my room writing a cross letter - both of us cross everywhere but inside. Miss ___ wants to know. Do I tabulate food & clothing? Do I diagram what I don't tabulate? ++++ Mr. Williams prays with his eyes open & [L.] wonders if it isn'ttime his ... was multiplied! March 12"-- Another something that stopped: & I only stop once in a long times to think about it. "Time driveth onward fast, & in a little while our lips are dumb". +++ O for the quiet-calmed-down-toned-down, if need be! only let it reach me. "Friend of sinners! I am in the dark & bewildered & sick at heart!" March 15". O, if the breaths of spring would come faster, would do anything to make the leaves come out. We are cheered by prospects of snow! +++ All the poly things possible to e condensed within four walls take this howling wilderness as their business center. Sat. Mar.15"-- I have learned to fill my soul with a horror of Saturdays. I am in terror over the long dark hall, the sweeping around, above, below me, the orders from below, the inspection of drawers, the bells, the dinners, the harryings by R.G.W. But then I am not a ghoul. If I only had a nice sense of propriety all this would be vital breath - native air. March 27"-- In which I find time to pity myself.== The pivot on which the state turns appeared to us at the first class. We all came in in the afternoon without feathers - we had been picked clean!== The rest of it ishard++but I can bear it. "To distil the one elixir patience" - Must there be another crucible- & another- & another? Will I learn? March 30"-- spring is waiting be wooed-& so is somebody else. Well! March. 31"-- March dies in just such a storm as father died in. Such storms bring it back even over ten years. April 8"-- I am going to adopt Milton's style of address next time I talk to Mr. Williams, Like this: "Sole partner & sole part of all these joys, Earth's hallowed mould, O prince of men, off-spring of Heaven & Earth & all Earth's Lord, O sacred, wise & wisdom-giving Plant, my author & Disposer, what thou bidst unargued I obey"-- And he will answer (probably) "Fair Consort, my latest friend, associate sole"! April 13--Memorable for the contemplated talk with Mr. Williams. Are you sorry to hear that Milton's style was not ours? I know now - how things look different to us as we learn - I can that it is better for me to keep the assistant's place; even tho' conscious that upon me falls the principal's work & more than the principal's care. April 16"-- Winter has very fairly set in! "Come gentle spring! Etherial [Ethereal] mildness come." April 18-- I wish etherial [ethereal] mildness would come to me! I don't possess much. +++ Tt is such a relief to me to be busy setting myself right instead of other people. I know better where to begin! April 27"-- Mr. Williams asks t dinner would we have hot scotch or solid meat? We live to regret the hot scotch & long for solid meat. May2-- It is a sad & sorry thing when one is made to stand before one's self as I have today. +++ I have seen the good, the glory of living, & have fallen in the very presence of it. ++ I stand such a sorry wreck before myself. I have made shipwreck of a whole year. O how the words hurt! May 6"-- We ride down to see them go, & come back to put something in the vacant places so they won't look at us so. We can't see "flame & azure [b]indingeach other - we only see the moving & the places left. May 26" One of the kind of Sundays that I dread when I lie still all day. Thinking is so close to doing that it is hard to have to think when one cannot do. May 29"-- Annie is all in a maelstrom. She makes it a duty to be happy as little as possible, & stay so short a time as possible. +++++++ I will not worry. A pain to bear now that came near enough to be a pain would make me so miserable. I can lay "no plan for next year - not one. I can't see the way. May 30 Would I decorate? I saidnot. She was mistaken. Miss G. & I went ahead with a flag & an umbrella & a flower or two. +++ We came home for the loaves & fishes & found loaves but no fishes. may 31-- A. comes up & I do not spit out much of the hardness that is in my heart lately - the bitterness that comes over one when they have wrought much, loved much, & lost much. June 3-- And the mill goes round & round - & I - if not a hopper what am I? On to the day - the good time out doors - the gala time up in the trees - the rest up in the blue - the whirl in the mill - & the heartsick of it! And what did I do to drive awaythe heartsick for somebody else? Anything? How can I tell? ++ I come up stairs so whizzy & perplexed! June 4--Miss G. asks for tea at dinner. Mrs. Williams arises in presence of us all, unlocks emerald treasuries, wafting odors of Yaddo & Changcha fu chun passes to mysterious precincts eastward. Is gone a long time. We eat on. Reappears - gets a cup. Disappears. Is gone a long time. The door opens. Mrs. W. & the Tea! Someway I'll not ask for tea at dinner. June 6-- "the Lord knoweth them that are his"-- I'm glad for we have a hard time finding it out! The butter is abominable. Never mind - its intentions are all right -it meantto be good. June 7"-- I wish we could browse indiscriminately. We don't. We take "meals regularly". June 22-- My trials consist in getting hammer & nails. Mr. Williams deals out nails as he deals our matches - companionless. +++ We behold with our own eyes a bouncing shortcake in the kitchen window, but not for us. We go down to bread & butter & platitudes.. June 25-- I have had my talk with Dr. F. He made me see things & feel good & now I am coming back next year. June 26-- Pretty hard day, Frances - pretty hard day! June 29-- I do love a wide stretch of sky & meadow: it gives me sucha feeling of perfect freedom - especially when days stretch before me as wide & free as sky & meadow, as full of places for the sunshine to fall & soil for daisies to blossom. +++ How jolly it seems to be company-warranted to rest. July 19" Albany. Today has touched me where I ache & long-on my book side. It was gala-time to me up there in the State Library. I come back elevated seven pegs & a pole! Aug. 10"-- ++ O how glad I am that no one but me knows how I am longing for Broadfields! If only a little piece of it could come into this vacation! At home things are real & hard. We know not anything save "getting a school" & "earning money" & "paying it back".Aug. 17"-- The nicest thing in all day was sitting down by the window with Grandma to knit after the tea-dishes were washed & put away. i wish my life - the whole of it - could be washed & put away for a long time. Aug. 20"-- I cook a great while but not much! Aug. 22"-- It's "no not yet" day! Sept. 5--Castleton-- Things look better. Mother brings deliverance in her very eyes & we set to work cheerily. I never went to my first day with such a heartache & with so little to expect. ++ But I can challenge the promise of this word. I met Miss Bissell first & she throws her arms around my neck & bursts out crying.Sept. 15"-- The silent side - mine - is growing more & more silent as there is daily less to tell & more to bear. Sept. 21-- I wish these days would stay. Why need I when it isn't weather that keeps me fit to live but grace? Sometimes grace takes the form of weather! +++ Folks come & I see them: & they go & I'm properly thankful.... Sept. 29 - Sunday - ++ If religion consists in being pleasant to have about I might as well ask the dear Lord please can't I begin again! Oct. 7"-- When the base & rate are given how do find the percentage? that's what we talk about up at school. Can we afford a new oil-cloth for the dining-room? that's what we talk about at home. How can I come close 7 know - that's what I talk about all to myself. Oct. 18"-- Folks can live & still not have things as they want them. They can still live & not do as they have a mind to. These significant facts are chapter from my personal experience! Oct. 19-- The weather is like last hours with friends before they go. Oct. 28"--What makes me get so tired - so right down tired? I almost wish what I never wished before - that there not five days in a week - that there not forty weeks in a school year.Oct. 29"-- ++ I get up cross - so cross - so cross as never was. Nov. 1"-- ++ I go to school. Sometimes I teach school - other times I only go! Nov. 21"-- ++ I go upstairs to the hall to be alone. Things go so wretchedly I cannot teach. ++ A. comes up softly & puts her arms around me & says, "What do you want me to do about that?" I look about about as pleasant as the piano box & don't want anything. Poor A. goes down. I call myself a narrow neck of land, chiefly stone! Jan. 1" 1873-- Into Isaiah! What does that make you think of Fannie? Play that I asked the question a good ways from todaywhen I have grown up & out of & beyond! Today I only remember the words that have comforted me so & given me out of my storm a great calm - "For the mountains shall depart & the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from there, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed." O years! still let the promise hold me. Jan.6"/73 - Into a prayer meeting. +++I never did want God so much before. ++ The coming home part of the meeting was nice to me: it was like coming up thro' the pines into the world again.Jan 8"/73 - Into red bows & vanities. Did I wear a red bow? When my existence for a long time has been a protest against them. ++ Yes. I deliberately marched to the store, picked out a red bow, came home & tied it & donned the same. If I were the only one who advances on the lifeless bodies of her convictions! By & by I'll begin to resurrect! Jan. 11" - Into grinding processes. Jan. 13" - Into a Cumulo-stratus. I don't seek such places: but sometimes I wake & find myself there; sometimes I'm pushed thro' like a pneumatic railway! sometimes Mr. Williams holds one up for me to jump thro'.Jan. 29"/73 - Into the Promised Land. For what is it but a land of promise to me? ++ I've held it to my soul thro' thankless tasks and heavy happenings++ in days when he was more than usual Williams & I less than ever Frances. That she was there was all & everything to me. In that real land of promise when I glide thro' the open door into the first glow of the warmth & light will my first feeling be one of pain as I feel. My whole life for this? Feb. 3" - Into her eyes - & down deep. " 15" - Into the Spanish Inquisition. ++ One chairman to face & four gold-headed canes - I had never sighed for such bliss! Mr. Williams lookedlike the strongest fortress the Moors ever held in Spain. I only it is ended & Mother's room is the refuge whereunto I flee. Feb. 21"/73-- Into seas of it! Floods of it! ++++ But oh, how cosy [cozy] it looked at home when I came into a nice tea, & a big fire, & a Friday night spasm of content! Feb. 24"-- Into bliss for which I did not sigh. Mother say, "Never mind, it's your last term." The bliss is object lessons & Mr. Williams' face as he looks on "to see if I have the idea"! Feb. 26"-- Into a blue that is the most blue! and I got into it. No alternative is left me, not even that of the man who found hiseyes were out. +++ Poor Mother! how pale & sick she has looked all day. Mar. 2",/73 - Into losing the name of disciple. +++ Could I not have borne for Jesus' sake? I must impose on me sterner discipline, & heart pleadings for strength. Mar. 19" - Into a little more powder now, my boys! Mar. 28" - Into a long pull & a pull a good while. A day of gaspings in Arithmetic, of giant strides in grammar, of much ado about nothing in Eng. Lit., of clutching at & panting in Botany, of crawling Orthography, of leaping for joy in Natural history, of feeling along in other history& going at Algebra in gunboats! What does anything mean for me but school? Mar. 29"-'73-- Into Terra catena - in libera poena-desidero te - English cannot express it. I go reverently to Latin! How much drudgery can be squeezed into one day, & that a leaky, Scrooge-like A.M. - M. P.M. in March I shall know hereafter more definitely than hitherto. April 25"-- Into bein' & doin' & sufferin'. " 17"-- Into matronly perplexities. I do not entertain guests after the primitive style! To turn a cake or bake a kid is very different from nineteenth century breakfast getting. I am sadly inexpert in slicingham, or cutting cold pudding, or finding where Mother keeps things, & I forget to salt! But I do at last muddle a breakfast together. ++++ April 28"/73-- Into knowing how sublime it is to suffer 7 be snapped! I do not bear snaps with dignity. Gentleness & forbearance seems to have been left out of Mr. W.'s religion this morning. My religion was not expecting to be snapped-And so-! April 29"-- ++++ Then I went over to help Ella with her Latin saying sadly to myself, "O Fanny, you have a queer way of laying your life down". April 30"-- Into being a benefactor to Miss Bissell by giving advice which she does not follow!May 1"/73-- Into a night more dreaded than the day. There's no telling what a Board will do. I've always said that. So I was not surprised today when lofty honors were confered [conferred] upon me in the form of a call from Dr. Webber & Gen. G. to learn that it was the wish of everybody & everybody's friend that I should remain here another year & teach with Mr. Williams. I've just sat & held the dreaded thing in my heart until it seems too hard for me - & then the night came for me to toss in & wake every few minutes to think how near heaven was - & now how far. May 2"-- +++ I've worked two ways today. Outwardly - mechanically atthis & that: inwardly at the question "Shall I lay down myself next year that mother & Danny may still enjoy our home here, & the girls come back? or shall I go away?" There is no answer & the rain falls heavily - drearily. May 4"-'73-- Into holding out. ++++ I finish "Middlemarch" & lay it down saying over & over to myself its closing words: "That things are not so ill with you & me is half owing to those who lived faithfully a hidden life & sleep in unvisited graves".keep on asking in my blind discontented way, "What shall be done with me next year? Where can I go?" There's not an answer anywhere. May 9"/73 - Into a next- ++++++ "The one elixir, patience!" How often do I think of that when it seems as if all of me was being thus distilled. There will come a day when there will be a next - so I work hard & find a "forgetting" even in the life of a first assistant. +++ And grandma knits & knits-- May 11"-- Into wishing to be less miserable! May 13"-- Into the more I think I will the more I won't. +++ I know all the words in the Englishlanguage but rest. I rejoice to see the last skeleton of an examination paper dissected, compiled, & filed away. No wonder I never see sunsets any more! May 16"-73-- Into finding people to please & nothing to please them with - such experiences fall abundantly to my lot - they prove disciplinary. May 19"+++ I fish away with imaginary lines in imaginary water & fish up what might have been. ++++ May 22"-- Into feeling heart-bare, heart-hungry, very poor. I am glad to come & find rest in Jesus. Glad of anything that takes me near to Him. May 28"-- +++ Today in my half-decided, sadly tortured state comes a letter from Edward Conant. "Will I go to Randolph next year? "O, yest," I say in my gladness at the thought that anybody want me - that's there's any place for me but this. "O no," I say by & by as I think of Mother & the pretty new house. +++++ June 4"/73.-- Into the new home. We enter it joyfully. Who can know how very good it seems to us? not in ++ its comforts alone but in the happier thought that, if God will, it shall be ours some day. We want mother to have a home all her own again; & we have brave hearts to work for it for her. ++++++++++O Father, reveal to me my duty! direct my feet for I do acknowledge thee! +++ June 5"/73-- Into a deep hard question that I cannot answer. And it grows deeper & harder & makes a burden of my thought to weary me. I am helpless before my life-problem. An answer now & here - its result for all time. I can't stay here next year - how can I! It seems almost wicked when I feel as I do. I can't go away next year - it seems too selfish in me to think of it. O is the right choice always the one that involves the greater self-denial? ++++++ June 7"-- Into taking comfort in the new house with Mother. ++++++++June 9"/73. +++ A new plan possesses me, thought up in a twinkle, but taking may twinkles to work it out. That's one reason why I don't like this world! ++++ June 24"-- +++ All feeling has left me but passivity to accept the best that comes - to let Dr. F. decide. He say stay. +++ July 6 - Albany... There is an ache - a dread in my heart - I have no strength to face next year with Mr. Williams. July 10"-- That Mr. & Mrs. W. will not go to Troy is evident. Won't I live to see the earth open somewhere & gulp him down? Why doesn't somebody want him?July 23/73-- My Latin moves slowly. It is hard for me but I creep on. My hopes rise & fall as a distant college looms before me-- And what will Mother do? is the only pause. Aug. 12"-- ++ I have not knowingly touched terra firma today. I have moved in one most joyous dream of Michigan University, until the year I have so much dreaded seems only as door. Aug. 30"-- I feel restless & stirred up. Nothing rests me or brings free visions of that all enfolding peace; & so I chafe on. +++ It seems so easy to let the Normal School & its troubles swallow me up body & soul: & I lend myself so ready to be swallowed.Castleton Aug. 31"/73-- Into standing before myself. +++ I need greatly these days the strength that comes from the Cross - the look from the Master that humbles. ++ Night comes - & I walk the streets & toss & toss! O Jesus! other refuge have I none! sept. 8"-- Into finding the stuff that R.G.W. is made of! Sept 10"-- A man has been raised up to teach me Greek! Like everyone else raised up for me he wasn't made to order - but I'll make him do. Oct. 12"-- Into the return of blessing. The day had so many things that were restful Oct. 19"-- Into beds of dying leaves.How lovely the trees begin to look. ++ And I, in among the rustling leaves & the lovely places can only think how near I am to being 25. The desolate places would not look to bare to me if Mother, too, was not growing old. Oct. 20"/73-- A letter- +for me. It treats of a fall of 45 ft & no bones broken; of a boy who will study good next term; of money to pay for a slate; of a lamp chimney & four window-lights broken! Oct. 21"-- What I feel like tonight is better conceived by the members of my profession than developed & recorded. Oct 23"-- Dreams of Michiganare like cold water to parched lips, like rest to heavy lids. Oct. 24"-- Into "This is the way the mill goes round"! Oct. 30"--Into patching up today to make it do! Oct. 31"-- Into the Greek Testament. Nov. 1"-- At home this evening is long & cheery: but I want Mother. That isn't all i want. i chafe so under this year's cross - it grows hard to carry & spring looks like a far-off speck. Nov. 4"-- It is what goes out from us from a gathered richness within, more than what comes to us from without that makes us know we live. A bright day - Nov. 5"/73-- Into a little more Greek, at once, my boys! That's all there seems to be of anything except school. A little Greek to read - a little Greek to study - a little rule or two - jump up in my faced every tired minute. But I don't die. I am quite alive. I shall sit up there & feel my way thro' 150 more days, just as tired as this, & then come home to 150 more Greek lessons increasingly hard. Where shall I find something good? In my new garters? Possibly! In Mr. ___? Who can tell? In the original Greek of St John? Always! Nov. 15"-- I've set everythingto rights but me, & I'm all to wrongs! Nov. 20"/73-- Our boy at home. We think he has improved. If God would only give some of us wisdom, strength, influence to hold him back from the pit that is digged - from the snares that lie in wait! Nov. 23"-- Into feeling unfeignedly comfortable.! Nov. 27"-- Home is so full of cheer today - there is so much in it that I want to keep. Nov. 28"-- A boy set down in our family seems to have been an unprepared for event. It is almost sufficient to furnish matter for the Tragic Muse. My hopes lookforward - But, oh "Thou Friend of Sinners! I am bewildered, & in the dark, & sick at heart." Nov. 29"-- Into a cheery Saturday night. I revel in the cosy [cozy] evenings by the fire with Mother. Nov. 30"-- I felt so good this morning so well, so strong. +++ Mother & I walk & talk, & plan for our boy - & next year looks at us wistfully. Dec. 3"-- Mother sat up till three o'clock sewing for Dan. That worried me wide awake: & i thought, & thought & thought if I could give up Michigan next year & let Danny stay in school. Dec. 6"-- Into "[Bils] of Work" by F. B.! Don't look at me, or talk to me. I don't dare look at myself.Dec. 7"-73-- Into a rest spot. Days at home, lately, are so nice all of them! Dec. 11"-- Into whatever is the opposite of "outing": I suppose Patience Strong would call it inting! +++ I go into winter quarters in Greek! Sunday, Dec. 14"-- A day that came like a hope of heaven in a field of graves. Dec. 20"-- Into little done or thought, or dreamed. That last is much missed out of a day of mine. +++ I keep thinking of that pitiful little note from my boy - the sick. Dec. 22"-- I was mercifully spared from a dragging-on existence.Dec. 17"-- Mother has been gone three days. The fires have gone out only three times around. We have eaten starch for soda in our cakes only twice! Dec. 29"-- Into finding things to be glad about. Jan. 10 1874-- I live too fast - so much is certain. +++ i write Greek exercises, & get girls ready for examination & answer the door bell - & after my hands at last drop, & the light is out I want to think of our absent boy & pray & pray & pray for him - but I am too tired to lift my heart. This not the way I was made to live, & my release seems far-off.Jan. 11"-"74-- ++ I am glad of the Sunday - glad to be more & more ashamed "to speak of burdens to a Man on a Cross". O god! give me the life Thou didst give Thy Son! And home - all of it -makes me sorry. Jan. 15-- ++ A vacant day: not music, no dreams - no incense - only vague reality - a living on. +++ Jan. 19". +++ Dr French appears, armed & invincible. he says, "Don't stay here." My heart say "No - I won't." But I must wait. He only, of all others, says "Go to college." Every one else says no. Feb. 3"-- We have ups & downs since Dan's letter came. What he means isincomprehensible. We are left to worry about it - which we do in a manner never before attained. It was a mistake sending a boy down in our family. But we are learning so fast that the next generation may all be boys & we'll be ready for 'em. One can live & worry, too. the latter doesn't kill one - at least not me - any more than teaching with R,G.W.! Feb. 7"-'74-- A good word comes from the boy & our hearts take rest. It is a blessed giving from the King in answer to my feeble asking. He cannot fall away & be our disappointment - not as long as I bear him up to the everlasting Arms. Work makesme feel good today. It is so nice to work at home. Feb. 12" '74-- The bell rang a year ago this morning &, Fanny, do you remember that I promised never to make you walk up to answer its call another first day Feb. morning? This seems like one of the problems where the slate & pencil were taken away from me. The girls bring good cheer. There's a spirit of good times in Normal Hall. ++ I go home from it into a cloud that settles black & grim & sends tears to my eyes. Feb. 13"-- What can she do! I suppose this is one phase of the woman question! +++ The answer seems tobe to start a school, to be its first, its motive power, & its waste material. Feb. 19-'74 ++ I feel so unsatisfied & forlorn today. I can't find higher level & no pastures are green. +++ Feb. 20"-- What the final decision is. I don't know what the [number] of this final decison is. There have been so many since the first one I've lost track. Today proclaims we move. It makes me tired & sorry. +++ There have been cheery things today, & I have been in smoothe waters without much of any head wind. March 1"-- I take long looks at mother & the cosy [cozy] sitting room & envy & enjoy till I am dizzy withthe blessedness. Home never seemed as nice as it does this winter. Mar. 3"-'74-- +++ How proud I should be to have my boy turn out well! Now my heart calls for this as from the Father who had a son in this world & gave him power to overcome mar. 11"-- There are some of my girls that will never let life look very dark to me - some that are as priceless as these priceless days that are taking them from me. Mar. 12"-- I know one thing thro' the day-school. I know one thing thro' the night - Greek. +++ i can't erase mistakes & i am longing to right all things - to make myselffelt forever. ++ if I only could! I love my girls so! March 17"-'74-- I am in my martyr mood today: that is I go about kind o' pitiful & work with my teeth set & my hands holding on hard; but not a word do I utter! This well for those who learn of me. Mar. 19"-- I feel a good deal forlorn. I drag Fanny around. I make her teach & write & translate - & the child doesn't want to. Even Michigan is a terror to her. Mar. 20"-- I change my habits & become a guest. ++ E. has a pretty home. I envy girls with a father. ++ There is a plant here they call heartsease & I love it. Mar. 23"-'74-- ++ I'm tired of buying coats for a contrary naughty boy who will do what we don't want him to. Don't let me worry about it. ++ Let me grow patient & keep busy with living. Let me lay day - & lay down -& lay down - that I may take again. Deny - deny -deny- thyself. Mar. 24"-- In which I cannot face a frowning world. +++ Danny is head-strong & unreasonable, school stormy & discouraging, & my head fairly swims for want of rest - & all of these things move me. "Jesus - A Saviour" - I need nothing tonight so much as to be saved. Mar. 25"- There is a happiness in the bright morning when soul & body wake together strong for whatever comes.++ O if I can only keep tender, loving feelings & be patient nothing else shall worry me! Mar. 26"'74-- In which I am "pleasant to have about". The rarity of this accounts for its being recorded! The whole day has been like a hope of heaven. I love these new fresh days! Mar. 28"-- it seems so strange to feel the shackles of my work so unceasingly. I reproach myself for taking one moment to play. But rest is coming. April 1"-- In which i lift up mine eyes unto the hills & help cometh. There's spring enough to smell the sweet breath of pines, & see the water running, & watch the sunset glory on bare hill-tops. ++ I thought of Sue. She must bethe poetry of my life for there is no beautiful thing that does not bring me thoughts of her. All before this lay a day of hard work with a headache & thoughts roll & roll. April 7"-'74-- ++ School is such a treat to me when I feel like work - & I do today every inch of me. April 9"-- I go to prayermeeting & hear about living above the world. I know less about that than I once did. The work of this world - the hope of success draw me & chain me. ++ "Bringing every tho't into captivity to the obedience of Christ!" Ah, I have work to do-- There's mud & sow & spring is an ancient myth. April 10"-- ++ It's so nice with Mother today. What I shall do when I can'twork by her & talk to her next year I can't bring myself to think. April 14"-'74-- In which a wave of trouble rolls across my peaceful breast. It takes the form of a coal bill. I have been so in hopes those old bills could wait a little. I feel bound hand & foot this spring with Michigan before me. School partakes of the coal bill - so does the sitting-room & the coal stove! Not much "Broadfields" about me today! April 18"-- +++ Well - there's one thing - my salary is a comfort to other people! April 19"-- Heaven has sent us a reminder of itself in the day: a suggestion of what may be somewhere. I felt like resting my heart in thetenderness that is in the Almightiness. I asked for bread & he gave me a creed! never mind. The beauty of God & the glory are all about me. ++++ Mother & i have a nice visit. We talk of the time when Danny will be thro' school, & be a joy & comfort to us - when the old debts shall all be paid, & our new house shall be builded! April 23", '74-- +++ These are pleasant days to me after all; full of the work I live & the light of young faces & loving hearts. April 25"-- We are in another [woful] snow storm ++++ I suppose all we can do is to shovel paths & hope. +++ A letter from Cousin Mary lays hold of me: "You cannot do too much for your mother. If you could see things as Isee them now would love, trust & indulge her more than all the world." April 26"-'74-- The ninth regular snow-storm in the series was delivered today! ++ but there's cheer inside. I am very tender to Mother all day. Can anything ever take her from me? How weak I feel to keeps her! - & yet how strong! April 28"-- In which I don't know what to do with Fanny ++ If she had said anything today it would have been cross. ++ How thankful I am for the little sources of discipline. I wish I had enough more to make me behave. ++ O for power - for power to become a son of God! April 29"-- ++ I'm so cross I can'tstand it! +++ The mignonette, in the dear little bouquet that came yesterday, has helped. It holds me fast like soft hands touching mine in the dark. May3"-'74-- In which I consent to live. It begins to smile out of doors, & the desert places are going to blossom. +++ Mother & I chatter, chatter thro' the day. ++ I write to the boy, too: & I lie awake & think & pray that God will give his angels charge concerning him. He must ot break my Mother's heart. I think over & over what Mary wrote - "Trust her, love her, indulge her more than all the world." May 4"-- In which "heavy, heavy hangs over me." I go up the Monday steps slowly & not steadily. I ponder overin my heart the things R.G. said to me & I take fire. ++ I guess I shall stand it! I've had an extended course of standing it. +++ Comfort comes in the girls' prayermeeting. May 8"-'74-- ++ I think & think what we will all do & how we can get along: but nothing comes of it. In the meantime I write to Michigan & ask big questions. And so the days go. May 15"-- In which there is something new to be glad about - my copy of De Quincey. +++ There's an end to every trouble under the sun. Even examination papers will fade away. But there's no end to a joy. My books are durable riches. May 17"-- In which serene is thelight in the soft May weather." My heart rests & sings. ++ "O moment gone too soon & morning left behind!" The pale gray night comes down, & in the stillness I am left with God +++ He is nigh even at my doors. May 18"-'74-- In which one girl gets tired - too tired to think or be good. But as old Mr. ___ says: "It's a good deal to ask any body to be good all the time"! May 19"-- In which the things that make me tired are not less. "A lodge in some vast wilderness" has had a pleasant sound of late. +++ I am a living martyr to the present ideas of education: & I scold to myself about it which martyrs never do. May 24"-'74-- In which rest remaineth. ++ It has been a hard week. +++ My thoughts of heaven are alloyed with thoughts of work, & dreams that do not centre near the Throne. I never needed more a tidal wave to sweep over in my life & carry me out of myself. Will not God send it? Or must I always live this way? May 26"-- In which I am again in the crucible. === I go to bed but cannot sleep. Life touches me at so many points: & who is sufficient for these things? May 27"-- +++ My head fails me. Every little nerve sends up its feeble protest. But there is no help. I must workFanny still: & if she runs over & lets out cross things how shall we punish her? Ah, the punishment is swift & sure! There are nights of pain - unknown. June 2"-'74-- In which I find plenty to do. You may have heard something of this kind before! ++ This is Sir Launfal weather; & the nights are those in which Maud came into the garden. ++ Life is full of grammar & arithmetic & essays: but the blue is somewhere! June 6"-- In which my desires lie in the direction of a ride & not in the direction of Botany questions. But I do not take the ride & I do take the Botany. I can't set myself to work. I have to drag the child to it & pin her witha star. She has things on her mind & she is restless. June 9"-'74-- ++ School is pleasant. It's one of the days when I resolve to teach always. June 12"-- ++ I'm glad I'm just as I am - mostly. I'm so up when I am up & so down when I am down. But it's good to enjoy with all your might even tho' you suffer in the same way. June 29"-- In which our mode of life is primitive. ++ I wash windows & sweep, & contemplate my work as the gods eat ambrosia - in a fit of divine abstraction. ++ My greatest housewifely accomplishment consists in being able to be here washing windows, & being off somewhere else at the same time - in fingering & thinking at opposite ends. July 1"-'74-- In which chaos is no more. One only needs to move to be reminded of the creation. Cohoes-July 13"-- I am full of the summer pleasantness, & a quiet, restful content. I have a feeling as if I had just been converted: & what is that like but opening tired eyes & seeing the "place prepared" for the first time. July 17"-- In which I am in the middle of the pasture, & do not even put my head over the fence. July 21"-- In which courage predominates. She kind that works & will not stop - that dodges pain - &will not worry. Aug. 1"-'74-- In which August drips in. Greek & I are getting on very good terms now. +++ I don't jump around at my work & sing: I creep when I'm up & sit down pretty often. +++ The moment D. leaves me nights I worry & I worry until he comes in. It makes me feel better, little book, to tell you about it. If I could only look on & see him safe-! Aug. 5"-- In which my boy is good to me & shows me his best in our quiet talk. Almost every summer has had in it some intense longing which has been put into words only for God's ear. This time it is all for my boy - the pain & longing. God is God -"To doubt is still disloyalty". My neuralgia is assuming painful proportions. I am found pitying myself. Aug. 9"-'74-- In which it might have been glad & heartsome. That is hasn't been makes me toss & toss. buy why do I chronicle my tossings as if they were good things to keep? As if in God's world the aches & sorries did not perish & the bright things only live on? God tells us so much about blotting out. I sat up stairs a good while & the quiet made me over. Aug. 10"-- Everything at home has taken on the most uncomforting aspect. I do so want Mother to be at least a little happy: & I think &think & plan & plan - but the night takes it all up away from me. Aug. 15"-'74-- In which its time Sunday came. I love the Sundays - look, long, wait for them - most of all when I am with Mother. I keep in my heart most lovingly the memory of our Castleton Sundays. They'll be dearer than ever when the little mother is gone. What made me think of this? It must be because she is so pale & tired today. Aug. 17"-- In which I make great efforts to be a hero. My most desperate attempts have been in two directions - to study some, & to sit up straight & still & bear the toothache. I've a great desire to see someone who achieved heroism by this method. I'd like also to knowif two of their teeth ached. +++ The little Mother is better. Her face brightens & she is her own dear little self again - our everyday hero. Aug. 19"-'74-- After a wilderness I come upon a goodly heritage. I am requested to be in Castleton at one & "take charge of the Normal School". +++ I hasten to order me a hat, & walk as the head of a Normal School would be expected to walk: & I dream as girls dream. Forgive my weakness! Mother comes home springing. Castleton - Aug. 22"-- In which I am fully instructed as to the kind of charge I am to take of the Normal School. My reception at Castleton partakes of warmth: I am waited uponby the dignitaries of the town, & compose myself to a placid benignity in the hotel parlor. Developments are not slow: i soon see that taking charge does not mean taking charge at all. What I think of it will not now be recorded. In the meantime observe my benign placidity. Aug. 23"'74-- In which He strengthens my heart. I have so dreaded this Sunday without the little Mother. God has not let me miss Him, too. +++ I am ready to take the place I did not choose - to be subordinated & humiliated if it be His appointing. Aug. 24"-- I go to the task of filling up the Normal School with a vanishingcourage. Lilly C. comes & takes me to ride - carries me off to reverie & dreams. I do not come back as I went. I am so like a child about going into the deeps of a joy; & so not like a child in my efforts to rise above the heights a a sorrow. Aug. 25"-'74-- In which they sent Mr. Sherman to talk to me. It is the old story that is told to girls & women as they learn with every struggle that they contend with men. A college boy, because he is a boy, is preferred, without experience or years: & the woman is passed by. Ah! don't I know how it feels. A man, they tell me, "will give the school more of a name." Andso the letter is already on its way that recommends Mr. Hyde to the principalship of the Normal School; & I, who have loved it so, & worked for it so long am out of sight. The whole of me says, as I toss 7 toss, "I will not stay." Aug. 26"-74-- In which I look for God's answer in a calm that is strange & welcome. The drawing away of the profs in Castleton means, does it not? that I shall realized my dearly-loved purpose & see Michigan. Aug. 28"-- In which there is a high tide & low tide. ++ I find myself the joyful recipient of a letter or two stating the certain coming of a student or two;& in the same mail I find myself the woe-begone recipient of other letters stating the certain staying away of a student or two.! ++++ R.G. Williams is vanished from my horizon! I have lived to see this day! Aug. 30"-'74-- A day of peace in country places. +++ Tonight I could pray for my boy & it has seemed sure, so sure, that he should be preserved from evil, for my faith grows stronger & stronger. Sept. 1"-- In which the tendencies are domestic. I sit on the upper piazza & aspire to make good sheets! +++ The day is full of the thoughts that almost always come with stitches. Someof them are restless; but those that stay are calm & full of courage. I feel so sure that the best shall be for me & mine. Sept. 4"-74-- In which I am at the height of all dreariness. ++ Which means that the Normal School is not filling by tens & dozens. ++ How am I to get up any spirit? I must find a way out of this. Come-arouse! The generations are calling & you are not a hero! sept. 6"-- In which there comes a growing comfort & a Sabbath peace. I wish I could make myself feel something away down deep - as deep as I ever feel. What is going to come upon me to bring me out of this valley?Sept. 10"-'74-- +++ The Board has met & it is done. E.J. Hyde is principal. God is plainly calling me to do a hard thing - To stay here & take the lower place - to stand here in the dark & suffer! Sept. 13"-- In which I am quiet a few minutes. How well for me it is! Anybody like me ought to be quiet a great many minutes: but my life spins on ++ while all the time I am wishing so still to myself that I had a little home & my work could lie inside of it. +++ I take all my steps in a maze - for where do they lead? Sept. 21"-- +++ I come back from the dear little home-visit with the firm purpose of making all the peoplepossible glad that I am to live among them! Sept. 24"-'74-- In which my hands are unequal to their burdens. Oct. 3"-- In which the King comes to his own. ++ It seemed God's message when the doctor came & took us up to the lake & among the woods & hills. ++ Was I ever known to forget my rides -- they form epochs! Oct. 5"-- ++ This girl is a mystery unto herself. She might be always kind, tender-hearted, forgiving - but she is far from it. O-God help her! Oct. 7" +++ Work is a delightful solace tho' I can't talk & explain. I sit in a grim silence which means only sorrow.Oct. 9"-74-- In which the evening is long & quiet to myself alone - one of my lovely times when I can bear to look out upon things as they are & not lose heart Oct 11"-- In which the day is delighted in ++++ It is easy to be homesick but I won't let me. ++ Everything cosy [cozy], even a cosy [cozy] thought, is a comfort - & I find a few. Oct. 12"-- ++ My courage is slowly coming back, as the old work is taken up & the put-away things are taken out. How funny all my dreams see - I who was to have been at Michigan! Oct. 13"-- ++ A metamorphosis going on. A cross girl is to be fixed over into a sunny girl. Come & see!Oct. 14"-74 ++++ The girl wakes & clings - oh, how she clings! - to the hand held out to her - lest a cross word come - a heartless word - God help her! I think the struggle going on down here in the dark is part of the battle for Christ. I can feel Him so much nearer since the conflict began. Nov. 2"-- In which the leaves go & the comforts begin to take their place. Nov. 3"-- In which the girl wonders how so many happy things could come at once. Nov. 4"-- In which mine is the deep joy, the unspoken fervor the sacred fury of the fight! This is one of the days when the girl likes to talk to herself - & to God. What she says in those still moments,let us hope will make her what she finds it so hard to be. Nov. 11"-'74 +++ I am clasped in the cold arms of Duty! This is why I am not at Michigan. You find me a favorite phantom chased & not graceful Sophomore. I am learning - how slowly! - not to expect all things to move for one girl. Nov. 17" ++++ I've not watched this girl today & I feel - as if it would never be helped. Do I not know the sunless depths that come after such a day? Am I never to be helped? Or must I be shown & shown & shown that without Him I can do nothing? Nov. 24"-74-- +++ There's a girl here that's wanting to go home. Some days she never hears the cars : today every car-ring goes thro' her. +++ I don't believe she is sorry down in her heart for this hard day. The pain is so sweet - the help so precious. +++ The home letter teases the child to come. Danny, bless the loving boy-heart! - sends dear words to me. Nov. 25"-- In which this looks pretty hard. ++ The joy that I can do it makes my face bright as I kiss the girls off & watch the trains go. How good life is even such times! Dec. 2"-- In which I make the world a little brighter for some people. +++ I take some time tobewail that I have downs as well as ups. This is also a source of regret to those who have to do with me! I stand the girl up straight & say, "Are you comfortable to have about? Then I'll know how much of a Christian you are." +++ I tell you what you may believe it or not but I'm good today. I've embraced Miss W. 1 I try to radiate geography & make the highways of grammar & arithmetic glorious. Hard job! Dec. 5"-74-- in which it's about so! Dec. 16"-- in which I come to a standstill. Dec. 19"-- in which I embrace my Mother & enter into rest. +Dec. 27"-- In which I come to a great calm.Jan. 8-/75-- Gives me the idea! I comprehend at once about what I've got to come to. I can get a good deal in a taste! All the joy there is in holding a girl down tight & making her stay is mine to the full. How thankful I ought to be for blessings like these! Jan 26"-- Shows me prospects of continued discipline. I fight at the very thought. I raise up an armed insurrection in my heart : but there's nothing to do but quell it & meet my fate. Jan. 29"-- Has to go chasing about for endurance. It is a pitiable sight. One can't gaze upon martyrs every day. Jan. 30"-/75-- Gets where the Dark is. These are cheering pages. What an addition they would be to the literature of the desponding! Such chroniclings of love rising triumphant over frowning worlds - of a brave will conquering & defying fate - of a patience that is not afraid to walk alone! Let the heroic record stand for "some forlorn & shipwrecked brother," +++ I go sorrowing these days for appreciation. Isn't this high moral courage? Feb. 2"-- Brights & darks alternate. Anything like a bright even with a dark tied to it comes as hopeful as the sounding tread of a victorious army to the waiting prisoners in the city!Feb. 3"-75-- Floats me about - My catch words do not of late convey any idea of fixedness. I am a spar floating, or a spindle whirling, or a speck wherving, or a piece of endurance chasing about. Feb. 12"-- Pushes into worries. The way there is so plain that I never lose the path. Feb. 16-- The girl thinks that she will do a great deal but she doesn't - she worries. She sees herself in the midst of things she ought to help: & some of them she does help - & the rest torture her. Feb. 19-- Do take a chair! That's the way people talk to you when your back aches. People whose backs never ache lay out the straight & narrow path.Mar. 4-/75-- I was glad to creep under the shadow of a trouble greater than mine. Glad to think of the eternal peace into which another soul has drifted. Mar. 21"-- Sunday - strengthens my heart. I am always so glad to see the Sundays come: & the Sundays here this year have been particularly dear & holy to me. Mar. 28-- Sunday - makes me fitter to live. ++ At church the flowers told us of resurrection & the sunshine made us glad. Mr. __ had caught none of the Easter joy. He threw his sermon at us, fiercely. April 2"-- All the melancholy verses of the forlorn poetswould apply. Minor strains wail through the rain. I grow & increase in ability to worry. What becomes of my religion such days as these? Cohoes - April 3"-75-- Is ready for a hallelujah or two! Delectable mountains have risen between yesterday's rain & today's clear blue, as I rush towards home & the little mother waiting on the hill. April 4"-- Being allowed to wake up in a christian manner is an ecstasy I had almost forgotten. I have been rung up so long! I never felt so tired before.Castleton - April 26"-/75 It looks as if there were a demand just now for a heart for any fate! I'm not on a quest for the immortal glory part of anything. To see me mount heights (stairs especially) would give you the most painful sensations. +++ I crawl on - & doze & doze when I can - & call it getting along. "Lift up your eyes & see!" April 30" - So glad not to have a headache. So glad to go into the schoolroom & find so much work waiting for me. I had thought for a little while that I could never go into the schoolroom again.May 13"-75. Something lovely & new is being done out of doors every day. It rests me so - I can teach 7 teach & not get tired a bit. It makes me just as happy in my work as I can be. The poetry of the May weather steals in & makes rhyme even out being rung up, rung down, rung out, rung in. June 21"-- Dreams of a better world. Anybody could with a lap full of essays. I know of nothing more likely to awaken thought of a heaven for you & a heaven for me! "How do you do it?" says Ignorance. "Why, re-write them, stupid!"June 24"-/75-- You'd better be careful, Fannie. There's always somebody near enough to get a part of your shadows. June 29" - Cohoes - The home door swings wide for me. God keeps me still a mother to be glad I came! July 1"-- Many of the interesting details which have hitherto been all-absorbing to this journalist will appear no more. There will be no more mention of bells or of anything that may, can, must, might, could, would or should be done. There will be only resting & dreaming with no money in it anywhere! I want it under-stood that I want my dreams aerial, etherial [sic] - that kind. July 3-/75-- I delight to record a visit with my mother & her mother in the open door. This is a good world as long as the mothers stay in it. July 5"-- Mother's short cake roused all our slumbering patriotism. We sat & loved the country where such berries could grow. July 17"- Crawford - ++ I've left the hard part for this last little corner. A little place is big enough to fret in. I've come to a standstill. But the Lord knows what to do with me. I am trusting a little.July 18"-/75--Knows how His love went before me each day. It came with all its beauty giving no sign. Night ended in day while yet tired eyelids lay upon tired eyes. July 23"-- My early ride was perfection itself. Such an air as I have not breathed since I left heaven, long ago. July 25"--Sunday - Lives in sunlight. Aug. 3"-- Lives in a What shall I do? +++ Everyday it seems harder to go anywhere & leave Mother. Weak-hearted girl! But she does love Mother so! [O years]! speak tonight. Open just a little way & tell me things.Aug. 4"/75-- Things look better to me today - brighter. As if I could do things - sometime. As if mother should have a quiet, happy old age. Aug. 9"-- Brings so much. ++ I was so happy I woke up in the night to think about it. I felt so good all day. Nothing could mar it. Aug. 19"-- Cohoes - Horrifies me! This page is for the desponding. It starts out as if it might be so bracing. +++ Yes, it comes over me - the darkness & hopelessness of things. Looking forward makes my heart sink, & I seem not to touch the solid earth. Why I never can go & feel like this. I never felt so before.Aug. 22"-/75-- Has a hope in it - that the head will be better tomorrow. +++ Talks at home have been more cheerful. It looks a little as if it would not seem quite so dreadful to go away. Taking up a new life in a new place, among indifferent faces sets me to hunting up all my courage, just to think of it. Aug. 29"-- [Woos] me away from life's tangles & perversities. It seems easy for such things to heap up, & where the biggest heap is you'll see me standing round most generally!Aug. 30"-/75-- I got up with the spirit of the morning in me, & everything that came near me touched some happy spring. Sept. 7"--the part of me that tosses & dreads things finds this a shut-up summer. Sometimes it will not rest on the promises that lie like solid rock under my life. It wonders if the time for sacrifice is come - if the taking what I so wish & yet dread to take is God's will for me - It wonders if anybody at home must give up one little hope or joy to give me this. Sept. 8"-- Keeps me pondering. These are bright days. Whowould think that in such days anyone would flounder in the dark asking questions. But I know who does. Sept. 11"-- Waxes not valiant. ++ It took me way out of myself to watch the hills tonight. I realized then that there was a shadow to lift. Such a dreary miserable sickness these days. Next week I must be better. It can't last always. There's been good cheer at home today. Sept. 16"-- Looks forward too much - & back plenty enough. What I fail in is "lending a hand". I look enough to supply all the demands. +++ Why-how can I make you know how dreadful going away looks to me! Sept. 23"-- Fixes clouds in the sky. It seems as if they were fixed to stay - as if it would never be bright & glad in my world again. ++ I can't say, "Not as I will." I hold up defiant hands at fate. I can be a weak little girl & cry & cry & cry. I keep thinking "I will be well - I must go." Have I not asked God all summer to tell me what is best?Sept. 24"-75--Lets the sun shine in. I kept looking to the hills all day & thinking how lovely it was. ++ Today my heart doesn't say "I will go" - it just waits. sept. 25"-- Stands in the dark & suffers. +++ The doctor has been seen - we know now. The day was so bright it almost seemed as if I couldn't ask anything but what I should have. Not so. It gives not & it takes. It falls upon me. Be He knows - that God for that. Sept. 26" - Sunday - All alone with the day & the pain. Sept. 29"-- Has a little help in it. In any trouble howI dread the first waking thoughts - those that come before we are wholly ourselves to face things & get courage together. Oct. 3"-/75. I noticed how bright everything was this morning because I wanted it so. +++ A long ride up the hill & drearier thoughts than I shall ever tell you or any one. I go off to bed alone with them. Oct. 4"-- Anybody would think I might revolve a little even on a creaking axis : but there wasn't any such thing done. I decide to think today & achieve tomorrow. Oct. 9"-- Has a ring of triumph in it. ++ God's great sunrisehasn't found me out but one of the best little earthly ones has. Oct. 13"-/75-- I pray so to get better - to be well. I will be so careful of the child if she will only get so she can walk once more. It is so hard to sit still these days & wait. But His grace is near. Oct. 14"-- Looks out for courage. Do you think it failed to come. It did not - it is there - ready - sure. +++ I am really getting better - O am I not? Isn't something the least little bit better? I get so sure of it - I feel way up. Oct. 17"-/75. +++ It makes me wish for the work - some work - any work. O God! anything but this! Nov. 14"-- Tosses - as it did one day before. +++ There's nothing down-hearted in the talk & I keep where Mother & the children are a great deal. When I do go off by myself the white chrysanthemums make me cry. The little thoughts that come of mother are so dear & close. In my thought of what I am to do or be I find myself in a perfect struggle. I can feel my heart beat as I try to decide which way is best - as I try to know just what God means for me. I try to see His way -but, oh, I so want His way & mine to be the same. Mother doesn't say much - O if I only knew what to do! Oct. 15"-/74-- ++ I go down to River St for Agnes - my one sister. I feel kind of sorry for this child as she trudges along, choking back the tears, as she thinks how hard it is to plan to go to Smith College - & how much she wants to do for Mother & the children. Well - well - we won't feel sorry. We'll just work all we can & trust God for the rest. Nov. 16"-- It's a pull & haul day. +++ I hate to have Mother get tired. I would so love to have a home for herfree from all this - just as some mothers have it. Nov. 22"-/75-- I go down to the doctor's & come back on wings. He says I am better - that I may get well. What could I hear that would be like this to me? Nov. 25"-- Thanksgiving - "Rejoice in hope." The girl that was down yesterday, down at the bottom of the hill where it is lonely, lonely, is way up today. I was so glad all day just be at home. Nov. 27"-- Mr. Johnson's words to Gertie about Vassar for me seem like an answer straight from God. I have so prayed that if there was any other way He wouldmake it known. Nov. 28"-/75-- ++ I think of Vassar & think, & think, & wonder if it is for me. Wonder what God's answer will be. Dec. 2"-- Brings the answer! I believe it is from God -- I believe I shall go. I get all my Latin books out & begin to climb the mountain is before me. Dec. 3-- Associates itself with dark closets. This is where I get some days & peep out on life thro' chinks. Dec. 10"-- A little better - a little brighter - but so tired! How could she study with the pain & the restlessness? +++ I can't bear lately to think how much I love mymother. Oh how close they lie - the tenderness & the pain! Dec. 11"-75-- "Let me hide myself in Thee!" Dec. 12"-- Gives me rest - not because I am worthy, but because He is good. Dec. 18"-- Insists on being an anniversary! +++ I feel stronger today & very hopeful. 1876 Jan. 6"-- A day when the steps turn away from home & toward a new unknown. One of the solemn days when we touch reverently all the little things that we must leave. +++ The last rolling away - the space between & the beginning of the great loneliness that already threatens to swallow meup. The ride up the hill to Vassar - the first look at its walls in the moonlight! Jan. 8-'76-- Will I go & be Lady Principal of Waynesburg College? says my letter. We will see. Jan. 10"-- A day when things don't begin. It takes an interminable length of time to get planted here. One has to be laid above ground sever days. +++ Jan. 14"-- ++ When I think of where I am & how I came here & what I have the chance to do my heart grows so warm, so glad that I know I can bear anything. +++Jan. 19"/76-Vassar-- A day when I lived tho' it! ++++ I feel a little fresh & good with the first of things: but on into the day I get to wondering what is to become of me. Jan. 20"-- A day when I stand like one bewildered. As given below: I want that position on Waynesburg. I just do. I want the course here - I just do. I don't know what to do - I just don't. ++ Jane. 22"-- ++ For me, the hermit, there was plough boy's work without the plough-boy's whistle. ++ Five pages of Cicero's first Oration, interrupted with flashes of Waynesburg. A solitary walk with a storm threatening, & my perplexities also threatening. Never mind. When I am oppressed Hewill undertake for me. +++ Jan. 26"-/76-Vassar-- A day when my career continues to be spectre-like. To stop & think about it, which we never get time to do here, it is easy to appreciate the feelings of a phantom, gliding thro' these halls & sailing around these woods! Never to be thought about, or missed, or noticed! ++++ Jan 27"-- A day when I will be glad anyway! +++ Jan. 28"-- To remove my spectre habiliments & find somebody that wants to talk to me because they do & not because I am alone, or a stranger, or woe-begone, is now the desire of my heart! +++Feb. 1"-/76-V/C.-- A day when there's a great flutter of things. Things here means heart. Put in the plural because I have a great many of them & all fluttering. +++ Feb. 22"-- A day when I sould keep his memory green! +++ God help me to fulfill in my life the best, the noblest wishes of the dead father, & care always for the one boy he fain would have taken with him! ++++ Feb. 25"-- +++ Worst siege yet encountered in V.C. Miserable floundering in Greek, & another squelch in Horace. I do get up stairs at last. Cry it out! +++ A day without a smile from any human being: & a long stretch of hard work without a letter. Vassar - Mch 5-76 +++ had my everyday siege of homesickness - the awful sort. No dear little Mother to come in. ++ Why can't I have her a few minutes? +++ Mch 24"-- Not a day to be blue in. Everything above & around laughed & shouted or was just going to. +++ Greek & dinner - neither in any demand by yours truly. A feeble attempt to walk. Abandoned! No more attempts to chronicle except the scramble to live tho' the President's prayer. April 4"-- ++ A great many bodies are packing. Found Laura Skinner at it & ventured to say "What does this mean?" "It means 'Exit Skinner'", quoth she. ++++April 13" '76 - Cohoes-- Here's a girl no good to anybody, wriggling this way 7 that under excess of aches & ills +++ looking forward to day after day just like this, pitiless & grim. What a queer standstill I've come to! Let's talk about the lilies in the window How they grow; & the pin, how fast it is opening to the light-- & the baby at the neighbor's window-- & Grandma so safely past the din & the struggle-- & of a sure safe time past all this weariness. No - it isn't for nothing that we hope & dream. April 17"-- ++ How comfortable that big rocking chair is with the huge pillows. This is the bestlife & the world can do for me now. The best I can do for me now. The best I can do for myself is to wait in patience for the sunshine to come back. April 19",/76 - Cohoes-- A day when the story reads not a bit as I had written the plot! There's just about as much of the awfulness of living on as there was when I came home - & I ought to be in V.C. this very day. +++ The doctor leaves some miserable little concoctions, vile & ineffectual, & says I'm pretty bad off. No, I aint neither! There's fifty years in me yet - good solid ones too! Cohoes - April 20"-76-- A day when I have "hurries to go". There are all beginning down there, & I'm up here fenced in. +++++ Sunday-April 2[5]"-- +++ It seems a myth to me that I ever got up Sunday morning & walked down to church - ever got up at all in fact. Little snatches of minutes between the pain - these take the place of all larger ambitions. ++++ April 24"-- It's surprising how little I can get her to caring. Dying or coming back to life - it seems all one to me +++ April 25"-- ++ The nights are very long. The great thoughts - the thoughts that have carried methro' so many unfilled hours - will not come to help me. But God's promises come & lift my heart up into the blessed places. +++ April 26",/76-- +++ How could I love my home more than I do? If God will only let me be well again - well enough to work! But I lie here waiting. I may be taken & these left. ++ "O God our help in ages past - Our hope for years to come!" April 27"-- +++ I get more & more glad of little things: a little brightness - a little ease from pain - a scrap from out of doors - all these have it in them to bless me. As my horizon narrows - as Isee this denied on one hand, and that taken away on the other, I stop resisting, & cease to demand. ++ Just as if at first we should want all outdoors & should say at last, "If I can only have this one green plant in my window!" Vassar-May 17"-'76-- Given a problem to work upon: To want to do a great deal - wonderful things - to be set in a place where everybody is driving ahead & turning out wonders - & then be forbidden to exert yourself under penalty of forfeiting forever all you want to do & be - & then be patient & unworn & light-hearted! ++++Vassar - June 1"-76-- Light & beauty enough out doors to fill us, satisfy us - if we would be good & rest in it. ++ I feel stronger to do & bear, today. O, if I could only walk! June 5"-- Dug a little at Greek with Laura. The Greek words took it upon themselves to be clothed in unsearchable forms & Laura says, "Lets hang ourselves!" ++++ June 10"-- Sprang to my feet with a delicious sense of joy in the early morning - of being glad I'm here - of an assurrance [sic] in my heart that my steps are ordered by the Lord & a determination that I won't be troubled. ++++Cranford-July 8"'76-- ++ I just love Susie, & it makes me happy as I need to be. Her home is beautiful to me - & someway i seem to breathe only when she is looking at me. ++ Aug. 30" ++ I am in the delicious dream of a may-be college. Dare I try it? I am asking God. His plan for me is larger, nobler than mine. Vassar-Sept. 29'-- +++ I know what one week of Trig. is. Fifteen more come up from the statistical corner of me - don't say grimly! You can't afford to be grim - 15 weeks. It is Friday - a breathing-space let down. It's like prairie-land between Fri. 11:50, & Mon. 8:15 - a smoothgreen stretch all level! Huldah keeps up an intermittent dig - that is her measure of prairie-land & hill-regions. Polly's digs lie in the last five minutes before she goes to something. Sept. 30"-76-- ++ Don't know who is steeped in homesickness! Oct. 10"-- +++ I got up this morning wishing I didn't have to. More cold, more strain, more something to make me an exact misery. ++ Laura lets me lie still & says nonsense rhymes to me whereat I rejoice. Laura's new word is "whaeck"! Oct. 11"-- More to get up for - so it sort of somehow seemed. This suggests Prof. Hinkel's[Greek letters]- & also especially those! We have actually left Chap. I in Herodotus. There is every indication of our making a continuing city of Chap. II. "Come up & gaze upon the felicities of cot-beds". I go. "This was the out-cropping of our brains", explained Laura. Oct. 13"-/76-- I come to it aching - I got tired - the big kind - over my rally in cosines. ++ The little Greek man says, "I will explain & then we will go on". So we sit & are poured into. It's a way he has. Huldah get a letter & goes around saying, "Poor Aunt Mag! poor Aunt Mag isdead." Somebody's always dead in the letters Huldah gets. Polly's letter makes her shout. It comes pealing forth from the bed-room & I take a new lease of life. Blessed Polly! +++ Oct. 16"/76-- A sort of clear grit morning. It is not brilliancy I astonish people with in Trig. - nor brevity. My demonstration only covers one wing of the college! +++++ Oct. 20"-- I am tired out trying to make my girl attend to things today. I had to make her get up in the first place - tendencies all against me. Then she staid up, in a dreadful poking way,keeping me pushing her up to this & steeling her against that: but now I've comforted her with the assurance that today is a kind of exception & tomorrow she won't ache in so many places. ++ O - one of my low-down days! Nov. 3",/76 - Vassar-- A sort of uplifting all thro'. I pray for days like this - ready for anything - glad in what is. Nov. 4"-- My birthday & how bright it was! ++ I had to be glad - there must be no dark guesses, no restlessness. There was help to see "the real whole best." "God is known in her palaces for a refuge."Nov. 5"/76 - Vassar - Sunday & I have lots of time to think how many days it is before I go home. ++ I believe if there was only a day between me & Mother I should think that day would never end. I am sure I never wanted home so - or tossed so to see it. Nov. 9"-- Could I get up? could I stay up? Rather singular questions from a girl who has Senior Greek & Sophomore Latin on her hands! There was a great mustering of forces: every available one was summoned, & I did squeeze through the day some how. +++ I have seen Dr. Webster. She makes no mention of death's door, but speaks of a time when I shall be well - bless her!Nov. 15"/76 - V.C.-- Huldah says that in the Bates Mitchell's class they are all "revolving around the marks." Heaven help them! Dec. 19" - Cohoes-- A good deal to it that wasn't consoling. I come home to add to Mother's troubles &, as far as I can see, to be of not the slightest use to any body. +++ Miss -- comes in like a fresh morning breeze. I'm so devoutly thankful to be relieved of my thoughts for an hour or so. Dec. 23"-- +++ I wish very much for the use of my feet. Have longings for the pretty shop windows, & the people withbundles & pleasant secrets to keep; want to see the cutters skip along; want to get stirred up. Instead of that I am a city set on a hill. But Aggie brings some of the good cheer home : there's almost always a next best. +++ Dec. 27"/76-Cohoes +++ D. brings up two tickets for the concert. "Can Fanny go?" It has not yet got fully settled here that "Fanny" can't "go" - can't ever go. She say "No - ask Emma." +++ Go! isn't it one of the nights when she would scream if she could go!1877. Jan. 1"--- I've found out how the courage of one is the courage of the souls that live near it: that good cheer is nothing short of an atmosphere: and even of a little patience the world has need! ++++ The worries that we began last year with are most of them here to start out with us again. +++ But I am a little surer that the storms are in the lower strata. We shall get above them by and by. I have reason to be more sure of a few things than I was a year ago. "I tell you that One knocked while it was dark."Jan. 2",'77--- The spell of silence is broken at last. Somebody has sent me a written communication. Huldah is noted for breaking silences. It is her voice, grim and inauspicious, that comes summarily into dark mornings : her alarm is that it is six and something, and I am too far gone to contest the point - usually. ++++ Jan. 3" ++ My letter from __ makes me feel rich - well-to=do in the world. I won't say that there were any bluish tendencies for her to counteract, but still I view her eight pages in the light of a "marcy".Jan. 6:, '77--- D. says, he starts to go, "Oh, I forgot!" and hands me - why, it was one of the loveliest things - L.s letter! What a new face everything wears for me. Jan. 10"--- V.C. and no. 11,d once more enfold me. Polly and the girls come at me. And - well, there's an example in Trig. for tomorrow with two solutions and six answers! Ye fates! I spend silent time with L. - bless her! Jan. 14"-- A severe talk on the married state - Parlor 12 all there. L. comes in for the woful [sic] summing up -- "It's a wuzzly world!" L. thinks there area few happy marriages - not many, perhaps, but a few! H. sets her foot down - "None - whatever!" We feel the projection of the great circle of hopelessness crossing our celestial equator. We turn reverently to the Greek of Matthew. There's no hopelessness there - no dragging down sensations. "Come to me" it says. Well - we are tired children, and He knows. Jan. 15",'77-- Head streaks of disaster in it. But then - why should you sing, "Increase my courage, Lord" if there's never anything going to happen to make courage, and lots of it, the thing to have?You were torn up by the roots when you got out of bed this morning, and you lay around on top all day. +++ It's L. who packs up 82 and brings it down stairs for my present comfort. Jan. 16", '77-- We aren't going to have any mournfulness about this business. You've got it on hand and we see you wriggling it through. Trot right along. You stand up before Prof. B. gladiator-fashion, and impress her with the fact that you embraced a hot water bottle last night and not Trig.-aches, and not cosines. She doesn't act as if you were confessing incendiarism to her, and you sit down,meekly, as is your wont. You persevere through half a chapter of "thought-weighted Thucydides" with L. and then her good angel comes down and enlivens the world by Keeping you up from tea, spreading for you a famous little supper in 82, and making you feel the blessedness there is in love. Jan. 24","77-- To be sure you didn't have your Trig. but as L. says, "That's nothing!" "Same problem for tomorrow," says the sharp-eyed Professor in drab. "You may get it." Another little supper with L. in 82. You peep into "Sights & Insights" while she lays the cloth and brings out the cunninglittle cups. She buzzes about & you call it "being out to tea", and almost forget you are a Sophomore with aspirations. Jan. 15, 1877-- For steady help from outside give me a day of sunshine. It is impossible to feel that you are fighting single-handed as long as there is sunlight that will not forsake you. ++++ There are lots of things left over that you wanted to do. Left over for when? We shall see. Meantime we are glad - glad for life just as it is this minute. Jan. 27".-- Undermining forces are at work again. You've heard about such days before.this week, though it ends with full noon, has had its hard places : but which one would I have had left out if I could? "Until He says 'Come up higher', let us be content at the foot of the board." Feb. 2", 1877-- For one day freedom from that pain has not left you for weeks before, and that has made everything you did so hard. You almost know, for a little breath, what the better day will be. Feb. 4"--"It's a lovely day, Fanny. Wish you could go to walk." Have not yet attained to any such paradise. Yet nights I dream of walking. +++ "Edith isgoing to read some of Hale's Christmas stories - don't you want to come up?" Inclination wanted props. Supplied by the maiden who wanted to know - "a maiden who wanted to know - "a very young Freshman". Feb. 5", 1877.-- A review of Herodotus is about to be entered upon. I like this way of taking it - viz. me on the bed, pillowed. L. in a chair, with dic. "Curtins" and most of it in mind, gives me exact meanings and optatives "with and without ar". I, purely receptive. Then we have crackers, and beff-tea, and Jam up in her room, and I am spared the dining-room. ++ Great uncomfort-ableness today. If I only could feel better! "Here I stand. I cannot do otherwise. God help me!" Feb. 8",/77-- Trig is over & gone. The examination did not bear as strong a resemblance to "the Assyrian" that "came down" as we had darkly pictured, though there was a slight disproportion between the number of questions and the number of minutes. ++++ How we've laughed today! but tonight we sit very still. To think that this was coming! Sunday, Feb. 11"-- The first thing was the breath of the flowers. Then the dawning sense that this wasthe last day - that the little Greek books lying in the window meant nothing any more. i got up with my trouble and went out where the girls were. Everything has been very sweet all day. My comfort has been thought of and thought of till I am strangely confused at being so cared for. ++ To see the day die over Sunset Hill and know it is the last time for weeks 7 weeks--! Feb. 12"-/77. +++ The sight of the little Greek books in the window, where we left them last Thursday, is more than I can bear. When I am bravest I can't look at that window. +++ It's all over now. I see them waving to mefrom the platform - my train moving slowly away. One of the hard times, Frances - one of the very hard times. "O Lord! only to be made like Thee in Thy great love!" Home - where are those who care also - who care most! Feb. 14", 1877-- Last night I woke in the night and heard Mother praying. It went to my heart and left the sorest kind of an ache there. How can I die when I know she wants me like this! If she were anywhere - anywhere in this wide earth and wanted me I would go. But how can I if it is that River I must cross? Bit it isGod she is talking to. Her cause is safe with Him. Feb. 15", 1877. "Faint yet pursuing" - to have this said of you because you washed a handful of dishes! Think of coming to this! Feb. 16"-- Yes'm. I keep very very still. These are not days for talking. I would not like to write what I am living. It is all too solemn, and I shall remember it all. It is not such days as these that we forget. Feb. 17".-- Saturday night - in the harbor, I. My boat rocks gently as the night comes down. There are cities full of busy people buying & selling; but I seemout of it all - with the feeling of one who is to be forever out of it. "Under His wings thou art come to trust!" Feb. 19", 1877.-- I feel as if I were following somebody over a thorny path between tall hedge-rows - and yet I know that it is not a stranger that I follow. Albany, Feb. 20"-- +++ I watched the little mother's gray shawl and black dress and little bonnet out of sight. I think after that I had the heartache. Tonight it seems as if there could be nothing grander than to have, like the Lord Jesus, power to heal such trouble as mine.
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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Transcriber(s): Pulver, Bonnie
Date: 1876-1877
Text: Jan. 13, 1881Friday, September 22," 1876 Such a sleep! How did I come to wake up out of it? It was the solid rocky kind, irresistible and utterly regardless of the foot of twenty-fourth street and 8:30 boats. But a mercy was over me and my eyes rose to the occasion at seven. Scampering to a degree followed and hair didn't go up elegantly. The tearful ? good-byes we omitted and caught a car! Operation two hurried into another. Pure insight, train on demand. "Where's my...
Show moreJan. 13, 1881Friday, September 22," 1876 Such a sleep! How did I come to wake up out of it? It was the solid rocky kind, irresistible and utterly regardless of the foot of twenty-fourth street and 8:30 boats. But a mercy was over me and my eyes rose to the occasion at seven. Scampering to a degree followed and hair didn't go up elegantly. The tearful ? good-byes we omitted and caught a car! Operation two hurried into another. Pure insight, train on demand. "Where's my baggage?" He thinks it's gone to Albany. This is interesting. Fully persuaded in my mind that I shall never set eyes on that trunk. I seat myself and have three quarters of an hour to tell myself that I might have waited for breakfast. Vassar you do look good! Polly and Hildah as of old and the new Letty. Saturday, 23. Last night my first in "number 12" will keep it's own memory green. This is exceedingly meant! We had been having a regular quad erat demonstration. Spirits well aloff................. Then I came to bed. To stay? No, not to stay. Made a great many gettings up. Scoured the inner walls to such an extent that each several member of "No. 12" appeared in night habitinents [sic] wanting to know "what could they do?" Nothing as I could see, Not anything. I was doing it all! Could they "hold my hand?" Permitted at intervals. Day amidst the virtues of Vassar blank.It's with a fierce cold holding on to me. Nothing to do but lie still and get better of the "woes of life" that had mistaken me. From home, my dear little text of Herodotus. Sunday 24: - O Polly the time when you were to order my breakfast and "poke" it to bits into my mouth has come early in the year. This which you promised to yourself in memory of that last Thursday when I fed you strawberries? The route upward from gastric regions was so well traveled on a preceding evening that a general lameness has lodged there. The President's first sermon, well fitted this first of things. "Let us press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God which is our Christ Jesus." There was the after church part when it seemed as if I must sit down in the little home a few minutes. Monday 25. - Not a day to play in and lay by in as we had a sort of way of thinking it was going to be. The powers that work out and declare in this institution worked out and declared ahead of the weather like meteoroligical reports. Lo: class lists at 8:15. I get properly introduced to"Room I" and "Room K" and then I hunt up Professor Backus and without a shiver or a thrill tell him that I want to be examined in English Literature. "Come to 'Room J' tomorrow at half-past one" We all sit ourselves to the preparation of lessons. The first of our engagement. O for a brave patience! Tuesday 26". - Feelings and things go on from yesterday. This subject is not fruitful in ringing in the new. As nearly as I can make out, I begin Trigonometry with a sort of desperate courage. I take a front seat in "Room J" in full array and prepare for a hardening process. Bless the home letter. Its springs bubble up today where no water is. We are leading a sort of floating life. We've no place, no being "put" yet and so we huddle. This is not a desirable phase of it. There will be a great coming round of things by and by. It is the time to "be strong". Lecture on the National Park. Wednesday 27". It's rather a pugnacious life I lead! I lend myself weekly to all the various uses I'm "put" to here and the marked out race gets sun. If I could go home and stay a week I'd feel better. This is one of very mental exercises. I get myself into "Helen's Babies" - and find it's "lots" of fun. What an era "Budge and Teddie" would be mother and Pet. They must have one. Not a Budge or Teddie. O dear, when an infliction! ... the book. The little Greek man deluges us with information. Every day he gives us Chapter 1. for a lesson, but we make no approaches to the aforesaid. We sit and look in. The examination in English Literature comes off in Miss Hiscock's room. Thursday, 28." - Let me refresh you. The first Commendatory sentence that ever fell upon my ears from Vassar lips has happened. From more less among the high and mighty, than our Miss Hiscock. An inside rising hereupon. The pipes in my room crack and pop and things of like nature. Very uncongenial room-mate. And the others say "Ay, Ay." Letty keeps a diary too, a bond between us. She doth bear witness with me that all diary-keeping seems not for the present joyous, but grievous. It is afterwards "it yields"....... We hear strange things of the Mitchell woman. The ways here are not plain to her! Friday, 29" We don't arrive at Chapter 1. in Herodotus yet. We are still entertaining learned discussions on that gentleman's varied career. The Professor's gestures are the principal thing! I know what our week of Trig. is. Fifteen more come up from the statistical corner of me. Don't say grimly. You can't afford to be grim fifteen weeks. It is Friday. A breathing space let down. It's like prairie-land, between Friday 11:50 and Monday 8:15, a smooth green stretch all level. Hildah keeps up on winter mittent dig. This is her measure of prairie-land and hill regions. Polly's digs lie in the last five minutes before she goes to something. I'll not be sorry when I get my trunk unpacked and get to living. O, dear no!Saturday, 30" Details hinge on a trunk to be unpacked and household goods to be set up, also books to cover. This canon of Parlor 12 is not to be trifled with. Effect marked. Room "d" is no longer existing as a name merely. It's solitary places are glad! The window is big where the sun comes in. And of our thing I am sure I shall near get in such a low down state that the big window will not live as a joy for me. 'Twill be a place for outside help. September began and ended. Old saw. Thirty days hath September." Sunday, October 1." Sunday the second October comes in with a beaming graciousness, a veritable promising of good days. Number 12 is five strong now, lately reinforced by a Bond. Four from her borders go to town to church and listen they walk! There's nothing in the realm of powers physical or mental that I do homage to more readily these days! President's sermon was on faithfulness in little things. Text, "He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much". The President has great words for those who devote themselves to great acts in hidden places; who, moved by a strong principle choose the right when they know that none shall praise. Miss Goodsell's meeting was very nice. Her talks always have something in them that take hold of one. Monday, 2" The heroic element comes out Monday morning when we creep back to things. I suppose it pays to have our heroic thrill. Not necessary even to be conscious of possessing it. I sit at table and nibble. Wonder if it's in the heroic element that one feels called upon to mention that it was "Saratogas" I nibbled. The only thing. Tomorrow I'll get a letter. When I say this I come upon a warm and rested place! I find small consolations in a larger hole to breathe through, more time to lie down in, a new way to kill ants, a ... the holding out of my watch cord, a gazing upon my new wash-bag. A getting my appointed seat at table. Tuesday, 3" Miss [Lord]. O friends, on whom shall her mantle fall? Not Miss Mitchell! Oh, ye dwellers in Olympus, no! Took the fearful risk upon me of bring late to Trig. Any such disaster to be balanced by my word from home. If lived in my pocket along side of one from [Maurice] through the forty minutes that sails us up to trigonometrical functions. Minutes of quaking to me. Prof. Braislin is so deliberate in the awful minutes between things, so sweeping in her sudden comings down! Oh, Fannie, I wish you knew a lot. Why will you not beseech a little more grit? Ants, red ants! I wish one of my afflictions didn't take this form.Wednesday, 4" A stalking in upon me of and unprecedented surprise, in fact nothing less than a document from Sir Charles Hughes. It comes of it's "bring a credit to be related to the late Capt. D.H. Bromley! Letter the second. This to me means a big house and a lovely evening in days when such things were [Poultery]. Emily, Yes, I know. To come back to more alarming things. Let us devoutly wish for an appetite. It is hard to struggle on here without me. Our wild will got up little Greek man throws at us his energies. As for us we act the part of receptacles. Bugology, hear the child. These things do move me. The skins of them cover every available inch. Thursday, 5". If it will be interesting to future generations to know that on this day Parlor No. 12 came near, terrifyingly near missing it's dinner here shall the monument stand. We all bury ourselves in business and become stalactites and stalagmites. Letty shouts from the bedroom, "Girls, it's truly minutes past one!" We all make it known that we hear by an instantaneous rise. Polly alone braves the living-hall. The rest of us supplicate. Miss Terry afterwards and life is infused in our starving crew. Friends, a sumptuous repast! A letter from Rhoda. It soars into blessed possibilities and my own status moves up. Our Miss Bond knows my Mr. Johnson. Shecouldn't know a better and I place it with strong tendencies toward her credit. My room mate that I keep shut up in my closet make a constant protest. Stirs me up. Friday, 6". Well, it's Friday even if all creation doesn't turn into heralds to proclaim it. "Miss Bromley to the board". "Cosecant 8". This sound has lost somewhat of it's mysteriousness. "Give each function its appropriate sign". A point for terror to rush in! It is the wicked generations that seek after signs. Afternoon. Girls scattered over my bed, girls in my chairs. Greek not achieved. Plainly seen why. Miss Hayes falls upon our lives in the evening. Grows vivacious over the new Miss Mitchell. Saturday, 7". Silent time and then Laura Skinner. Bless her! She is ay "a shining in a lighted place." Our enterprise agitated with so much vigor last evening can stand up and say, "I am begun." We do not as yet express ourselves highly satisfied with No. One. I proceed to invest in time at a most heedless rate. It was benevolent of me to begin on Mother's tidy but reckless will I cannot but condemn. She has taken it all out. Antecedent of "it's" labor, stitches, details. Invested in Cicero d: Orator, two pages. Not yet taken out. A camp-chair and my own. Just come. Five ghosts in the moon-light. Last bell some time ago. Sunday, 8". A being treated to an unruffled dozing until approaching eight. A finding merits in steak and bread and butter. To get into a hungry condition is still a novelty to [Greek writing] Bible class Room J. Professor Braislin treats us to a talk not a quiz. Happy for me. The Presidents sermon had for its basic Romans II. 14,15. Parlor 12 girls, as it's opinion, that is was worth while. It was a mental philosophy exercise provided. Amidst the direct abstract the president stopped and put this little reassurance. "You all know what I'm talking about." I precipitately throw my energies into a journey to the glen. Under taken with my feet. Some of me insists upon it that my outdoor airings be short. I come back from most of my attempts downcast. Monday, 9". March out of bed with strenuous pullings toward sines and cosines and presently I find myself where they abounded. As my head gets so profound that it forgets that cotangents have not always hinged to its cerebrum's topmost labs, the bell give forth and lo! I am in Room J. "Miss Bromley [sin] (270 = x)". That lady by a foolish process recently acquired evolves out of these dire symbols a (- cosine x). Whether the value of this evolution will stand on the books as 1 7/8 or 2, she will never know. A statistic. My darling ivy gets potted. Another walk and too much for me. She shall keep still. Old Greek days with Laura come back. They are over, and we are glad. Tuesday, 10". Will you hear it? Miss Martin has asked me to walk! I am so surprised!. More astonishing still I could walk up valiantly to that board and prove that "sin 45 [degrees]" is equal to "1/2 [square root]2". This quite takes down any ante ... achievements. Professor in an antique little dialogue with Miss Harlow lets out what Laura calls "some swell things to know." These to be brought out and aired tomorrow. I got up this morning wishing that it wasn't weak if not downright wicked to wish I didn't have to. The day has been not a singing day. More cold, more strain, move some thing to make me + an exact misery. Laura gives me pieces of herself from sweet hidden places somewhere. Let's me lie still and says funny little poems to me. Laura's new word is "whack." Wednesday, 11. More to get up for. So it sort of some how seemed. This is quite striking in form. Goes back to Prof. Hinkel's "[greek writing]" "and also especially those"....... Executed another drama in Room I. "Miss Bromley 180 = x. Obviously [misuaded] by her. ........ Greek. We have actually left Chapter 1. There is every indication of our making a continuing [city] of Chaplin second....... "Fannie, come up stairs and gaze upon the felicities of cat-beds." Fannie goes......."This was the out croppings or our brains", Laura says in answer to my eager. "Who first thought of it?" ........ Mrs. Johns drops in on "12" "To see who lives here" she says. The upshot is that we are to bring up our rooms in the way they should go - drawers, too, and top shelf of closet...... We are glad, [now] [in] [dire] and proper trial that Miss Bond fell to us. Another good thing to happen to four [mentals] blessed above others. A ... Reunion at Castleton the day after Thanksgiving. Authority. "Middletown". Will I come? .....Mother's tidy. Will you hear it. She's done some of it and it may not have to be taken out! Thursday, 12". It's so long way back to the first of things that I can't think of the strong points that hover around the beginning. I see a vision of a man tearing my room up to change the bedstead. This brings to pass a further revolution of bureau and wash-stand..... Chambermaid severely squelchy. Polly is not meed before her. ..... I do exceedingly fear and quake in Room I but I needn't ..... Greek. A great wings to a letter that is to go to Dr. J.M. and spend three periods on Greek. The New Testament part is since read with Laura. There follows an unmitigated (sic) season over the square root of 1/2 into 1 - cos x and [acres] more, handing over to us at theend natural functions, not to me! This from Fraulein Kapp. "Is it not beautiful to know German? The more languages you know, the more lives you live." Friday 13". The Professor getting to a realizing sense of the magnitude of the square root gives us another day. I needn't have "strained" quite "every nerve of the charger". The little Greek Man says, "I will explain the last chapters and then we will go on", so we sit and are poured into. Hildah gets a letter and goes around saying, "poor Aunt Mag." "Poor Aunt Mag is dead". Somebody is always dead in the letters Hildah gets. Polly's letter makes her laugh. It comes pealing forth from the bedroom and I feel as if I could take a new lease of life. Blessed Polly. Laura has been reading up. She rehearses to me not quite all of the mythology of the nations of the North, brought about by the probable coming of our word sin from Somme, wife of a Loke. Miss Hiscock comes to our room after chapel and brings me a letter from [Crecy]. ...(Chapel seating assigned.) Saturday, 14". Our day was "uppish". It started out to be a glory and the first of it was such a brightness that I said right off, "Now if this was the day for my ... sister to come" , but there came a cold grey part ending at last in a slow rain. Polly's curtains, these exercised that vigilant spirit, taking her from "Muscles", she ejaculating, "I don't see how I can spend the time." Hildah puts her soul into Trig. and from her comes "darkly and wild", "Oh, I'm so sick of it". As for me I give the day to Cicero de Oratore and mother's tidy and the evening to sines and cosines. Polly comes out with the journalof "the infants" kept at Madison while they were summering. She sets her foot down that it shall be read to us!. Sunday, 15". It was cold. Rumors are rampant of snow in the night. No visible appearance anywhere, but feelings everywhere. The President's sermon went on from last Sunday, giving us "the true function of conscience." He said it was three-fold - "To show even that they were amenable to a higher law", "To show them that this law was whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are pure & c" "To impress them with the need of repentance". The service seemed very sweet to me. My attempts at making calls do not bring me back soothed, [nerved] up or fed. Gertie Bascom's coming to see me had more of each of these in it. Monday, 16". A sort of "clear grit" morning. It is not brilliancy I astonish people with in Trig. I never take a cross lots method for instance, (cos (v + x + Y + z.) It only covers one wing of the college. The little Greek man takes this day for his rounds. Sequel, no class. According to the head of Polly's table, (Miss Whitney) this "ought to prove a source of serious regret". I am summoned to room H to hunt up missing hose. No Bromley hose there. "Come again next Monday wothout being notified. Keep coming." Tuesday, 17". Nothing very individual in days like this one and yesterday. Parlor 12 gives us little to help them along. A smart speech or two would invigorate us. I droop some at the first of the rush to the onset but I have merciful additions which take a propping up from in the shape of a prodigious home letter and a comfortable state of things in Room J. I try to get it through the little Greek man's too much gorged cerebrum that I'd like permission to make up De Oratore. By appearing very much enlightened and taking for largely for granted I close the interview. Then I sit forty minutes to see Miss Morse. This is one of the ways of doing here. It comes out that Miss MOrse is away from college and Miss Dame don't know. Wednesday, 18". I am not utterly forsaken of things to tell this day. This comforts me. I can't say friends, that my first Trig. examination was anthing of a staff. Pass on. I want to tell you about that ride I had. My coach and four was the baker's cart wrought up to a proper constituency with pillows, shawls and water-proofs. Abbott A. W. and Abbott W. W. take this thing in charge with spirit. My bones are rattled but not over stories. Not over one!. I am taken to the lake to see it once as I have never seen it in October embraces. What a perfect delight to me. This is bring ministered into. My faithful watch cord can hold out no longer. Reinforcements must be resorted to. Thursday, 19". Another edition of yesterday. "Through the thinning brances of the trees came down the last most tender kisses of the sun. This is in our thought every day now as the kisses grow tenderer and tenderer. The little Greek mand scared me half to death at a moment when my forces were scattered. "Bad pop", as Laura would say. A letter and from Susie. "That is good". Letters from her are stages in my career. Our goes out from room "d" to the poor stricken home that I think of so these days. Friday, 20". I am tired out trying to make my girl attend to things today. I had to make her get up in the first place, tendencies all against me. Then I had to make her stay up. She stayed up in a very "poking" way, hunching her up to this and stirring her up to that and now I've comforted her with the staying prop of an assurance that this day is a kind of an exception and tomorrow she won't ache in so many places. I left her in bed reading "Shiloh" which was followed by Polly's coming in to rub her back and Ida Street's coming to call. Saturday, 21". Came to dawn and consciousness with a kind of dismay that the night hadn't done more for me. But there's something in being up. My strength was good Bible strength. As my day it was! The order was, De Oratore, two chapters, mother's tidy, large additions, Trig., a burnishing of my armor for Monday. Parlor 12 with holiday spirits on; a flow of cheery talk and two hours of reading. This takes in Lowell's essay on Pope. A lovely call in the evening from Miss Healy. She is so bright and chatty. It's nice to have easy ways. Highly comfortable it is to other people. Sunday, 22". We are approaching the fall rains. Feels like it. The day fails to brace or invigorate. A proper amountFor "January 13". To be opened when you like. It isn't anything worth waiting for. of blowing would do it. Spiritual bracing and invigoration als fail but not from want of blowing. Mr. Evans does it. It is never edifying to have a man take pitch and preach in tones that would lead us to question his sanity were he to salute us in that way. [No'me.] God's gospel was given us in dreadful grammar with sort of throw and catch correction. Miss Dale said it would take a good old fashioned Christian to appreciate such a sermon. Gertie Bascom mourns the dearth of good old fashioned Christians. Monday, 23". Large Miss Ives sits at the table behind me and our collisions are marked in their nature: for instance when both attempt to sit down in their chairs at dinner at one and the same time. Operations began vigorously. Led off Trig. recitation and was not inglorious in Greek. Laura Ada Skinner couldn't "come down", "could I come up?" She did not mount up in wings like eagles; This, reserved for elevator days that have not come. We had before us the fourteenth chapter of Herodotus. Filed through him Ionics and all! Tuesday, 24". The bright has come back again, so have the pretty colors to what was gray and ... above. I had no idea of getting up at half past six so when Hildah put her head in at my door to call me, mark her vigilance. I thought she had come with a confidrutial communication, a fire or a flood perhaps. Home letter tells of a new bird. This promises. I begin sturdily on a letter that is sometime to go to Gracy in [Chelouse]. Miss Terry told us at dinner we were going to hear Mrs. Edna D. Cheney talk to us this evening. Some stirring around in Vassar's interior in consequence - attempts at concentration - a great many. We listen to a charming talk on Albert Durer. We return to explore our rooms for something in the way of a "spread." Seven chestnuts contributed by Letty. Hear her, "Why don't somebody get a box?" Wednesday, 25". Wasn't I alarmed in Trig? It was rather of an attack in my rear. Prof. Braislin was "on a tear". (Miss Skinner.) No approaches to "Number 6." It is so disagreeable to be attacked when you feel morally sure that your trumpet will give an uncertain sound. Greek, comments not forthcoming. I compiled a treatise on all subjects and sent it home. "Is that the kind of letters you write?" say my little Freshman, as she waits for me to fold and seal preparatory to our entering together with bold strokes upon chapters twenty-nine and thirty. I promise her one and pull my chair up to the window. Mother's tidy gets the last stitches put in. Are the taking out days really over? I cannot astonish myself to that extent. Thursday, 26". You perceive I am out of bed, whether by hopping, [poking]considerably or otherwise. This I forget, but anyway, the first thing was: "Why it's a birthday for "Pet." Then came a consoling edition. "She has that fat letter to read." Prof. B. still has a strong persistency to whopping triangles into shapes beyond us and calling on us promiscuously to recite several pages in advance of the lesson to her. This is a peculiar gift of hers. It begins to occur to me faintly, "what's the first thing I'll do". Feebly I trust myself to see sines and cosines that "ain't there!" Some of the day is bright. The clouds that rested on Sunset Hill in deep purple are beautiful with rose and garnet in the dying sun. Late. Wash-bags! This generally comes over us as we are about to put the gas out. It's such a grasp on one's nerves to find at the last minute that the marks washed out! Friday, 27". Started out with forces in stock to fall back upon. Prof. Hinkel starts out with, "Now I call on all of you." A few quiverings in my neighborhood as he says, "Miss Bascom, we have [greek writing] . What is the first [greek writing]. As the Professor proceeds we get fully settled in the fact that Greek as a study is exceedingly prolific in things to know. A letter from Satie stirs up Reunion. Well, there's things to take into consideration, pocket-books and [sore] places in front. I have an uplifting as I get into that library, and can't get out. O, what ever came to me like this?"Sometimes the work and the gift are nigh!" Saturday, 28". Advance sheets of a snow storm that is coming along in a month or two. Just the kind of a day with it's mists and it's gray clouds to make you thing of cosy goings on you've had sometime, to make it nice to sit still by the window and read De Oratore. "Rape of the Locke". This was to be our set apart portion at 11.15. Applause from the audience. Also two chapters of "Essay on Man". "How wise we are. In our crockery jar!" Latin out of the way I try another reading circle, one of the attempts of the class of '79. The getting with folks was what came of it to me. Good to have. I try an early bed and Alton Locke. Amusement is afforded me outside of this my Miss Littlefield's encounter with Polly, Our unselfish glorious Polly! Think of her holding back anything from the hungry starving poor! Sunday, 29". Two dear full sermons today by Dr. Weston of Crozier Theological Seminary. They have helped me to places further up the journey. The morning sermon was the story of the temptation of our Lord. I was so glad to have made plain for me some things that have been "dark sayings" always. For instance, the peculiar appropriateness of Christ's answer to the first appeal, "Command that these stones be made bread". The evening text was that ringing watchword of Dr. Bridgman's. "If any man will come after me, let him denyhimself and take up his cross and follow me!" Who can come away from such things and live for himself? Why do we! Monday, 30". Well, the day meant to be glorious and it was. There's that to tell. Right into the heart of the blessed October we were taken and I had a beautiful share. Not from d's window but out where the world was in my royal cart. Laura and her Polly doing it. Of course she'd take a ride if they'd get the cart. Why shouldn't she. Did she wait to study the manual? To get into the quiet places out where the evergreens make them. How good it was! What if a diving into Greek irregular verbs followed? We say in calmest serenity, "never mind". That letter set apart to ... C.H.W. is gone. My soul beats its wings. Tuesday, 31". What is really worth telling in days that are marked off and divided up before they come? When one knows the thing they'll be doing up to the fraction of a minute. Can calculate on anything except the way the wind will blow to the sixth decimal place! Tuesday, this brings Cohoes mail of a desirable size and "write us when you are coming home, if you know. " Know? I know it up to the second, but I won't tell 'em. It is not very refreshing to go down into the generations but I didn't get my problem right in Trig. I repair to Prof B's room and get a smile which takes magnetic hold. We go letter by letter in Greek. My ivy has put forth, bless it. Dr. Webster gives us her first talk. Wednesday, November 1". Here into the November of it. That's where we start. A good time to begin things, the benevolent things for instance we've been going to do so long. It began Indian Summer fashion, a warm, bright day followed by a night with the full moon. Sometimes when Prof. Hinkel begins the word for us and waits while we finish we hit on the same word he begins. There are times when we don't! Today he began; " it is an af. af. af. Several of us came out with "affection". "No, no, not affection at all Effect!"Imagine our feelings. Every day Laura comes down. Every day we say "What shall we study?". Every day the Professor says, "I will go on explaining". An unexpected meteor flashes across my sky, a fine chance for me to enter upon that benevolence I was talking about. Miss [Dendney] of ancient faur sends: Would I, Could I, do this, that, ever so much? Thursday, 2". (The people.) "How fat you are. Why how full your face is!" (A mental wonder). "How anybody can have such delightful impressions and you ache so! Prof. Hinkel is still on the twenty fourth. Some of his energies were given today in describing the [greek writing].(long robe.) There was a great deal to it, (the robe) ending up with "ankles". My head had grown restless and "it ran". It heard "ankles". How much it did not hear it does not know, but with one bounce the Professor went back to have it reviewed and shrieked, "Miss Bromley." She looked wise and waiteda minute. She knew he'd begin it. He did. In the proper place she shrieked "ankles". Professor charmed. Half of anything in his class is all you need, ever. It is sometimes a little dubious which half. Friday, 3". A sort of uplifting all thro? I pray for days like it. Ready for anything, glad in what is. Even outside of things there's promise of sunshine tomorrow. This, too, God [metes] out. He will not let us have too much even of this helpfulness. An afternoon Frances versus Latin. I want little places left open tomorrow, hence this is, thus. My birthday eve, en rapport. How well 'twas thought of says my secret self. No one else guesses, friends! Getting ready, bobbings back and forth in Room 12 is as if something had come. Something has, Delta sociable, chatter toasts, games, sandiwches and in room K. We came back full of the good time Polly, Letty, Ella Frances. Dear me, isn't that half of it to talk it over when you get back? There never were lovelier lights over the sky of Sunset Hill, never a brighter earth under the full moon! Saturday, 4". Her day and O how bright it was! The last and sweetest kisses for us dear and glad. I had to be glad. There must be no dark guesses, no restless chafings, no forgetting to read the signs. Never a better day to be "patient in the rims He finds us in." There was help to get to the place where my eyes were looking, that calm strong hold, where nothing ever looks as it does here in the narrow round, but there are the meanings of things and we see so well "the real whole best". Polly came in with her hands full of chrysanthemums for me before breakfast, beautiful ones, yellow and brown. They made my room look my birthdayish, the darlings, but Polly don't know what she's doing, not at all. Laura brought gifts well worth having on a set apart day, pieces of talk and some of her own earnest living. There were Dr Quincey and Pope taken together, with stockings to mend and there was dinner, and Latin, and reading club, and the Greek of the Sunday School lesson. Not many free minutes to think in till bedtime. Yes; but I tucked in the thinking all the way through. "God is known in her palaces for a refuge." Sunday, 5". The President discussed in his sermon the question to what extent fear should be used as a motive for right doing. He thinks there is danger of forgetting to be as reverent as we might before God. "In these days there is too much familiar talk about Jesus and to Jesus. We do not keep close enough to the fact that we are [worms]".... Read Greek Testament with Laura an hour, she in a sweet close Sunday mood. After evening prayer meeting, read a criticism on "Daniel Derouda" in the "London Quarterly Review." Monday, 6". Talk about getting over Sunday inspirations, and coming down from table-lands, having to wonder how people feel when they're not horrified, or martyrs without the palm. You get singular combinations of them all when it comes over you at ducky half-past six that it is Monday morning. You hunt around for severall (sic) consolations, such as watching the calendar, hoping there'll be Saratogas for breakfast. Seeing that my buttons have taken it uponthemselves to evolve off your .... Then as likely as not you button up your dress and go to breakfast to find those potatoes that you hate so, fixed like slippery-Elm for [poultices]. Miss Banks, the presiding genius of our end of the table more of a stick than is usual. Ye nurses of good fellowship take pity, and Hildah, she won't say a word, and you get back in that chair and sort of want to know if when you've been "jolly" under all this it counts you nothing up there where the eternal records stand. By now you get somewhat raised. You even read the newspaper, and widen your perspective. Tuesday, 7". Rain and a steady rain. Cosy places of comfort inside to sit and watch the outdoors part. I made a pun at breakfast, "Hazy enough", Miss Carver will probably have me expelled from college. She can live through almost anything but "a pun." But there are extenuating circumstances. You see it is election morning, Vassar girls voted last night. Results as given today: Hayes 250. Tilden 57. Liberals 3. Did not vote 15. "How is it going on in the high places outside? All of us ask this question eagerly and many times. Laura brought me George Herbert to read. Ivy has another new little leaf. Wednesday, 8". Which came. The three-hundred and twenty-five appeared at breakfast. An hour after the two-hundred and fifty went thro' the halls their garments trailing in the dust. First reports bore down upon them, they having mailed. (A Greek idiom). A ray of hope at 11:10. In the midstof one of Professor's most startling discourses one of the irrepressibles writes and hands round. "I can think of nothing but Florida." Dinner solemn. Miss Martin sacred to democracy and a remarkable city on a [bill]. At two, Florida heard from, "Hayes". At every sound we rush forth into the corridor. It comes thicker and faster, "Hayes one fote ahead". We file in crowds to the telegraph office. Tea-time. The voices of the two-hundred and fifty are heard in our land. Bed-time. "Hayes still one ahead." Thursday, 9". Could she get up? Could she stay up? Rather singular interrogatives from a girl who has Senior Greek and first semester of Sophomore Latin on her hands, not to mention the higher mathematics! There was a great marshaling of forces, every available one surrounded every solid bit of ground contested for, inch by inch. She got the day through without anything worse happening than missing her bath-hour. One can not have all things move on pivots of his or her placing, not exactly. A little "Nemesiac theory" drawn from my afternoon. To sleep she thought. There came some wandering minstrel tribes "with comet,flute, hasp, sack but, dulciver, [psaltery]" and all the rest. She turned over. Something took the old man with the white horse to go banging in chromatic scale fashion under her window. This she couldn't stand. She got up. 5:30 P.M. I have seen Dr. Webster through it and feel better. Friday, 10". Hers not to make reply. Hers not to reason why. Hers but to do and sigh. Noble six-hundred! A Trig. "wrestle" just ended. She kept saying, "On ye brave", but the brave got on with many wrenches and twists. Idiotically she goes searching for tangents among the logarithms of integers and adding tabular differences that one would mistake for logarithms. Hildah "sticky" to the last groans every few minutes. Ella, energetically, "What's the tangent of half the sum." Frances, her spirit unquenched by logarithms, "Why, I don't get that." At or within the range of the ten o'clock bell she knows by actual computation how far it is to the moon. Delta sociable. Essay by Grace Darling. Recitation. Grace Learned. Reading from "Martin Chugglewit." Miss Stevens. Illustrated song, "Three Fishers went sailing out into the west." (Note. Prof. Braislin, "If Vassar stands on a meridian where is it? We ought to see it." Laura to Grace, "Maybe we're sitting on it.") Saturday, 11". A party for the Freshmen engages the souls of '79. They went into the council chamber to talk it up involving minutes out of our precious Saturday morning. With a spirit of self-sacrifice worthy of "Felix Holt". I let De Oratore wait and read. Greek with Laura. I approve of this, anyway only so that you get some wholesome discipline. We had a jolly reading hour. Letty in the character of Sally Blake, "I won't pronounce it right, I will have a pillow for my back." "I am so mad." We are all Fourth of July,ish in No. 12. Polly's Emma is her. "How very festive", says Laura coming in after her oil of cloves. Sunday, 12". A dear Sunday has gone, one that I shall love to keep in my heart. What lovely things do come to us, watching not, knowing not how closely they are drawing near. I could not believe my eyes when I saw my Dr. Bridgman walking up the college aisle. His sermon has roused all that is within me as they always do....."When saw we thee a hungered and fed thee" ......"They did not ask this to show in any way that they had not recognized the Jesus they were working for but in their absorption in the work for Him had forgotten what deeds they had done." "Self-consciousness is the deadly foe to all true working for Christ." "Love, indeed, 'feels no burden', talks not of what it does, does on, dares on, but courts praise no more than the stars that shine all night over a world where eyes are closed." Monday, 13". Which is the beginning of a strain not in any degree soaring. Letty calls out, "It shall be Monday morning", "I won't have one of my lessons". "I will go to class and fail up." The lawn is bright, the day laughs. I look out. I even play and think it's nice. It's well I did. There came another way of doing, a darker. ....."I will give you two examples. You may take them down "says Prof. Braislin. Down they are, down for this planet and Mars when we get to it." A little sociality to Polly's company, ordinary decency to friends and neighbors, attention to the things the doctor told you to do. You'd think she'd tend to these. But no, She's in deep water and she cannot swim. This is what it amounts to. The last thing of the last minute when distraction has reached its highest and the gas is wrenched out with a groan, "Done one." Tuesday, 14". "Twenty-two is to twenty-five as sin A is to sin B." No wonder I arose before six and dressed for breakfast shockingly. A better [craziness] would have answered every purpose, but seeing that there's no other way except to abide by the one I started with I'll keep at the pulleys hoping to evolve something. Lost. Professor, "You may take the same two for tomorrow".....I dare hope, Nothing has as yet happened. Not until the eleventh period and Laura comes and reads me her letter from Miss ..., do I regain the status I fell from yester morn. I even get back enough to things of time and sense to ask how the election returns read and if Hayes is to be chief among us. What I hear: "Hayes is unquestionably elected." U.Y.World. Wednesday, 15". Imagine the consternation that possesses me when I went to class with my one ... ... . The one little way of doing it left of six hundred, and found it was right! We snow a lot out doors and get a real gay winter fit on. A real Thanksgiving smell is in the air. My ivy says, "Look here if you please, and just see what I'm a doing." A new curling leaf in the meantime is just putting it's head out. Hildah says in Miss "Bates" Mitchell's class they're all revolving around the marks. Thursday, 16". Was invincible in Trig. Could this be less than a tower to her? Got into no Greek valleys, hence at 11:50 a frame of mind equal to E.B. Culbertson's, so calm, so indisturbed by anything on a planet so small. A thousand wonders possess her. Why does she feel called upon to take up her weveral sheets to Satie with moral optionisms, and turn into a certain wise-acres? If I were Satie, I would send the letter back. Dr. Webster says I must get better, must keep getting better all winter. How well such things sound! Friday, 17". It is not with agility she goes to breakfast. Am I to wring and twist and control? It seems so. It keeps on seeming so. Take a stomach and put a bit of neuralgia in it and there aren't many worse things. I wonder if this might to be a comfort. Professor Hinkel doesn't believe in letting his sun shine on the evil and on the good alike. He says, "That is good" to Miss Dana and to Helen Brown and dares to ask me something I don't know. Listen. The elevator on it's first trip Monday. The quiverings and I go up to Delta.Saturday, 18". We have a good reading hour, "Tale of a Tub". Girls all in my room. Laura down to sit with us bringing her work. Whereupon I set half of me to listening to Letty, the other half to watching Laura's fingers in the mysteries of ... and transparencies. A dainty little ... a piece of tonight has gone into my treasure-box. It will keep. How very nice it was as I sit down and think it over. O Vassar you are very good to us and you have some dear people in you. (The Freshman party night.) Sunday, 19". President Raymond meandered fifty-nine minutes through a sermon supposed to be the out growth of "The just shall live by faith." I went out of chapel feeling as if I had "fizzled" in a lesson in "Hickok's Mental Philosophy" and the marking left to the "Bates" Mitchell. Well, we were off and away from it before we knew it to the next thing which was eating celery. An example of what we do all the time. (Not eat celery.) Isn't life a queer blending? Laura brings herself to me after dinner and we have a long read in Matthew. Then we talk and she don't go and it's nice. Some people are put together beautifully. A superb plan enters somehow into the construction of their souls. Parlor 12 in phalanx deep goes to "82" lock-step. This is after prayer-meeting and before the elevator made us ecstatic. Monday, 20". Professor, the little Greek man said "That is good" to me. Excellent to begin the week on. He has to be particularly like the angelic host to be so promiscuous in his awards. I feel as if I'd had a medal from the Centennial. Can I project? Feebly conceived fledglings are they so far. Plainly this spherical business deals with things that are not as they seem. It is not how can I make flat things look solid, but how can I make solid things look flat? I'm sure I always had good success in arts of this kind. I'll hope. The great geometrical magnitude, the one, the only, that we consider greatly worth while projects us! How perfectly blissful to walk up to the creature and say with assurance, "To the third, please." and then be wafted dreamily to the place you start for. To arrive there well preserved! Tuesday, 21". Think of waking up to say to yourself "a Trig. examination." Dawn must have given birth to fortitude or I near would have walked so grimly erect to Room I. Trig. students are [greek writing]. I descend when it is over and tear off the end of Aggie's letter as if I was turning the corner and the wind blew in my face. Sophomore prayer meeting small. Only one class meeting called today. ....... Frances is projecting. Thursday, 23". The things that woman thinks of to ask is a growing marvel to my intrigonometrical brain. One has such a sensation of uncomfortableness on the way to Room I when they
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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Transcriber(s): Hausam, Josephine
Descriptor(s): Ditkoff, Andrea
Date: 1880-1882
Text: PLEASE NOTE: Blank pages are omitted (in the original, the diarist left every other page blank from the beginning.) "The thought of her blooms in one's mind like the whitest of flowers: it makes one braver and more thankful to remember the simple faith and patience with which she bore her pain and trouble."Frances to Edith. -May 2" 1880- Dear Edith, Every word that I say to you this afternoon will be drowned in the voices of those bells. Chimes, my dear. The Cathedral is...
Show morePLEASE NOTE: Blank pages are omitted (in the original, the diarist left every other page blank from the beginning.) "The thought of her blooms in one's mind like the whitest of flowers: it makes one braver and more thankful to remember the simple faith and patience with which she bore her pain and trouble."Frances to Edith. -May 2" 1880- Dear Edith, Every word that I say to you this afternoon will be drowned in the voices of those bells. Chimes, my dear. The Cathedral is at the top of the hill just above. They've been calling joyously this long time, those bells. Now they are rolling slowly the Venite, adoramus. I can't keep them out this letter - I just can't do it. The Venite adoramus - perhaps that's given us to pitch from! I wonder if I can get Frances & the afternoon up to it. I didn't think so a minute ago when I sat down in this May rainstorm; but if the chimes come along and ring the gladness in, we shall just have to take it & pitch higher - that's all. ++++++++ You were good to write me. I think of you as very busy always. It is such a busy world & you are so strong to do "The Lord hath need of you". I like to think about you, & some other dear people that I know on my still days - & have many days that are only this. +++++++++++++June 2" 1880 Well, dear, I have put the "June 2" " down & I have been sitting here ever since looking at it. There's something in the look of the word that makes my heart warm & glad. It comes to me, the June of the world, with a delicious undercurrent of joy, always. I cannot imagine any sorrow that would quite crush this feeling out of my heart. Just because there is such a thing as June, & just because there is such a girl as I - well, I know I never feel so sure that I ought to be glad of this last fact as I do in this kind of an air & this kind of a day - nor so sure of what's coming. You know, of course, the name goes back to the Mr. Olympus of things. Good & royal, isn't it? "Sacred to Juno," says the lexicon. "Sacred" - that sounds good, too. I'm glad we got our June from the celestials. Somebody else is thinking of the royal mountain, too. I take this from her last letter: "We sat down on a stone, Home & I, & entered into conversation, & this is what he told me -" Then the bright-eyed Athene went away to Olympus, where they say the seats of the gods ever steadfast abide: nor is it shaken by the wind, nor ever wet with rain, nor is there snow there, but cloudless the pure ether is outspread, & white splendor over lies it; here the blessed gods rejoice all the day long'." +++++++ I'm going to bring you right into this minute, into my most comfortable thought. It's that word "take". It seems so restful - the feeling that just the being ready, the putting out of our hands is the whole of our part of it for so many of the "good & perfect gifts". There is so much waiting for us if we can only get to the taking point. Did you ever notice in the Testament how it is "receive ye" - "receive ye" - & "take ye" - "take ye" all the way through? ++++ Is it as good a thought to you, I wonder, as to me - that we can be still & just "take"? That with all our reading & striving we can never come into possession of the best of the "comforter", even, but that it cometh" � we have only to be quiet & "take". ++++++++++++ Talk to me sometimes about your sisters. I have an insatiable interest in other people's little sisters. I tried to keep my sister little, but I couldn't. She would get tall in spite of me, & old & wise & profound & I know not what else. +++++ "Oh that hillside of waving grain!" I echo your words. Do I "remember"? O my dear, will the grain ever grow long, & the wind come down & touch it that I do not remember! -January 3" 1881- Good morning, dear! We are going to get a visit out of this morning. It feels like one of the real visiting kind. ++ We'll begin, I think, by finding out what kind of a world it is we're in on this particular morning, & we'll talk from outside in. A white world - a clear, white world. It began away back somewhere in the night. To think of the clouds dropping down upon us such things as these - those thickinexplainable clouds - children of the night. One would never dream that out of them gentle things like these would come. +++ Strange night! strange world of clouds! Out of the darkness of the one comes rosy dawn: out of the other softest drifts of snow. Is this the message the morning has for such haunting things as dreads? They too are dark things. Do they mean nothing but soft sweet touched upon our lives after all? Light, or snow-wreaths. ++++ Hills are pretty good things - & they go well with cream. This takes us quite naturally to Portville. Yes, I saw burnt Hill, & the hill where the Arbutus grows, & the Arm & Shoulder across the river. I'm not setting myself up to teach you anything about Portville hills. --- We had long mornings on the piazza with Jean Paul, & Justin McCarthy's "History of Our Own Time", & Taine's "Philosophy of Art," & John Burrough's "no end".We had afternoons of botanizing & fancy-work, & the "Tribune" & naps. Yes, m'am, naps. We had little walks in the garden after tea, picked nasturtiums, counted the rose-buds, named the pansie, scolded the verbenas, told the scarlet & flame of the geraniums every particular time that it was just about everything that could be put into color, & the arms of the big butternut tree that they were everything that could stand for shade & coaxing. Then we would sit on the porch & watch the night creep up the hills. Did you every go to Hookertown after ferns? That is one of the climaxes of an August morning. +++ Yes, that lake - now you can talk to me & I'll understand. I've learned the language from that blessed lake Erie, from Laura's own "joy-forever corner". I didn't just look at it & runaway, but I saw daylight come & bless it twenty three mornings. I saw all the sweet ways daylight has with it : I learned what it was to wake up in the night & feel it there - lived with "a bit of infinity on my horizon". +++++++++ So you were not happy with "Patience Strong". The "too-much"-ness is against it. Quite right. The "so-ness also. Right again. It's a sort of herb-extract of everything that can preach while it's a-simmering. ++ For a pure lark I think Paley's "Evidence" would have been much better. ++++++++++ Your dear wishes for me & your Christmas card came Christmas morning. What a blessed warming-up time Christmas is! -August 10" 1881- It is such a morning, dear, as we could take from & take from & still feel that we had only crept to the door of its fullness & looked out. It is here to the heart of summer that we have come. No more surpriseslaid away - no more unfoldings - but the great miracle of fullness before us. We can't understand much of it, tho' we seem strangely enough to belong to it. It is only in rare moments that we find ourselves high enough to see even what it is like. Then we think of life unending. +++ These are such little glimpses at my window today. The summer that I feel is larger than this. All the broad sweet places where shadows have crept after sunshine; all the deeps of the woods with their manifold secrets; all the meanings of long mornings with the sun coming up; all the sparkle & shimmer & rest of water with the parable of color upon it; all the wide upland stretches; all the forest goo-paths with gleams of still water in the distance; all the nights coming up over the world with the sounds in them that only summer nights bring; all that I have ever known of summer - it is this that I have here with me thismorning. How rich I feel! How glad I am to think that if anything in life seems limited it is we that limit it. +++++++ I have been reading Thoreau lately. Do you know him well? I can't tell you what a contrast it has been - his cheery out-door walks & my one bedroom window that looks nowhere. I couldn't see one sparrow even jump from an elm twig. But to go with Thoreau "cross-lots" on a ten mile walk - that was quite another thing. There wouldn't be a note nor a flutter up in the woods, there would be a thing to know about a swamp or a pasture that Thoreau couldn't tell you, & you feel all the time like poking him up to say more. ++ It is good in this age of hurry to stop & hear Mr. Thoreau talk about minnows, or, if you please, scarlet raks or ripe apples. Think of getting out of your room to do it! ++++++++++++ I do not like to talk of myself & of my sickness, but I must talk this little bitto you. +++ There is a strange uncertainty in what may come. But whatever comes be glad in it-.. Let it all mean the brightest, sunniest thing to you. +++++ Dec. 19" 1881. Is it so long since we have talked, dear? Perhaps so in the counting, but my thought has held on to you so, & filled the space with those thousand little things that were like talking to you - almost better sometimes, as touches of hands are better when the heart is full - that it seems as if there had not been any break ++ but we had kept right on. ++++++++ I don't wonder that boys grow up sort of braced & toned up - that they have to cultivate that sense of feeling that to girl is so often a sixth sense. A girl gets so little of the wide free living which a boy is so often born to. And so it falls out that a boy sees his way though life. a girl feels hers. I suppose one great question with us all is the kind of relief we seek for our moods. There is nothing, perhaps, that determined more the whole drift of our nature, next to our way of bearing sorrow, than the way we seek relief from it. ++++++ As to H. what she needs now above everything is somebody's arms. There are times when to the strongest there is nothing like a little human tenderness. There are moments when the dear Lord's best message to us is an arm around us. ++++++++++ The comfort part in my own statistics is very large. I'm not putting it at the best, but the best is putting itself at me. I say to again, "Be glad for me, whatever comes." When I said it you before there was the thought in my heart that perhaps for me there might be the going home : but there was a deeper thought than that & there is today - the thought, dear, of the long waiting that is likely to come first. Be veryglad for me in it all - in the pain - the slow waiting if it comes - the weary laying down. This is the hard part. For this, dear, put your hand in mine & be reverently glad. It is the joy of my life - the crown of it, dear one, that I am finding the gladness; that there is no longer faint far-off dawn, but that for me the morning has come. "Do not fear for me dark days. I think there is nothing dark for me henceforth. I have to do only with the present & the present is light & gladness." +++++++ -July 5" 1882- Well, my dear girl, to start with I am going to give you a downright hug. When a hug is downright it is the best one I know how to give. But hugs in this world have their limitations. As I have been known to remark on several occasions there are several things more satisfactory than a hug with a metal pen. But here it is, my dear - takeit quick. It is only one more thing - I say this settling back & putting on my - why, no - not spectacles - surely what do people put on when they settle back to begin a moral reflection - people, I mean who have outgrown their airs & haven't yet come to spectacles? Well, as I had begun to remark, it (this hug, mind!) is only one more thing that has to stand in this world for a great deal better something somewhere! +++++++++++ I am looking this morning straight up into the elm trees & my thought gets all tangled up there where the leaves grow so thick & the limbs cross. In one of them there's a bird's nest. I take the greatest delight in giving you this little peep at it. I think you are one of the people the birds would be sure to tell. I don't know any house around us that's capable of making more poetry than that little home of theirs - & poets, youknow, always confide in you! What else do I look at? Carts, my dear, & poor, spiny horses. I suppose there are a goodly number of sleek, fat, easy-going horses that I don't see. Horses take their chances like folks - but how in the world it is to be made up to these other horses I can't conceive. There must be a horse-heaven! I fully believe, you know, that there's a dog heaven. +++++ There's such a delicious little thing in that journal of Hawthorne's that he kept when he was a boy? Can you imagine Hawthorne a boy? I'm afraid I imagine it less since I read this journal than before. But if you can say the alphabet of him backward & get him fixed up there in the wild edges of that little Maine town, & see him stopping his fishing long enough to write down what he saw & what he thought about it to please his uncle, you willbe in fine trim to read that little colloquy he had with a horse. I think of it every time one of these sorry, graceless things goes by. +++++ Do you know any horse real well? I wish, if you do, you would just mention my anxieties about their future sate, & find out for my comfort what they have made up their minds to about future felicity. ++++++ That bird from my big elm has come down for a wisp dropped by that big hay-wagon. How wise you look, you tiny brown thing! Isn't it a bit of rare good planning that that bird's next should be set down - poetry over all this plodding prose? Planned? Why, of course, it was planned, & by a Heart that comprehends the meanings of all beauty. The sense of the doing for us beyond our thought is wonderful to me always. The great plannings are so beautiful : but the little thingslike these - the thinking of little things to please me - the sending the birds to me - the springing up of tiny weeds among the stones - I can't tell you how such things touch me! It is like walking behind somebody - every step - is it not? Well - the cart-wheels rumble on; the poor much-worked horses go plodding by; the rag-men & a the umbrella-men, & lack-a-day, the strawberry men go shouting by; the milk-wagons from Araby the blest go crunching over the cobble. +++ Perhaps it isn't just the out-look for a Browning talk. ++ It isn't that big orchard you & I would like to jump into this morning - & the bees aren't in the clover. Indeed there are no bees, & it's much to be feared there isn't any clover. However (let us begin it with a big H) ++ some of "Parcelsus" [Paracelsus] was lived out & written out I fancy under the inspiration of cobblestones. I quite believe the sameof "The Soul's Tragedy". Perhaps there was an organ-grinder & a swarthy man selling strawberries. "Well, it is earth with me; silence resumes her reign, I will be patient & proud & soberly acquiesce." +++++++++++++++ Get out of the atmosphere where people "scold for a principle" and, if heaven gives you the privilege unspeakable of of getting into the atmosphere where people die for a principle", if it is only you or I we could write a poem. If it is Mr. Browning he can write "Lyrics of Life". +++++ "Abt Vogler" touches me. I can't tell you how. Perhaps some of it is too near my own broken life for me not to understand. "And what is our failure here but a triumph's evidence For the fulness of the days?"Haven't I fought for this? It's a hard thing to stand before a failure - big or little. ++++++++++++++++++++ I have told you that I was rested, & I am. God is taking care of that: but close beside all this rest there is pressing upon me the consciousness of the work that has dropped from my hands. If I had died into some strange existence where I knew nothing but the pause & the waiting, to pause & wait would have been almost easy thing by the side of this that has come. But to be dragged to one side & left, & to hear the battle going on without you - that is another thing. Some of the pain of the world lies very near me. This is perhaps why I feel so much, how real a thing the pain of other people is - & with it the wish that is so strong in me to help- and close by me there are such sad & sorry things - things that I have to know. They roll in likewaves from that world ful [sic] of sadder things & sorrier. And I lie & hear them. ++ The longing grows upon me to do real work; but with the longing comes more & more the consciousness that my hands are dropping. If then, my dear girl, I call out to you, forgive me if I seem too earnest - if indeed one could be too earnest in a world like this. If sometimes, when you see the vacant place at your side, you can be a little braver, a little stronger - if you reach out more tenderly to others - how glad - how very glad I shall be. +++ If there come moments when your heart fails you, or your courage flags, think, won't you of Frances, & don't, don't darling, know one discouraged hour! ++ The dear Christ bless you & endue you with power from on high! Dear love - always--- -Sept. 28" 1882 - [The last letter]. ++++ I can only peep out of the window for a minute to get a little of thefeeling of the morning into me. ++ The feeling of the morning! I like to say it. I like to stand & feel for a breath of that wider morning that is always somewhere. I can't say "morning" without thinking of it. Such a long, dear letter from you! I cannot say "I thank you, dear". It seems as if we had both got beyond any thanking for such things. ++ It is untold giving when one gives one's self. Your words are never commonplace events to me. +++++ I'm glad you didn't let me miss Miss___'s talk. ++ I was interested the more that she is at Michigan University. I prepared - perhaps you don't know it - to enter there. It was a dream that never came true; but I never hear that a girl went there or is there but it sets some of me stirring. My plans died, dear, so hard! I am ready to believe anything in regard to the possibilities of a strong friendship. I am ready to believe a long, long waybeyond what I have lived; for you see I have only sent out a few feelers yet - & I don't know much about living - I've only begun. +++ Friendship is a constant surprise, I think. I suppose life is when one gets to the deeps beyond its shallows. A strong high friendship with another woman is as incomprehensible to some people as heaven its. I think those to whom an ideal marriage has been a thing known & lived are slowest to believe in the possibility of this other thing. +++ I think it is so with H. She has had, she feels, the very best that any life could offer in her love & marriage. That such a thing could even be approached in the tenderness & love of another woman is something she neither believes nor comprehends. ++++++ I am glad you have found a new friend this summer. You have discovered a new country! What a royal time is before you! & how thesun will shine, & the leaves rustle, & the birds sing as you explore it! ++++++++++ I have never talked you much about myself. You have taken me on trust so far. You do not know how little there is of me. +++ I am slow about saying things - too slow oftentimes. But my hour for writing you is nearly gone - I cannot say what is in my heart to say - until some other morning - I hope like this with the gold coming. It is so near your royal month. One thing I will say. I have wanted you to be happy in your thought of me. I have wished it very much. The pain of my life has doubtless come to you to hurt you in moments when I have seemed nearest perhaps: but you have not known, dearest, how much beyond any pain is the joy that has been given. So, be glad in your every thought of me. The Christ has come to me. "Go tell my brethren" were his words on that resurrection morning. Darling, I have come to tell you. +++++++
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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Date: 1872
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Why are we here my friends, all of us? Let us in a spirit of love inquire! Mother says ten times one are ten! and we bestow our selves variously. My sister is priestless in the cantata of Pierce to either pole! The rest of us are not priests. O, no! We were grave. Went down to our graves, like shucks of corn fully ripe. All of us. Sure enough! Ring in the new, every thing says, and there's no, knowing what beautiful things are up that river.January Tuesday, 2 1872. Are the wrens and phoebes martin's we be? Mother says not. It's a question that has been upon my heart some time, for cogitation. Several things are owing to the resistance of the air. Maybe it is. The above is the result of my brother's profound thinking. Aggie dispenses love. We all do. We are a little love than the angels. If I hung my harp up, it was on willows. Willows stands for optics, mirrors, angles convexities, concavities and Merlins willinwood. Mother demurs.January Wednesday, 3 1872. Again. If I had birds I'd name them. Coke, Gum, Dr. Aldens, strawberry short cake, and Harlem Extension. I'd set out to liberate them when Dan came home with a change and mother had given up going to heaven bodily. The [faucet] rises up against us, and we are founded on Mrs. Leslie. This story is founded on fact. Miss Van Kleeck appears to us, and mother wanes. Mother has never heard of the Pied Piper but we who have, know that they exist, sometimes when there's no fire in the front room. January Thursday, 4 1872. One of my troubles is the walking. This puts the wind in the east. Slush is indescribable, and I come back accurately described. Did I go out to be stoned at my friends? Why am I out? Why, my friends! Brother Crip interests us by his ecclesiastical forthcomings, "What if the Judgement Day should come to night?" Nobody being able to answer him meeting closes. The faucet has it and visions of water commissioners yawn over us, with plumbers all shuffling off plumbing. Is that right?January Friday, 5 1872. One of my refreshes is Bleak House. Before my mind reached the present mature age of twenty three, once B.H. yielded no supply. Things is worken. Mother's ruling passion is old pants. I have come to the solemn conviction that new ones won't do. She'd rather not have them. Give her my old pair, a very old pair, or a water proof cleak. She'll first rip then wash, then color, then make up, & be very much obliged. I wonder where the shirtless city is. I'd send the boys there to school if I knew so mother would go to bed.January Saturday, 6 1872 Mother washed. If you don't know what that means, just be me. The whole day is a perfect treaty of aches-la-shapelle! and Ma was aches and I was shapelle! Agnes appears as Mr. F. aunt. Dan and Ed "move on". The former has known mother to wash before. Sure enough. Mrs. Husted gets the first call in the [...] little brown dress, the dress that mother put together and sent to meet me for Merris Christmas, made beautifully, but covered with places where the fingers were tired, and the eyes hurt. The call isn't old enough to be written about. January Sunday, 7 1872. Nearer to these, and the heart was in it. Dr. Bridgeman led us down among the beautiful things, so gently, and we scarce knew it until the beauty was around us and the breezes of Tiberias fanned our cheeks. "Simon, Son of Jonas, [lovest] thou me more than these? Lord thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee"! And the music said it, and we answered Jesus all of us, and He heard. Then silently with the holy types we remembered Jesus. January Monday, 8 1872. Eddie goes back to the delightful town where we've both been set down, and my mother insists on his taking all my precious [vistmoments] oflabor, cards, [pens], broke note books, and without bestowing proper thought upon the subject I yield. Mother makes tea quite to my liking and I enjoy our tea drinkings as a pleasant piece of home, something not resembling the stiffness and solemnity of our Seminary teas. 'Guess not!'January Tuesday, 9 1872 Well? and again, well? "Nice little beautifullest ma" says my sister in her favorite style seeking cold corn and finding none. My brother seeks other latitudes, the prelude being less repose than usual, and the drama a pioneering down to the train early. Another drama was announced for ten o'clock. It ended by Frances giving up going to Rondout. [Ad libitum-ad infinitum-et cetera air!] ["according to what pleases" or "as you wish"] Mother looked glad that I came back. I want to see Susie so, that I must somehow, but there is no somehow. I can wait. January Wednesday, 10 1872. This is a pretty time to go around sick. Frances I did not bring you up this way! And it needs fell into my hands to go up to the train for Miss B's mother. It does no good to tell me, not any. I shall never find the R & S depot alone in the world. No ma'am. I can't even pick it out when I'm there. I was sure I should know her for was I not duly around with a piece fast purporting to be her, and of course no other lady would get off the train. How delusive! I found her by great skill, which behold, all the other ladies were borne off, one was left. Who knew not where to go and I found her, and lo!January Thursday, 11 1872. If not, what? As near as I can make out Mrs. Brayton and Mrs. Bromley after an eventful career have been blessed with wonderful children. I lay on the bed and hear them talk. Wonder if they ever lay on a bed so and heard mothers talk, way back somewhere. I shall have to talk of other people's children when I am old. Mrs. Brayton has not quite spoiled my visit. I like to watch her. She has a [savor] of sunshine [pursuing] through years and years. And I am standing to look forward. All I can see or know is just this, "Wish ye not that I must be about the Father's business!"January Friday, 12 1872. Mother gives me a most uncomfortable feeling. Mother suggests, "My wife and I", I fail to see how it is attainable since my sister informs me that "she knows nothink, nothink at all"! and mother has no shoes. My back is polarized. Two sets of vibrations are in motion in different directions, therefore I must be a tourmaline. I wonder if Mother would still suggest porous plasters if she knew I was a tourmaline. I expected [...] this to be encased in porous plasters, having for a shield or buckles, a mince pie but things didn't work. January Saturday, 13 1872 Mother thought I wouldn't be well enough to go but I thought I'd better, somehow. The little sitting room looked pleasant when I came to leave it, and the tea kettle sang, and mother looked sorry. The nice cup of tea and the cosy dinner of mother's peaches seem too bring back so much. The ride I liked, all the way, but the Seminary looked grim, and I am alone of all the comers back. The house is desolate, and [Elim] only [Elim] comforts me. Come we'll get our places little pictures. January Sunday, 14 1872. Imagine me eating in Mrs. Slater's room, walking down to church with Mr. Williams and coming back to a burden of Gyre, dinner. Not a sounds in the hall, nor any where, and every body speaking in gulturals. I was glad when Eddie came up for me to go down there, to tea. I was glad to go any where. I send out feelers into next week, and the after weeks, and I feel strong for them. I can make them bright and cheery if I will. "Neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord". January Monday, 15 1872. And I've got to where it begins. The Normal again proceeds to flourish under the direction of Mr. Williams and his estimable companion! Folks come back by degrees. Anna Phelps of all these astonishes us with short hair. The empty seats of those that haven't come stare at me. I put a peg here and a peg there and slowly begin to settle myself for twenty three weeks. Would you! By tea time we were all established, place had joined place, and we began. January Tuesday, 16 1872. The piece of Albany that we represent is heard from. The wind never was so far from the east, hopes are built on roomers, and on Model Schools. We, up here in Vt, catch hold of our piece of the life that joins 99 Philip, and try to fit it on to the piece up here. I've make it do. There is one building fitty joined together, but it is further on. It is a part of the life where we go to begin the world. "Not here. O! No!" It was nice when Annie Adams came and we said "how do do?" Guess. January Wednesday, 17 1872. Everything that belongs to me has reached a place where the centrifugal force is 17 times greater. There are scenes of rollings and pitchings! My lady's chamber is perplexed but not in despair. School receives a new impulse in the shape of green wood. Quiet times! Cesarean [velies]. Yes, we! How do we know when we are striking the right notes with a human soul before us. And mine are such unskilled fingers, [...] must we strike and hurt, and not know how to go back and do it better. What I said to Anne to night was for some night when she was stronger and ready for hard things. And the signs how wrong I read it. Well? Anne needs something, and perhaps I'll read better next time. January Thursday, 18 1872. To day it was Jakie's letter. It sort of set me straight and sent reflected rays into the afternoon. Perhaps they went into my face. Something sent Miss Heath up after school. To fix things, and kiss me and say somehow they all liked me very much. Five minutes after she had gone one thought was in my heart. It came welling up from where the tears are, and the springs of life, and the earnest things. "I don't believe I shall ever be cross to my girls again". January Friday, 19 1872. The little something that came to piece out to day, the little comer from the great world outside, was Susie's letter. "I will be at the Ferry Monday night". The little girl that hears and has waited, must listen and wait on. The good time is for some one else, for some other far away day. "A few souls can wait". The old, old pains. To see blue, and live red. Unless Anne asks, we shall not talk again for a long long time. I've been striking the wrong key and the discord has hurt me so. Somebody else may understand and be the one. I'm afraid it is never for me. January Saturday, 20 1872. Frances built a fire, nothing that she achieved all day could afford her half the satisfaction of that fire, for the pieces that got together to make it, and how she knew, and how twas done was a romance with a sequel. When Miss Worcester came she was elected, poker. And the fire burned! At dinner Frances who might have been kept unruffled was very much moved to know that some piece of the State had also been making a fire. While she mused the fire burned, and she was a stick, a Model Recitation! Whew!January Sunday, 21 1872. Something must be done. I am all adrift. For days and days and days I have just gone on, and I must stop a little while and rest and think. "It is not what Christ is to us, but what we are to Christ, that we should think of when we are humbled and before God". we are so much to him, and he does see while we are yet a great way off. Like as a father pitieth, and I am resting and thinking. January Monday, 22 1872. When there were funny things! This day, when Julia Ward Hine lectures and I was to believe hard & hear her. No, I had to live red. Mr. Grady, "Like the jewel that he isn't" says Miss G. and its "Dan" that we're both after, or freezing is inevitable. My Model Recitation Class is formed. Miss G. and her father. Miss Bissell is trying to make it evident to us that she's the "estimable companion". Why, no! its me! The day goes out scorched, and it was me that ailed it. January Tuesday, 23 I go to buy shoe strings. I say to monsieur, "Have you shoe ties?" We have lazings! "Do you want lazings?" "I don't know", says she befogged. It ended by a venture on one [part]. Miss G. attends a lecture on Proughgress. She fears in mind the finis for these pages, which is, "And be carried to their nuptial brown with anthems of immortal praise". That's precious. Mr. W. approaches me on the subject of "model [recitations]" in Middlebury before [gums] and sour of [gums]. I am very much surprised. Spoiled another day for my girls, and with O, yes, yes, yes, that there was help for it and comfort, and beatitudes not there. January Wednesday, 24 1872 There has been no interposition and I believed hard. Which means for Susie & I, "an everlasting No!" No here in [El...] it means a sort of choking, smouldering gum cotton, all along of the State Association and F. Bromley, Castleton! The girls befogged suppose that mysteries are working about them! O, No, only Model recitations [El...] gets the most of whatever it is. The amount of brain evolved is displayed all around, the [...] reminds me of Vashti or perhaps Edgar A. Poe. Overcome by the thought of what awaits the Association she falls asleep.January Thursday, 25 1872. Did you ever hear of such a performance? Nobody did. The principal parts are. Go. Go it. No go! Passive Forms! The Model Recitation lies comfortably on my work basket, my satchel is robbed of its victim and here I am in brown dress and fixings at the donation! Miss child! How wise it was and is, and we all said so. What is like a country donation any way? Nothing but being a little girl and sitting down in some far back winter night with the old faces, the little round faces, them of some who are mothers now. Of some who sit and love us up in Heaven. January Friday, 26 1872. This morning we all came back bundled and fixed as you never was. And in the fresh crisp morning air why couldn't I shut my eyes and play it was Broad fields? What is it to be back? Don't ask, only stir yourself up to think what an otherwise busy pretty piece of my life that State mountain howitzer has spoiled for me. No wonder I feel so good with the blessed relief of staying here, and not going near. Act II. Sent five of the class home to write compositions. That's what we call bringing to terms. Not settled, as I should say for some things but, rather a stirring up a whew of things out of which should be thought forth a composition & a knowing better next time. [from left hand margin] Ellena. Jed. Luce. Auntie. H'm.January Saturday, 27 1872. Miss Heath is a Hydrostatic Press, and what of it? Only a paradox. I laid down at the door as a first principle, (it was the principle that was laid down), that I could not go in, it was not to be thought of. She made me! She kept me! and two hours of my precious morning went out in a note book at Northrop's, a word with Eddie and that Miss Heath! Long Pause, Dinner! And we went off over the hills to Laura's and took Miss Bissell, always genteel, brought her back, always one, Normal. Can she now? Yes? January Sunday, 28 1872. Elim on Sunday. O come and see then, if you would know. Sit down in it and hear what the pretty, dreamy little belongings will say to you. Was the half told you? "Winding down through the night", but the blessed daylight is full in the sunset behind us and in the day break before us and He shall compass me about with songs of deliverance! Wrote to Grandma. I am so glad I thought of it!January Monday, 29 1872. We do have to take big steps now and then, from the poetry into the prose. One thing I lay down for Frances, she must listen to me. "Don't let me hear one cross word this week!" Love your girls too well, please do. The prose I commenced with is grand to me. My life opens into such larger wide ways, and if I rest in poetry I work in prose and the work makes me so happy, poetry ripples in and the whole is like giving the little ones the kingdom!January Tuesday, 30 1872. A thread brought up from way back and afar off. A tender little thread that hurt so, a year ago, and the days that followed this last year. How near I lived to some thing, how sweet they were, how very hard and sad. How near Sue grew. How much we learned! and have since I shut my eyes and I'm there! To night I am riding with George and Eva through Market St. to Mr. Horne's. How plain I can see it all. Mr. Horne comes out in his study gown. Wonders a little to see us. Takes my letter, and we go over in Fourth St. to finish our ride. It took such a little while, but the thread broke and I came up here to begin again. January Wednesday, 31 1872. Mr. Williams is spouting down stairs and I hear him. I'll container! January is packing her trunk to leave us, and Spring is a little nearer. I have watched more than they that watch for the morning, and its so long! The day closed with a prayer meeting, but then the meeting had hovered in the air all day. "By me you shall go in and out and find pasture", and we all came, and found it.February Thursday, 1 1872. It opened with a Caesarem vehis! February and Frances! The latter didn't storm, she carried Caesar. Miss Worcester is mad! Yet [quid] times! [Quid] sorry all of us! Of my letter there is little to say. It takes a strong strange hold of me as few letters on things ever do, and the afternoon, and the going down of the sun, the quiet dark to morrow's work, it has made beautiful, it is one of the meanings, one of the signs that life is to work out. February Friday, 2 1872. I was pretty good considering. I let patience work experience. Didn't get any further than that. Spun round furiously, and little new old book, let me tell you how that the finishing touches all found bright places and made a week for me. One round little week that has gone out into as many weeks as I have girls. Children of my week, for girls that belong to me, & for girls that shall belong to them, on and on. "The rivers run into the sea, yet is not the sea full?" Anne came up and I said, "Stay". February Saturday, 3 1872. I can't look just as Miss Grose does when she says it but indeed "things is peculiar". Very! The sepulchered dormitories of the Normal School will be invaded no more until that key is put back. However I sit down to color lessons and twins with india rubber platitude, outwilliaming even R.G. (himself!) Sure enough. By anb by Mary Bryant comes over and I put her on the feathers & try to shine up, a bright little hour in her life to stand out and look cheerily both ways over the dull dark ones. Dinner was taking up the cross. Outside snow fell bountifully. In the home I wrote color lessons until my eyes like two stars starts from their sphere. Inside is was beautiful.February Sunday, 4 1872. A foot of snow says the Positive Declarative. The statistics relieve our minds. I spend much of the day in toasting. So would you. Its' [nill] to be all shut in by such pretty white walls and then send out dove after dove up into the blue, and feel as they come and go, the smell of hay and clover, and sweet alyssum from my summer home. Patience Strong's Outings fits in like Chapter VI after Chapter V, all of it. It had one verse. Shall I say it for you? "And his tender mercies are over all his works". February Monday, 5 1872. Even a snow storm to happen is better than to depend on Sarah Kelly items. Its a good deal to understand a stove, especially ours. If you would see me without a rival behold me at and around that stove! Do! R.G. bethinks himself, and not unlike Van Winkle stoves around. He would like Frances, and she nothing [doth] lets every ear attend. A new term says he, "One to begin two to crow!" How does it crow?February Tuesday, 6 1872. Mr. Williams selections for family prayers tends to build one up! We get a great many "burdens of"! Its so unusual to hear from Mr. Sias, and more than that. He varies in a powerful manner. Which disposes of two subjects. The snow looks as if it might hear us any minute. Hear no money, see no money, lose faith in Frank Adams. Who's he. For [zions]! Stand forth in the age of bronze, and proclaim examinations to my girls. They've [read] to it to most anything. And my hands keep busy [hive], while I think and think of my little girls down in Bennington, to come back, glad, or real disappointed. February Wednesday, 7 1872. Examination days tire me more than almost any others. Its a different kind ot tired. And we are on the last day of the old times. How dear every thing is getting! And as I think of it to night I am sure that all that is tenderest and closest I can keep always. I do like the work, and the girls, and the thoughts that are sent out and come back to tell me of the spring time that I look for with longing unspeakable. February Thursday, 8 1872. In which I make [...] said on Frank Adams. It's destined for me that all my songs I must sing myself. So I struck off on this one, having wanted seven days for my friend W. Who ever knew me unequal to such an occasion? If you know speak now or be forever silent! I first encountered Miss Peck and a regular [Ike] marvel fire. After wards to my infinite satisfaction Frank Adams appears and we proceed to a long conversation briefly touching at the class on capital. February Friday, 9 1872. I go down to the bank but no Frank Adams. Boy goes out, but returns unto us void. Disappears again, returning bringing his sheaf with him. The sheaf does whatever's necessary to give me the survey, then informs me that Mr. Hope's picture is splendid, very fine. This was a cause. A first cause to a first effect. Weltha Annie Adams, Anne Phelps, Mathi Abbie Hattie, Nancy and Lucy go with me to see the picture. We were twice paid for there came out on the west of the sky a painting that night that went into the night and left the seven colors which is white light. February Saturday, 10 1872. And I'm glad for I wanted it so much, and how could I wait to know? So I went over to Mr. Patterson's. Mary had gone to bed, could I wait? Wait. Of course I couldn't. The cushions were unruffled, not a track or a spot or a wrinkle or any such thing any where. Positively uncomfortably spotless. The old lady talked of health & school and headaches and dear me knows what, & I excitedly restless to know. How could she? "Has Mary passed?" I interrupted. "O yes, she got her certificate. Both of them did." Then Mary came down to tell me. "I know. I do know that he heareth me always!" This is the house Jack built not. To Rutland went not. "Drummer boy" saw not. Things took not off. Scolded not. February Sunday, 11 1872. I feel pretty good to day. So does every thing. [Souls] of heaven was on earth, and there were foreshadowing of unrevealed fullness of joy, pleasures forevermore. Does light always reflect light? never shadows? Jesus comes, let me know for sure that thou are near, and I shall say, "Abide with me for the day is for spirit". Make today, or it shall be lonely and dark. February Monday, 12 1872. Burnt hash for breakfast which put me in a very uncomplaining spirit. The first cause which is Truddie Brown is to the second cause which is accumulation of flesh and weariness, as the first effect which is death of smiling countenance is to the second effect which is unthankfulness! Did at considerable, expected at on to and infinition! My eyes are not Tracie's. I shall weed harts home to keep them. Data. A cold back. And a long long talk on into tea time with Marcy Bryant. February Tuesday, 13 1872. Quietly and not without touches of cheer, the days move on. I am so glad that Mary will listen to me, and let me do for her just as I want to. If I could only take her away somewhere and muse her, and see her well and strong it would make me real happy. I must let her feel that there are bright beautiful things to live for and a few things not all selfishness. Out of the crimson we climb into the blue. February Wednesday, 14 1872. And I took comfort in doing up Patience Strong's Outings, and writing on the fly leaf Sue's birthday, & sending it tied on the Charles Dicken's edition to go to Williamsport. A year ago to night was that sleigh ride with my boys and girls. It was such a funny time. Taking Sue to the doctor's, taking tea at Johnny Clark's & staying with Eva after the ride. Eva with her arms around my neck just as Weltha puts hers now. "To see a light upon those Crows which is the day light only"February Thursday, 15 1872. I am not writing this page at date, it is weeks later. Were it otherwise I could not write what I shall at this time. My dear girl's wedding day. Giving herself joyfully and yet with conscious fear to another so long as they both do live! My Sue. My Austiss. Are you married through and through? And yet, says her letter, they were happy after so many years! O darling come close and know at the feet of his Christ! And "beyond the sunset forever and forever are the hills of God". February Friday, 16 1872. I miss Neithesto ever so much, and look longingly toward the little place on my shelf where it stood. Pretty soon its coming back. I forgot all about Miss Bissell's birthday which was Wednesday. All along of writing up! Why not tell it now. How Miss Grose and I dressed up in attire beyond our years. How we sent Miss Bissell off and all the girls came in to see. How we called Miss Bissell and seated her in the bedroom while Nell acted in the capacity of pulling the sheet which hung in the door back & forth between the scenes. How Miss Grose got up the very taking little tableaus for me to enact alone and named it "The Velentine" because it was Feb. 14. How her little tableau was the [nap]. How we had a very suggestive little dialogue. The [boy] & rubbish & how hell say I then & how and February Saturday, 17 1872. how the oysters bubbled up and almost stewed over in recognition of the fact that it was time to commence 1. incision. 2. mastication, 3. deglutition. How after my cap had fallen off and been readjusted and one dish of soup had sought its level the floor, I calmly [came] & read "An ode to Miss Bissell" and a programme to be carried out Feb 14 1873, both of which were duly presented to that lady. Then she of the cap that would not stay on but fell backwards unceasingly recited Mr. Chadbaud's two most celebrated speeches the first beginning "Why are we here my friends". Loud applause from the friends. All this on the eve of Feb. 14. To day Sue's letter came. It was written the night before she became some one, little girl for aye. February Sunday, 18 1872. How could I help it? I had to be a little sorry, but I didn't tell any body or take on, or let melancholy mark me for her own. But of it I thought and thought until the whole grew so real to me that it seemed as if Sue had been married a year instead of only since Thursday, and that I'd known her married and talked with her and wore off all the strangeness of the new name. And my thoughts went back to it and back and back, even while I sat at the window in the afternoon and drank in the fullness of my Sunday. My work over the examination papers left me tired but Sunday rests me. I sit down under His shadow with great delight. February Monday, 19 1872. And the world turns around or it would never be the twentieth. And there's good mornings to say and a chair to walk up to and sit in and fifths and sevenths to add and roots to extract and natural boundaries to give and kingdoms to explore, and adjectives to compare, and corollaries to think up, and trains to set in motion to go noiselessly on temples to bear without sound of axe or hammer. I go to this. Do you suppose I think of it all? Not now, but by and by after tea when I go up to Elina and sit down, it will come over me and I will be so glad! And it does, even to night. The Father knoweth that I have need of these things. February Tuesday, 20 1872. The passing days do not leave any blank spaces. The living joins itself on and on to the old pieces and even our first poor work we have to wear. Let a day like this come, when the noun was more than ever noun and none of us verbs, then does Miss Grose rise to assume the benevolent shape of Mark Tapley. Miss Bissell comes wild possession of the body and temper of Gabriel Varden, and I try to be a Dinah, such as was dear to Adam Bide. I am coming to look upon knitting as a fine art, and one that I would like to be skilled in. Happy Miss Grose. February Wednesday, 21 1872. There I dropped some stitches yesterday in my knitting and I must pick them up to-day. I was talking about Miss Grose and her knitting. Sometimes there are days when she don't pick up the shiny needles. Those are her hard days. Then bright days come full of letters from Howard and she laughs and goes quick to the knitting. My graduated scale of ups and down is not thus indicated. You may look for it in me outward tokens [safe] now and then. Sometimes you can read it in the little old book. February Thursday, 22 1872. I enjoy the delightful sense of being revered in the spirit of my [mind]. I suppose its all along of an expected tramp. It makes me feel good to lay out the things I am going to wear on the bed and look me over to see where the stitch in time shall [...] mine and all other suggestive poetical things, that make one about to tramp, furl loudly! Half past eight, and I've marked it off in years, one by one. Ten times one are ten! When they go from us up into the mystery, if we could only know they were ours yet. It seems so long to wait. O. God to clasp those fingers close and yet to feel so lonely!February Friday, 23 1872. "This is the way Vermont teachers do" says our philosopher and guide as we wheel off in the stinging air, bundled head and foot! Auspicious is every breeze and favoring every gole. Which suggests not only life and liberty but the pursuit of happiness. The man beguiled us and we did eat a great deal but Mr. Dana's box was not like the broken cisterns that held none. It was more like Mrs. Williams' excuses inexhaustible. All this and more on the train. We were conducted on our arrival in Bennington tenderly but fiercely from the train. Thence to the mansion of Miss Parks. We got in as Weltha would say with a "Known crew" but other fate lay wait for us and [...] their house opened wide its doors to us. February Saturday, 24 1872. Thinks I. I like this! I'll come again. So thinks Sister Bissell. The folks were good to us. I forget their names and we were good to them. I forget how Sister Bissell leaves us at noon for the material roof, and I am consoled by Miss Clark. Our friend philosopher & guide R.G. surprised every body greatly by getting up to say that we had nothing to say on the subject of grammar but would introduce to the association Miss Bromley. Not less me! I might say, me much less. I remember, one distinct thrill, from the rest I shall never rally. Think of it! Scenes going home beggar all description. Mr. Williams and the small boys, Mr. Williams and us. "You sit here and here & here". We do wondering. Coffee and doughnuts and please picture the rest. February Sunday, 25 1872. And we come trooping into the house to find it two o'clock and all things silent and desolate, which we soon reverse. I go to sleep laughing in an unheard of manner about Mr. Williams and the small boys and the coffee and doughnuts. Locked in slumber I dream of them and so does Mattie. I talk some, read some and sleep a good deal. The other teacher does so too. I go to church and the most that I recall now of the service is small boys, and Mr. Willams, coffee, and doughnuts. If I remember right the singing affected me to tears. It often does. February Monday, 26 1872. Mr. Austin cannot take away from my firm belief in diagrams as a means of. It is a joy he did not give, therefore....[3], sing. I always like my school better when I have been off and seen folks and come back to it. What is maccaroni? Who first harrowed mankind with its being offered for sale? Why must it be set before me and no dessert but ginger snaps. A ginger snap is a desert, but maccaroni is dead men's bones!February Tuesday, 27 1872. The best thing we have set before our hungriness is rice pudding. How it came to be so good doth not yet appear, but it possesses many saintly qualities. We always have it with beefsteak. Such days too we smile on butter. Why all this but to make maccaroni more dreadful? I set faith on two [ch...], with from, in or by, my friend, Mrs. Foote. She duly promises me a Christian Unison which shall appear weekly. How long before I'll go and break the news to Miss Bissell. February Wednesday, 28 1872. Let me see. Where shall I hang my [...]. They will be done in oil and smile upon my whole room. I guess I'll clear a place for them on the bureau. Shall I put trust in [...]? Shall I know of a surety they will be here? or will all the Halicamassus tribe stand on their wall of unbelief and point at me. Will not some guardian genius interpose and give Miss Bissell & I a theme to talk about at table? Minister thus, unto us, or we shall call upon the coffe cups, the soup plates, to hide us from the face of Mrs. W. February Thursday, 29 1872. Again the big noise in our house was me. Twasn't bringing a trunk down nor taking a trunk up but taking Mr. Williams down and bringing life liberty and the pursuit of happiness up. Was supposed to but then people never do, when they go to work that way. You mustn't scold unless you want to ease your mind or see what you can do, or show a man that you are not afraid, or give him and idea of his [meanness] but to carry a point never. Take a silken shuttle and silken thread and spin a man into any thing you want, but don't scold him. Then I ran over to take tea with the girls. March Friday, 1 1872. What girls? Who do I tea with any more save Mary, Abbie and Mattie? Bless your heart, they're enough. So would you have been surprised, as much as me. A real, live sleigh ride! Why I'd as soon thought to see John Brown's soul marching on, and there it was with Miss Heath and a boy and me to get right in, and go before the snow went. A bright thought was the offspring of this command, "I'll make them leave me at Miss G's". Apparently guiltless of my planning I ride and talk and listen to Miss Heath's fullest accounts of how she teaches Geography and how she has the asthma. I quietly ask when we reach the brown house if they'd as soon leave me there. Wicked child. March Saturday, 2 1872. How did you live? Doing so. [diagram] Yes'm! Mr. Grose queries. Mrs. Grose wonders. Miss Grose interferes, and makes strong appeals. I listen but relent not. By and by the people come and we all sit around in the cosy kitchen for the covenant meeting. The covenant of His [pence] overshadows us and we sit under the shadow with great delight. Most of the words were spoken by men & women who had grown gentle and childlike in long year of walking with God. It is all so sweet, so restful, so unlike the strife & harshness of living young. March Sunday, 3 1872. Is a vow any the less holy because a repeated one? Not to me. I feel more solemnly than I could possibly have done the first time what it is to pledge myself before God and his church to walk in love, in faith, in meekness, in Christian forbearance and self sacrificing [patience] with the people of God! Jesus, come down into my garden, breathe upon it that the spicec may flow out!March Monday, 4 1872. And we both sleighed up from Hydevill, guessing what this week would bring. Pretty well I thank you. Mr. Hart who sits himself up to write "fax" says, it is unlawful to write "up", in diary keeping. Probably so. Nevertheless I write up, every Sunday! "A diary" says he "is a record of events". Mine aint, hence it is no diary. It isn't an editorial. Isn't and essay nor "News", nor Fiction. Its a treatise! Then, moreover being the product of a creative imagination must be versification! Treatise. {diagram}March Tuesday, 5 1872. Mr. Williams is on a perfect rampage. Stands primed and ready to go off any minute, usually. Lately he runs around to hunt up things to go off about. Hawklike in his nature he looks for a chicken and finds one, Miss G. The burden of the valley of vision. I've heard of four footed hearts and creeping things and fowls of the air! [Don't] remember to have seen, then combined before, which discourse admits of no further heads. Do I like Sarter Resartus? Yes'm. Do I get cross any? Not much. There's untold sunshine down deep and it torches me and shines for me. March Wednesday, 6 1872. How can I tell it? Of course it was the prayer meeting. I mean The "Lo I am with you", made it holy and we came and rested. It was so dear to me to hear Lucy say in my car going out, "Please pray for me", and Abbie say, "I will try and pray more earnestly", and Anne say "Jesus is nearer than He has been for weeks", and by and by in the evening to hear Annie say, "I will speak next time". "A hundred fold in this life", That is all I can think of. I am almost sure Addie has at last decided for Jesus. I wish the old happly look would come back. Dear Mrs. Browning "It is beautiful!" The half [hear] after day break.March Thursday, 7 1872. Our friend Master Willis Hyde is marched against. R.G. thinks Willie and his eggs are poles of the same battery and suggests something of the kind to him. Slightly [detestful] to Willis, who objects to such delicate insinuations. Annie Adams looks like an untimely frost, bluely dreadful. We're all sorry but there's a never failing cure. Is Miss Patch cross. Patch? Dear me! knows! I should think it was! and without the best of my knowledge and belief. It's all been planned and I'm to be Barbara. Nice old lady to stick her head out of some illy fastened window and scream a la Grandma Nash, "Shoot if you must this old grey head". I see it all. However I must go back to United State Constituted [tabulated], Judiciated! March Friday, 8 1872. "Things is happening most years" all of which I affirm it my solemn intention to believe. Nothing could have made me out of sorts, for Susie's letter came, written by her own self, and it kept close to me every minute. "I shall never see the little home again. Does that look hard? It would be only the dear Christ has made it easy". It seems easier now for me to fear it but I am not brave enough for the present to open the gate into the last three sermons. Not yet. I shall be stronger by and by, and there went in once more to composition which I stride, and much more which I stood and can stand and be not at all overpowered. I simply said, "Mr. W., Since I have been informed that questions are to be settled by force of power I have nothing more to say"! [Surrendeth].March Saturday, 9 1872. The right proportions says Miss G. is an ounce of serpent to a pound of dove. She was in my room writing a cross letter, both of us cross every where but inside! We be, Miss Worcester wants to know, "Do I tabulate food, clothing diagram, what I don't tabulate? Do tell her. Sort of a meat hash Saturday afternoon. First we sat down in the midst of visual angles and took to [Phataswagon's]. Laura said several remarkably bright things, Mr. Williams prays with his eyes open. She wonders if it isn't time his convexity was nullified. Then we went at with [...] and there was bread to tend to. Annie is fixed for a breathing space, (in Mary's room, by the window). O, how it tires me! Sure of W. as she was never before, and she wrote and I'm glad, and I know now. March Sunday, 10 1872. Spring does think kindly of us, does not forget, only we must wait, "For as long as hill and vole shall last. Will the green leaves come again". There was something for me in to day. A little. There are things that have never entered into the hearts of man. They are too grand for us, too full of the deep things of God, but reaches of them are for us, little types of what will be when we are kings and priests and can understand. While I was writing Addie's letter I drew near, just felt how much could be, and then after that it was S.S. & dinner, and such a tired tired [tiredoutativeness].March Monday, 11 1872. And this is how it came about, and its so fine to start out on firm decideds (Now) and see it safely through. It's so much better than having faith in Halicarnassus. That horse we drove, is of a very retiring disposition on the walk. When on the gris vive which is at rare intervals unless it is suggested, he is a modern acrobat. The harness like sails must no where to allow not only freedom but expansions. He neither ran nor sidled. He bounced up & down. His early childhood must have been spent in picking cherries from high trees! Wendell Phillips! The third attempt. The complete triumph! And was it nice? O yes, my dear, and we'll have long talks about it for who could forget it? Daniel O [corrects]! and we learned things. March Tuesday, 12 1872. Another something that stopped; and I only stop once in long times to think of it. "Times driveth onwards fast, & in a little while our lips are dumb". Miss Heath came up after school. Why am I always so uncomfortable after I see her? Why must we go over & over things we can't help? O for the quiet, calmed down, turned down, if need be, only let it reach me. "Friend of sinners". I am in the dark, and bewildered and sick at heart!March Wednesday, 13 1872. A man has passed the window twice taken of butter. Out of the strong lately has come forth no sweetness. "Wist ye not that I must be about the Father's business?" and in the meeting hour we listen and let the words touch us, the music is to be played out in the years. My years perhaps, that are full of things laid up, "prepared for you". It's so good to me lately, the thought of the joy and the rest of it. The joy of to day too, every day, even being taken down, clear down with Christ to learn. Adjourned meeting of Miss G., Miss B. & Miss Br. at Mr. Spencer's. Who'd have thought it? March Thursday, 14 1872. I think I can say with Paul, "I am ready to be offered". You soon get into that frame of mind if you come here. I have a sore finger, a stubbed toe and a pimple. When my hurry is very great, stirs me up, makes me top like. I'll immediately go to Miss Heath's. Get pulled in, made to stay " whether I will or no"! Miss Mason writes me from beyond the Missisippi! I hear and am glad. Forty three dollars for tooting. More than it ever brought me in before! And there's a wee breath of spring, just a breath, and from some land a great way off. March Friday, 15 1872. O if breaths would stay, would come faster, would do anything to make the leaves come out. We are cheered by prospects of snow. Miss Grose takes herself off, and a prophet has left us. She's him. All the poky things possible to be condensed in four walls take this howling wilderness as their business centre! Why can't some fertile arrangement be made simply & solely for me. (But first mother must marry a minister) by which I can be stricken out of existence each successive Friday night & take part in a resurrection Monday morning. March Saturday, 16 1872. I have learned to fill my soul with a horror of Saturday. I am in horror over the long, dark hall, the sweeping around above below me, the orders from below, the inspection of drawers, the bell, the dinner, the mail box, the surveys by R.G. & M.E. But then I am not a ghoul. I ought to have a nice sense of propriety and if I did all this would be vital breath, native air. [...] me away from the thoughts of so dreadful a fate ever to befall me. I rejoice not to be in the bosom of the family. March Sunday, 17 1872. There comes such a gathering of sunshine as there has not been for weeks, a sign, one of the hesitating tokens of a coming April. Why didn't I go to church? Sunday isn't going out. The last of my Sunday is the sermon. It's so good to be all alone and think a whole Sunday is before me. The answer to my questions "where can we wash and be clean?", comes over me, like somebody's strong arm, making me safe and glad. "The blood of Jesus Christ, His Son cleanses us from all sin". Why did my talk with Miss B. wander back to Hoosick and Judge Ball? March Monday, 18 1872. A query has suggested itself to me. Am I a self made woman? Is it probably so? I'll ask Miss Grose! A verb is to be, to do, and to suffer. Mark Tapley said he was always a bein, sometimes a doin, and now and then sufferin! So be I! E.P. Whipple says in reading Emerson he feels like the English reader who had the delightful sensation that might have been his had he asked for in agricultural reports and been handed [...] mince pie. My sensations prolific or otherwise have all centered in bein and doin! Suffered but little as the Principal of the State Normal School saw me not! And I him not, and there was a great calm. The little flannel skirt for Grandma is all done. March Tuesday, 18 1872. I'll go on with my last sentence and say, and sent. I just get time to get into one day and look at it when it is another. Mr. Williams has gone to practice for the Peace Jubilee! Which suggests several things. I've been in several big things in my life but nobody ever knew of it. I never could get any body up to the feeling of it, or was able to convince them how big it was and I was the biggest thing it it, but let R.G. water his plants with hot water or play a flute, and [how] his name has gone out through all the world and his weather reports to the end of the earth. I did not scold any body and yet there were rough places that did not become smooth. O for infinite tact, infinite something. I can think of only one verse, and it was my last thought before going to sleep. "There is now therefore no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus". March Wednesday, 20 1872. A very interesting conversation at dinner. Mrs. W. to Mr. W. on seeing a trap, "The mice are not very fond of your society". No answer. "Is that your trap?" "No" "The mice are not very neighborly". Deepening frown. "Have?" "Did you set the trap?" "No what would I set a trap here for?" "It's a queer place for mice!" "No mice here at all". "I saw the trap and didn't know but you had set it". "I don't know anything about it". "I thought that it was all right if you had set it". "I didn't set it al all". "I supposed you'd set it there for some reason, and I thought it was a queer place". My cold shows me that I am mortal, that I am of the earth, that I am not of the air. We read Milton up in my room and Mary stays to talk. I can see faintly how that sometime there may be a help, for the trouble with Mattie. Not soon, but I can wait. March Thursday, 21 1872. There is a sort of centering point in some days. To day it was Mattie. I watched her and watched, and watched, and it seems as if she couldn't hold out much longer with the trouble, but would have it settled. The anger has all gone out of her face, now, she is feeling [keenly] sorely. I invested in a cramp today, none of your short lived ones, but an hour and a half kind. Have [...] cold i'd my 'ed! Was unlawfully deprived of liberty, but bore it with a sweet submissive spirit, and Triffy was sent to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of prison to them which was still and holy, and Annie Adams spoke for the first time. The tea with the girls was so different from any other we ever had together, but Mary and I act our drama admirably for novices. March Friday, 22 1872. [After unmitigated interruption I will now sit down to my journal in peace. Tableaux begin and end all things. Wash ails Philip! Every where all over, come Philip's tread, "under a slouched hat left and right! Miss Bissell waxes wroth. Very! All of us get "afraid", and crouch down under the shadow all protecting of our "walor"! For we wrestle with the ruler of darkness in high places!] It seems so strange to me to have one trouble take hold of me so and possess me until my heart goes out of my work, and work drags. Annie only guesses what it may be and she says, "It will all come out beautiful, all the hard things do". Mattie and Mary came over and I got Mary off early, then by and by I said, "Mattie are we ever going to understand each other again?" She broke down in a minute and after a long cry she told me all about it. March Saturday, 23 1872. A shower of snow flakes,that shot downwards, and quivered and fell all about us, not guessing in the wildest flight of their dreaming fancies that it was the 23rd of March, and that down here the sun was shining! And so all things have been to day softly, hurriedly leaving no sound. Saturday has not come to the top to day. My highest order of standing is falling and a day over examination papers is worse than a thousand, if your eyes ache, and your back, and you can't sit comfortably with your feet up, and have to, what then? Mary and I plan campaigns with renewed vigor, and this time, it's Addie. I lay on the bed and toss around. Is there not a land of peace beyond my door. O lead me to it. Give me rest. March Sunday, 24 1872. Poor little sick Addie, and I've had her in my arms all day, while I was on the bed beside her. I learn lessons hard, all my lessons, but to day I have been learning slowly, seeing a little way, wondering, praying, and I may get it. It isn't Addie. Everything is all right & happy with her, but the little things the girls have said. That worries, and hurts like knives, and it is so tender and sorry where the hurt strikes. I wonder if Annie is any thing like Emery Ann! She flies around just like her [forzino]. Mrs. Granger shakes her head at me and emphasizes! I do not feel brave to night, more crushed and pitiful than for a long time. Is it because my girls are so very near that they rebound from everything, or am I a female bear? "Closer than a brother", closer. O, my Lord, for I am in the dark. March Monday, 25 1872. Well its all strange. Anyhow I am all mixed up! My troubles after assuming the shape of comes, pimples, colds, stomache, Barbara Fristchie's, and compositions have taken a form, which I can not define but will proceed to illustrate. In the new scenes of Philip's marching, I am given a dramatic personas and act it [...] & Philip sees me. Perfectly unconscious of Philip on drama, I behold Philip rise and leave without my best of knowledge and belief! Philip is still marching on! My affections linger, around that office, and my solicitude is contrary to the hypothesis. Let me write a cheery word now. Mattie is real happy and every thing is so bright and clear for both of us, in the reading each of the other. Can you guess how good it is? The old prayer of a year ago is on my lips. "Lord I am oppressed. Undertake for me." March Tuesday, 26 1872. In which we are all Philips and march. It snows and every body don't come to see. For particulars are large bills! If I have any preference as to character or costumes I think I appear best as a none! I shall never cease to have a tender affection for Barbara. I always reached her as an exceedingly brave old lady. Well worth being handed traditionally dowry but now, my interest in her is all absorbing! I want to know all about it! How high up she was, where she set the staff, what she was doing when they fired, and how she caught it, and how she was prevented from being shivered, and if she said her past as Mr. Williams told me to say it! I am still enquiring. That office yields to me its ear attentive. I meet the High Priest when I meet about as often as the Jewish law requires. Carry no turtle doves or young pigeons. Haven't any. March Wednesday, 27 1872. In which I find time to pity myself, and bend and [slackens] in the storm! The pivots on which the State turns, came down upon us at the first class. We all came in in the afternoon without feathers, we had been picked clean, and not even the little sprout of me is left to tell where they were. The rest of it is hard. I can bear hard things. I do not ask sweet cordials to like them with, and I can bear this. "To distal the one elixir, patience." Must there be another crucible, and another, and another? Will I learn? March Thursday, 28 1872. I shall be careful how I give two roots to form an equation next time. One of them has proved to be the root of all evil, and the other three more! My cold assumes new forms, shuts my throat full and backs me in every thing that I do! Am shut out from society, and the way to be happy she found she had got not! I suppose I ought to be let alone, when I'm still down stairs and say nothing, but I can't talk today! I turn to that dear little poem by H.H. and say it again and again. The sunshine on the long windows, says things and I pray that bearing oneself still royally may be for me. Me under the sunshine [pour] the long windows. March Friday, 29 1872. Where nothing happened except chicken for dinner and a better back. Winter is a continued story, and bless me what a chapter this is! I hear nothing from Philip and I can't get ready yet, to let Philip hear from me! But why agitate? I am seeing a little further on, and am learning to feel the force of those words that have come over me so many, many times. "How vain is all architecture save that which is not made with hands! And the face with the trouble and the work is growing paler and thinner, and still the architecture is vain & vanishes even before the tired eyes. If ever I was dragged to [use] in this world against my will, it has been to day. March Saturday, 30 1872. Spring is waiting to be [woved], and so is somebody else. Well! A stand borrowed brought over to Elina, put down by the register. Rocking chair drawn up. Frances in it, never off it, still upon it. By and by three parcels are tied with strings and I live, several blessed minutes. I am next seen investing in soap. Honey soap, three cakes. I am going down into something this Saturday night, it may be, a hard dark way, but I feel and know that I can go!March Sunday, 31 1872. "It is a far better thing that I can do than I have ever done. It is a far, far better [rest] that I go to than I have ever known". It seems to me (as I wrote Susie) that "Twenty three" is such a sweet fulfillment, so like death challenging the strong. March dies in just such a storm as father did. Such storms bring it back even over ten years! across and far back. A beautiful sermon and the text was Twenty three! The righteousness and joy and peace in the Holy Christ might have helped me to prepare for the hard things that are coming, but they came not or I knew them not. But the glad Easter time is come, and all of heaven is nearer. April Monday, 1 1872. "The night is far spent. The day is at hand", read Mr. W. this morning. If he had written it, it would be the day is far spent, the night is at hand! Such cheerful things! Everybody's soul is on their guard, and imaginations grow creative! Not a bell was heard. We walk continuously and are not communicative! Every five minutes no matter where we are the hall or the skies, or the house shakes with a peal of fun. Every body's at it. The best joke of to day was inguinal with our friend Mary. She went todwn stairs informing Mathi that she was to make a cake. Came back & was called for to go to the pastor, asking Mathi as [reparting] request to tend to that cake. Mathi's patient soul goes down to tend to cake, & Mary & Arbis laugh away as to this time. April Tuesday, 2 1872. Said I, "Diagrams", "I had a large high cap made of goats skin". One of them. [diagram] A look of love in the eyes of April a soft glad sunshine coming down. I would not let anything keep it from me. It all began with a query. Shall I send for Miss Worcester, or after everything has opened my eyes or shall I say to the Dr. that I can't do it? Since the whole trouble started and has been carried on by her, I cannot feel that I have any amends to make and I shall not so I wrote to Dr. F. What will come of it I know not. It may cost me my place, but I will be just to myself. The rise of notions such in & out of my head to day, as if I were drowning, perhaps I am. April Wednesday, 3 1872. I feel that I have been sent as an apostle into the world to teach cut root. From present appearance the undertaking promises to be a solemn one. How shall they teach except they be sent? How shall they hear without an extracter? In most cases possibly not! I am an inspector of buttons and three are gone! All seems quiet along the Potomac to night, but I suppose there is thunder on the horizon as well as dawn. Lot has not entered into Zoar. The sun has not risen. The face is not lifted nor the vision clear!April Thursday, 4 1872. Several things. It was supposed in [Cornell] several families also have that I should this day break off from the present stem, and go, but nay, not so. Anne is off and away without me. And here I have been all this time intending to tell that tomorrow is fast day. The principal thing is not getting wisdom this day, it's getting off. Sarah Enright is here, and it seems nice to see her. "For our God is a sun and shield". What made this come to me this morning? How glad it makes me. It's good to feel that His is a sun, but it does not help me today, that His is a shield why it fills me full, and I'll abide under the shadow of the Almighty. April Friday, 5 1872. Fast Day. Appearance. Eyes - With marked effects of being called too soon produced. Ears - A generous expanse. Nose - Coinsides throughout its whole extent & is suf. Tongue - A lives of the first class Lips - First future indicative. Hair - Unwept, unhonored and unsung. Apparel. Shoes - A layer of cloth between stratas of chalk. Dress - Blue and white all wool. Neck-gear - Funereal trappings. Adornment - A meek & quiet spirit. Air ..... [Caesarins velies] Health. Hand - Volcanic action has ceased. Nose - A sea and my banks are tossed hither & tither. Lungs - Fertile. Brain - Has found a vent for collected vapors. Nervous action - Inversely as the squares of the times. Digestion - Abhors a vacuum. Virtues. Meekness - Went out with the tide. Easy to be entreatedness - Some. Brotherly Kindness - Graduate. Simplicity - Largely developed. Occupations. As an apostle - To hang up my fiddle & my bow. As a First assistant - To be clothed with sabulations as with garments. As a ghoul - To get Miss Bissell's feet wet. April Saturday, 6 1872. What a merciful provision that two corns cannot grow in the same place at the same time. Getting about is accompanied with difficulties, and a footing any where is [unsartain]! So are potatoes. Whether the problem of getting potatoes and butter to my mother will be solved or approximated remains for further developments involving the theory of bags. Sarah came over to say good bye, and I watched her from my window down the walk. It was a little thing but it was so like a spring ago. Then I went from my thinking into "Great expectations and little Pip and old Joe", and the dreary marsh, and the corner by the kitchen fire. April 6th. What does it suggest. The strong, beautiful love that has come into my life, to be about it, in it, and through it always. April Sunday, 7 1872. Why were some people ever allowed to write hymns? Why must we sing them? The words which the speaker and [cheer] seem to regard as most directly appealing to our sympathies and aspirations were the following very impressive ones. "Whether we walk, or fly, or swim, We are one family!" Sat by Mr. Williams at table and was a source of great amusement to Miss Bissell chiefly by nodding to the Aged. And I came up stairs and there's gold in the west and April around the window and to try to forget everything for a little while, but Jesus. It seems a long time since I stood by the door of the tent and said "Through the Flood on foot" longer since I felt that the [Veiled Quest] in the starlight dim was Christ the Lord.April Monday, 8 1872. I am going to adopt Milton's models of address the next time I talk with Mr. Williams. Out of respect to his favorite author, of course. It will therefore be something like the following: "Sole partner, and sole part of all these joys, Earth's hallowed would, O, prince of men, Offspring of Heaven & Earth and all Earth's Lord, O sacred wise and wisdom giving Plant! My Author and Disposer. What then bidst unargued I [...]". And he would answer (probably) Fair Consort, my latest found associate sole! Me teach penmanship?! There are things not dreamed of in your philosophy Horatio, but it isn't me that's Horatio! Flying or swimming to my mind is much to be preferred to walking, and as the [hymn] gives us a choice, lets' fly or swim! My home letters give me so much confort lately. Especially that I am troubled and need a little soothing. O, girlie. If you walk alone, let it be with no faltering tread! April Tuesday, 9 1872. Where we find causes for thankfulness, for dry feet, for a bag, a basket, dry wood, and for good society. We dig at Arithmetical Progression. We hoe, we harrow, and deduce and are deduced. Miss Bissell is on a rampage. She packs, she hammers, she sings, chiefly from Plymouth Collection! I rejoice with exceeding joy as I sit and see brought up big hand the last line of Thomson's Winter. I feel as if I had lived to see! I have one sad fact to chronicle. Did not go to see my potatoes! I am to be sure and return the bag. I am told from reliable sources that those potatoes are brought and lodged and await my word of command!April Wednesday, 10 1872. Whereupon I take great pleasure in chronicling the fact that in the brief period of time between tea and dark I went to see my potatoes. Of course I was haunted by nameless fears! What if somebody had with malice aforethought been & claimed my bag and taken it. What if the family at the depot had been supplying their table with them. What if the bag had bursted? What if the depot was shut & locked! But no! a light, a man, Said I, "are my potatoes here?" He caught the fourth word. "Yes, yes, & seemed to know all about it. He passed on as if our conversation had ended, as if I had come all the way down there to say that I felt [lowed] him. "May I see them?" I asked meekly, "O yes you [...] them. So after lighting a lantern and proceeding cautiously & with great difficulty we came to a bag, my bag, and as the [...] had concluded gave orders & I found my way back. Feet wet! Soaked, dissolved! April Thursday, 11 1872. And the house is left unto us desolate, [as] is Eddie, George Sharpe and I! Who could care or be dreamy with real, live April sun shine every where? It's tolerably comfortable to feel that you can do just as you please for three whole days, and then feel precisely like doing the very thing you ought to! I really believe that must be a coincidence! Such a load went off my mind with those potatoes! I keep getting near to Susie to day. I wonder if she knows it, if she thinks and thinks as I do how we shall surely see each other in the summer. I've lived over some of the dear things. Why does a bright day, a rare sunset, or all holy beautiful things that love the light & have the sky above them make me think of her? April Friday, 12 1872. I commenced by being sick to my stomach, breakfast was undesirable, even with omelet. I laugh away as if things were funny, but they aint. Why should they be, and why shouldn't they be? Is it bacause we are of the earth, because we are not of the air? Annie Adams has come to live with me until Monday, and we contemplate together, many things. I sit down with my head tied up metaphonically to finish Old Curiosity Shop. It leaves me with a sad, yet calm and holy feeling and I go to sleep and renew my youth abundantly. The birds sing out doors, and the girls come Addie with them and we go down out of a glorious morning into a cloudy November afternoon. April Saturday, 13 1872. Memorable for the contemplated talk with Mr. W. Are you sorry to hear that Milton's Models were omitted? I know well now, how things look different to us as we learn. I can see that it is better for me to keep the assistants place, even though conscious that upon me falls the principal's work and more than the principal's care. It is some my fault that I have not consulted Mr. W. more. W. is not altogether. I will put all the mistakes together & build better this time. The April afternoon wooed us out into the sunshine Annie and I, and we saw the folks and it was a good time! And so we go on learning, wondering, opening our eyes to the awakening glory, and living in two far off summers. April Sunday, 14 1872. Which was composed of winds, church, a letter, a praise meeting and a nap. I wish I could say sunshine but there wasn't any. Taking them up in regular order I will say of the winds, that they have come so old a story that they excite in us not even an attempt to a remark. Of church, there was more of a likeness to the winds that some would like to own. The choir must admit it. Blow ye, and they blowed, and he blowed! The letter attempted at, aimed at, went out, but struck nothing. It was there humble pages revised and enlarged! The nap, suggests many things. A [noise] in the Flying Dutchman Constantinople, Circumnavigation! How to determine the form of the earth!April Monday, 15 1872. No one has had half as good a time as each separate individual that comes back! It's ay a wonderful thing says I who haven't been away, how folks take on! It's a sealed fact that I am to have Easter morning two times, once for me and once for [Jeune] K! The verb, bear and the noun bear, walk before us prepositional to their interceptedance! School was pleasant and I was in a mood to enjoy it. I was thoroughly happy and contented in my work until the hard things came. Now expediency seems to urge me. I fear the guiet closing, the pleasant good byes, that I had hoped for, will not before me, and my heart aches through it all. Aches as it did one spring, a little while ago. April Tuesday, 16 1872. I am a society I myself and there are several members in me what was. Miss Grose said 63 gallons made a barrel and I said it didn't & then she said I must tell how much the cube root of the radical [symbol for pi] times x y x z would be! Which I don't think much of! Of course I know, but she shouldn't ask. I went to tell her how that Abbie Adams brought me a bottle of cider and it broke. She followed a discussion on what I know about keeping cider sweet in which Miss Grose knew a great deal, all accounted for in the following formula. Cider is kept sweet thus! [P [square root] M : b of c: : [pi] [divided by] 32 x y z : 63!] Winter has now fairly set in! Hearing of the soldier who has sent out gold pens and holders, and half dollars from his loins and fore arm we have written to see if as yet he has ejected any chromos! Come gentle spring, etherial, mildness come!April Wednesday, 17 1872. In which I get into the confidence of Mrs. Williams. Which shows that things is happening! Who ever understood making people thoroughly confortable better than she? Or thoroughly miserable better than he? And here we go up up up. And here we go down, down, downy. And here we go backward & forward. And here we go round, round roundy! So you'd think! Which shows that things is on the gui vive! A letter from home informs me that the bag of potatoes landed and that they (the bag) are nice! Which shows that things is marching on! Castleton is the garden of delight! Mr. & Mrs. Williams are "children of the Heavenly King". The Normal School is a joy forever. Crops without handles are a source of pleasure. Soup is grateful to the eye, & sweet to my taste. Which shows that things is workin!April Thursday, 18 1872. I wish etherial mildness would come to me! I do not possess much. Things conspire to keep me stirred up, and I am stirred and stirred but do not [...]. I have remained at the freezing point so long that a crust is formed! I kept my eye on four resolves vigorously & swerved not! The very Spartans did not complain! It is such a relief to me to be busy setting myself right instead of other people. I know better where to begin. I think I have got down where I can begin. Mathi and Abbie were nice to night and we walked until our feet grew cold, so weary and cold we thought they'd never be warm any more. April Friday, 19 1872. Then it up and rained. This act was followed with intense shivering on our part, and intense smoke on the part of our stove, but we learned long ago to endure hardness as good soldiers. Mary Bryant has at length decided to be sick and she gives up and I miss her. The tea bell finds the Normal School still in solemn conclave. I address them on the subject of white dresses and blue sashes. I think early in the afternoon I'll go to bed the minute I get up stairs, and the next thing is I don't do it!April Saturday, 20 1872. Which must be written about in a hurry. The sun touches me on every side, or else I turn every side toward it. Don't stop to tell which. I think I'll do a good deal, but who can when they feel so good. Mr. Williams dispatched me over to Mary's to give her any [...] sweat with full orders. Florence and Addie collect me from a vigorous nap. Would I like to go and ride with them, and sugar off? To my mind such interrogatives admit of but one answer. You just ought to see me seated before the snow and the hot sugar. It was an era in my history. Susie's letter was too nice for anything. She could look forward into the vacation too if she knew I was coming there to spend it with her, perhaps. April Sunday, 21 1872. My morning devotions consist in getting up before six and getting home to breakfast. I just revel in my Sundays. I have time to stop and watch the light over on the hills & across the slope of the park, time to think not hurriedly of the dear Christ and take into my heart deep, it may be only one thought one word of his, but but it takes hold of me, and I cling to it. I have time to think that I would like to be with him, like to over come, and sit down on a throne even as he also overcame and am sat down with the Father on his throne. It would be grand to overcome as he did. Laid down his life that he might take it again. Laid it down of himself. April Monday, 22 1872. It is time that Oliver complained. When Philip commences to march on and sits in your own spacious domain and takes your notes and your words fitly spoken and brings an excuse for absence signed R.G.W. and is excused not, then the Spartans may complain. Sparta is not dead. It seems to me that its very much like the sun shining on the evil over the good. And I am exalted. Again Mrs. W. takes me into her confidence & tells me such sealed mysteries that not a word is to besaid to Miss Bissell or Miss G.! I'm afraid I shall get things I ought to tell mixed up with the confidential & never breathe it! What if I should? Dear me! I very much surprise Mr. Williams by saying that I will not receive Miss W. until she apologizes & I make him say he would do just so. Then I feel good. April Tuesday, 23 1872. I have only breath left to regret in this connection the poor government of the State Board. Now it takes breath to do that may be a source of surprise but don't worry. Philip marches to me and falls down at my feet. Philip will love me all my life if I will let her. Philip left my class because she could not trust herself to speak. She has not trusted herself to speak since, perhaps! The tableau enacted at the close had evidently been practiced on. Philip was to rise, put her hand over my right shoulder, her arms entwining. She was to say tremulously, "Will you forgive me?" I stood and took the spirit of departed Stephen and then it was eleven o'clock! Miss Grose is called upon to go to the sugar party at the Town Hall. "Have I a feeling in my bossom for a fellow creature?" said she. "Will I go?" I do in a yellow bow. The Methodist minister makes himself many. We that is Miss G and I, approximate! April Wednesday, 24 1872. Chromos? No, not yet. Marins seated upon the mires of Carthage! Breathless expectation. Lips compressed. Eyes fixed! Miss House the relief Committee carves, and where R.G. abounded she abounds! None of the rest of us abound. Miss Bissell saw a cough open and gulp her down. Miss Grose says "Lets all get sick to oncet! We do. I call a teacher's meeting. Miss Grose exclaims, Give me liberty or give me death! She goes to bed I go to the flat top of a mountain and see Physical Geography forever. April Thursday, 25 1872. In which Miss Bissell takes too much Down's Elixir and barely gets out of the dining room, I find her, up stairs presently, defying competition! Miss Grose says "Sister B. won't you have a cold boiled egg?" Sister B. will. She eats it without an emotion! Mrs. Williams raises Frances to perpendicular height scarcely less than cotopaxi by saying, "There is something in your room that makes me stay! or somebody!" In the quiet time of shadows Annie Adams and I go over to see Mary and come home through the village! Then I can read my Physical Geography dear!April Friday, 26 1872. Where the undercurrent was away back and far off, and not very far away, and coming. Scarce anything touches me lately as tenderly and close to me as the little thought swatches of things we did and said and thought when I was with Susie. I sort of feel as if we should be together this summer, and I shut my eyes and I am there an you won't see any thing that there isn't. Of course not! Mathi puzzles me. I am ashamed of myself for caring so worn down tired. I feel a great deal more like running away somewhere than like being brave and earnest and strong. Chromos. No, not yet. Faith in Halicarnassus! Yes Ma'am. April Saturday, 27 1872. Mr. Williams asks at dinner would we have hot scotch or solid meat. We live to regret the hot schotch and long for solid meat. Miss House broke up dimurely and sends me aghast by saying, " Have your chromos come?" How dare she? My propensity is bedward, but I'm good and sit up. I find Mary in a very high up state of mind & when I ask her who tells her she may do things she says "Mollie". Mattie thinks Mollie is too free with her permissions! It's nice to hear the sound of the croquet mallets, nice to hear the girls laugh, nice to walk around the park, over the new springing grass. April Sunday, 28 1872. It took a vast deal of nerve for me to say to day I'd go to church. I'd been looking to Sunday longingly all the week. Besides I hadn't any gloves. Well, Miss Bissell wore an old pair and blessed me with her new ones & I went. As a special discipline to me a man from way off somewhere preached. Said the Missionary Association was raised up the Lord. Said it was a beautiful sight to see a man out of all her sex leaning on his strong arm. I am sensitive on the subject of being called. He read a letter from [Tungalor] and told us he had lived among the Zoolu Caffars. Miss House has set up to teach me. I won't have it. I staid with Mary while Abbie & Mattie went to church and, well. Read over Susie's letters and the journal for the summers I've been with her, and it was beautiful to me. April Monday, 29 1872. "And hands that are swift and willing". That's what comes into my head the first thing so I've written it, to think of. One [shorelss scarf [tabulations], and for me it filled four blackboards and stretched into the time of other people's dreams. Under their skilful teacher who didn't know not that May flowers were chicken berry blossoms because they were tied up together [...] for [...] class analyzed their first flowers. My sences on the subject of May flowers came back to me in time to save me from utter distruction before that class. Addie is in a barrel of brine, and dear me I came near being too. It closes as it commenced. And do God's work with a cheerful heart. And hands that are swift and willing. April Tuesday, 30 1872. It's so satisfying to me on appealing for money to be met with the assurance that Mr. Adams is a queer man. Enjoyed the luxury of a letter from Mr. [Lias] to day. It soothes me. Eighty dollars, stage five, interest fuel. Present do. Past did. Present participle doing, being doing having been doing. When shall I. Both done? (done) I go to bed marvelously at 8:30 and all the world wondered! Made a tabulation that the world will never see. Then went at in upon six chapters of Christiana! Looked out from my window at the good things, the near things that have come, and I saw what I could not reach, away and away, and yet for me. [Now tender pitying blue awaits far off for the [enger] asking red!]May Wednesday, 1 1872. Chiefly executive and judicial! Mr. Williams says two or three days to me and my executive propensities say, one. I open a correspondence with Mr. Grey betake myself to the bank, and do Mr. Lias, and Miss Witherby, and Mrs. Leslie and Mr. Gilmour and the Model School, and come back immensely bankrupt! "A little of Ralston sweet for Fannie". And the little pleading eyes of the star flower and the tiny ferns tell me what Sue would if she was her. But she wrote me, and Fannie was glad. May Day, and I went a [...] among misty shadows, and Mary was worse and Mattie is going home! May Day among the angels. Where the [...] and azure have [...] each other. The joy of the Lord and the place which passeth understanding. May Thursday, 2 1872. Miss Grose calls Miss House "The Vampire", and then adds, "poor thing!" We talked things over generally sitting on the bed in my room, Miss G, Miss B. and Miss Br. And the sunshine out doors fell lightly, too lightly for such a heavy heavy heart as mine. It's a very sad and sorry thing which one is made to stand before's one's self as I have to day. How could I write it or tell any body but you Dr.? I have seen the good, the glory of living, and have fallen in the very presence of it. Did "be ye kind one to another, tender hearted forgiving one another", ever look so beautiful to me before? And I stand such a sorry wreck before myself. I have made shipwreck of a whole year. O, how the words hurt. May Friday, 3 1872. Several things conspire. Christiana is not one of the them. I scarcely, dare say even that confidently. I've wanted to say all day, "Please don't", but things did, and they are yet. I am thinking of Hope Devine just this minute of that something that had it touched her would have been a pain, but she could not let it, she must be happy. But the pain I said Please don't to come hard, and I lived an old new word, endure. From five until half past nine, hearing what Addie had to say. Must we reap then the hard things that we've [...] unconsciously! not knowing! Perhaps I've hurt her and made her feel these things, but I didn't mean to. I can't always see things. May Saturday, 4 1872. It commenced by dashing and splashing. Then Mary commenced. We wise ones thought it would not do to let her go, and we wise ones were right. She looked so funny sitting up in bed ejaculating "come girls get me ready". "Abbie can't I go? You'll let me go won't you, Abbie?" Then Mattie, "Yes she shall go, Mollie and Marfy will go, wait till Marfy finds her shoe". I talked Grant and [Greety] with Mr. Maranville at dinner. Do you know of any way to get to Hydeville? Neither does Jerry Beach. Over the hills and far away, trudged first person, singular "gathering soil by traveling". Sat down at last in the middle of my pasture, in a wonderful happy home. I set up to laugh, and things are funny.May Sunday, 5 1872. When has there been such a Sunday out doors? I just ached for some green leaves, but don't you see them coming, coming, coming, right along? Miss G's. infant class occupied our thoughts at the tea table! Her questions had been supposed to be adapted to the capacity of the youngest. She asked What does [...] stand for. Quite surprising to hear them say, Adam! But after superhuman effort she at last got them to say Bethlehem. Who was born there? "God", say they. Quite discouraging thinks Howard. "How should they be supposed to know when they don't know their letters?, says father. "Simply because I've taught them", says Miss G. But the infant class does not be heard from at the concert. Not any. I am a new feature. B.W.B. knows. May Monday, 6 1872. What I know about driving. H.G. "That horse means well. He doesn't do so good as his intentions". How much better one feels in being reassured, especially on the subject of motive powers and intentions. But you just ought to have been along. The next bit of life for me was to find myself with Mary, and see them get ready. Then we ride down to see them go, and come back to put something in the vacant places, so they won't look at us so. But banks stretch wide and we follow the moring specks on the far off far away side. We can't see flame and azure finding each other. We only see the morning and the place left. There now. Susie writes that Mother D. and Father D. say No, ma'am, and I rise up. May Tuesday, 7 1872. In which there is a possibility of a [few] days of quiet content. Of storms that have gone over, staying gone over. Our latest was the botanical excursion. We found blood root, hepaticas, wake robin, and wild forget-me-nots. Rocky proved himself an excellent shot. Came very near scaring three squirrels and a great big black bird! There was scarcely much of any thing else except a straightening out process, and a girl trying to go to sleep. George Reed is a brilliant boy, gifted in conversation. He is of great help to Annie in teaching her to be sociable. How to talk by George Reed. Hitherto unpublished sketches taken from the dinner table. May Wednesday, 8 1872. Quotation from dinner table poetry, "How doth the busy Mr. G. improve each shining hour, and seek for office every day. From every opening power". Howard and Charley came over to our infinite amusement and we were very much obliged. It's so fine to see folks that dare laugh real good downright hard and hang their hats on your stove. Now I've just thought of it. Howard is like Sue. I am pretty generally decent to day, and my crust has been less short than common. I take great pleasure recording the fact that I have found where the [Revilleagedido] Revillagigedo Islands are, so Miss B. will class her devastations on me in the shape of that. We go down to see Miss Briggs and gain admittance after knocking for entrance with unusual noise. Miss Grose has just informed me that what [remains] to be told now is where are the Long ooooooooooooo Mountains?I enquire about my hanging baskets. No body know. I gave to the world a work on Practical Physiology and work it was. That is I exercised. [...] me to Mrs. Cook's. Saw hats, and a frame. Mrs. Cook thinks I will pay her. Miss Bissell * Clarence reassure her. The leaves aren't out but they are aching that way. I have such strange pains in my head, it feels real badly & especially in the morning. I rotate in my mind the summer prospects for Susie and I. See no fish. Why can't somebody interfere and let us be together? May Friday, 10 1872. What I know about trimming! Just you step in here a minute and see. After the frame comes the sewing over and then the putting on of things, all of which bring out hitherto undeveloped capacities in the art of hattitudes! The crowning feature of this day has been "The story of the Parson's Hen", by the author of Too Numerous to Mention & c! And our laughs to the ramparts we hurried. We go over to the words by the cemetery Annie, Addie and Georgie with me and find blue and white violets. After tea coax Miss Bissell into a peanut investment which proves a perfect success. May Saturday, 11 1872. I [array] my upper extremities in spring attire and feel dressed up! I patch, and take many stitches! Then I tear around with a brush and a broom, and a dust pan, and [ape] well to do housekeepers in processess of renovation, and rejuvination! Misses B and Br. go out together and find the meadow air pleasant. Did I jump out of last summer into two Stephens' pretty home or hear there been winter between? Does any body know? The moment I opened the front room door I said "Has Miss Freeman gone?" I need not to ask. She was not there. Nothing that made us think of her was there but the rocking chair I always sat in. A rest remained and she has entered into it!May Sunday, 12 1872. "Open thou mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law", said the text. Come out into the sunshine, and rest thy tired hand with the joy of everything and the stillness and beauty of everything, said the little breezes to us. "That in me ye might have peace", said the dear Christ and so Sunday was beautiful. Everything out doors is growing more and more beautiful, and God is over all and in all and through all, blessed forever. Out of the crimson we climb into the blue, the holy restful blue, that never looks so blue, so near as on Sabbath nights when the sun is going down. May Monday, 13 1872. I don't do a great deal, not even trim. I just sit and am come at. It takes a great deal more grass to do that than the other, as I have inwardly decided. "Miss Bromley what shall I do about my essay?" is coming at me from all the cardinal points! Miss Worcester and George Reed, Co-seekers after bliss and flowers, add zest to teachers meeting, so does Miss House! Everybody is wrapped up to day & the Mercury falls. So do I who appear in a calico waist, and look according to Addie, "terribly cute". Annie Phelps says she has the non compos Mentas! It reminds me of what Mr. Williams read closing up with "anybody can tell when a dog has that". [...] abound in the faculty! [...]!May Tuesday, 14 1872. I am still in calico, and the world is put away to cool in one vast refrigerator. In Geometry we made through that dismal lesson in pi times! There it stands just pi times, and pi times it will be. It kind of seemed to me as if there were things to live for, rare, holy things. It seems so restful in the nights now, and when I am not too sleepy I have nice times laying awake to think. In His own good time, and we wait and long for it. Sometimes we do. Do always behold the face. Of my Father. May Wednesday, 15 1872. Howard is a means of grace to us, and we laugh very much. Miss G. has resolved, for some dark reason to read the chapter on Charity every day for two weeks. I commend her but she fears Howard will act more directly upon her than the chapter in making her good. To that I cannot find an answer expedient. I am honored by a dissertation on reproductions, and then the house comes down. Simultaneously or thereabouts the House comes up. Mr. Williams thinks at supper that water is nothing but a medium. Miss G. thinks not and talks wisely on cellulose. Howard believes in the Inductive methods of teaching. Miss Houses opinion I am very sorry to [rent] but not having heard her express one how can I give [rent] to it here? Visions of blue muslin flit before me, but no blue muslin! Miss G. addresses a letter to her friend and author Howard in German, after three weeks study. We who never dreamed of such a thing wonder. "They always write so in Germany", says she. May Thursday, 16 1872. George and James and Rocky and Charley get under the windows and sing "We are little sun beams". We listen. Miss G's German letter has met with the attention it demands. Both father and Howard linger showering on the brink. "Doud it?" One word proves uninterpretable. To linger showering is not altogether metaphorical, it is concrete. We shiver and wear shawls. While the reproducing of Ancient History process was in its bed and early blossom between the hours of seven and eight we had a fortification meeting in the Corner Room. The objects used were sliced pineapple sliced several hours under Miss G's judicial management in much sugar under Miss G's financial management. I know I am uncomfortably tired. I know several other things. Most like a tired child at a show. May Friday, 17 1872. All of our heads ache! Awfully! I am found in combination with paper and pencil and essay subjects. Worst of all Annie who puts all my music in minor key and won't be set right. O, dear. Such wretched measures we make of it when we could be so happy together! It gets sort of Friday night-ish, as the carriages wind in and out, every time taking somebody. I coax Miss Bissell out doors again and we peep in on Florence and Addie! Then I render up my accounts to the General Proprietor and Great Head of Learning Dispensed, and it gets later. When I've laughed at Mr. Hart and played a few minutes the drapery of my [...] is wrapped about me and I am laid down to wait for the next day!May Saturday, 18 1872. Which comes. For we wrestle not against principalities and powers, but against the geography of Vermont, and a map, and Physiology questions! A stump bug. Spartan's, incommensurable from my sister, whose business talent and inclinations swallow up, moral reflections. Measuring the distance to Hydeville by feet is less delightful than we previously, fondly, imagines. We see a boy! alone! A little sunbeam! I aske him. We both mount, are seated, and fly on the wings of the wind. Howard sets me at fox and glass. After several attempts I retreat and fly away bundling, which means Howard beats. He lectures me because I will not expect to beat so I will be worth conquering. Not I! We are made quite happy by a ride on the lake. A cosy ride way up to the bay and we sung coming back. Over the blue we rode to the upper far away blue.May Sunday, 19 1872. What there was of this Sunday is all around in bits, and I must get it together some way. Some of me lay a good deal between the head and the foot of the sofa. Some of me was up in Delaware to. It rained up and down, all over, it made me think of that day Mother and Dannie came to Rondout. Bye & bye it looked green and glad out doors and I had to go out and see it. So we did, bareheaded. Know ye that the Lord hath set apart the holy unto himself. Reward was having it over when he came in and he sat down zealously and talked about the sermon, and Unitarianism and close communion, and Liberalism and Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, to me. May Monday, 20 1872. Miss Bissell expects me to forgive her. I know she does. I don't believe I will. She said my horse was fabulous and a phantom. "Twenty minutes more of surprise" quoth she and ere the words fell from her [...] lips, a horse appeared, my horse, and we rode over in the joy and the green and the newness of life. How could it help touching us. The Normal Scholars sat mute, inglorious I take large [...] of fine point credit to myself for not scolding a bit. Not any. Writing up. You'd think so to see me at it, and in it. Notes? Yes'm! Frances Bromley. Present!May Tuesday, 21 1872. Some sunshine, some faith, some Dolly Miss G. and I talk over our little dialogue, the cunning little one that we spoke Miss Bissell's birthday night. We all laugh. When Miss G. and I, ladies of our dignity and position speak about a rabbit and I a boy, and improvise as we go along it has to be very funny. I show them how Mr. Williams teaches Butter and with the small shovel show them how Mary passes things to me. I am in blue muslin. Not that the days for blue muslin have come, by no means, but it was smuggled in by me. I do not wear it comfortably, but I make a fire and sit in the corner behind you. Notes still, "Plenty, plenty". May Wednesday, 22 1872. The unlimited leisure also supposably mine is broken in upon. Mr. Sanborn supplicates. Her O.C.U.T.A. rises before me, and [...] I run to Miss G. to find out what flower I behold before me. Says she, It is the Polygala possifolia! I think perhaps it is. Further from Delaware Co., Fish! No, not yet. Will I propound plan November 3? Plan No.3 is in embryo, needs stirring. Miss Bissell is like some banquet hall deserted. Miss Grose asks questions. A great many. Weltha says "Will Miss Bromley trust her if she'll be good and is sorry?" And she will. May Thursday, 23 1872. "The rain is falling very fast. We can't go out to play"! nor swing. An event that I had not [Kalkilated] upon came about which was no more nor less than a missive from my brother Daniel W. I am fearing it with fortitude. My head has been taken into consideration. It behaved in a manner vaccuum table for a member so well brought up. Miss G. has just left me, left me in a perfect fog, all along of the names of brain, nerves. Why should she talk in language unintelligible to me, and I a teacher, a propounder of Anatomy! I wish I could write stories. I would not like to be "a sweet swan of avon". Shakespeare is! It says so in the Troy Whig, at the dinner table! Also some other things. May Friday, 24 1872. The distinctive feature was Miss Tebordo and her horse and me, taking Miss Grose to Hydeville. The [feature] being a grand division, the subdivisions were Miss G's new bonnet, and my Great American attempts. G.A.A. Held my big hat on, and an umbrella over all of us including the horse and kept Miss T. and Miss G. in the buggy, and held in my hands geranium slips! It rained not coming back, & how glad I was, how good it seemed to see beyond the gate for the first time this week! I see tonight farther than I've been and I sit down in the quiet somewhere to rest and get well for eight weeks. O, how the girl dream do vanish as we learn. How vain all architecture becomes save that which is not make with hands. Hathie Boardman makes me come and see her and Mrs. Knapen fusses for me which nobody does often. May Saturday, 25 1872. No. Nobody fusses for me often. Not any. so I let Mrs. Knapen do it quite conscious that she would any way. It's lovely and I think so. To stir and to be stirred. Wherefore, my friends? Let them Riches, we'll just have a good time! The next was something else. Somebody else is called upon to fuss for me. Namely the whole house! Was it a faint or a feint? Shut your eyes! Mrs. Williams says, "Exhausted worn-out, worked out", to me, also rest and Reunion back and great care! Well, so be it! back and all!May Sunday, 26 1872. One of the kind of Sundays that I dread. When I lie still all day, and sat up stairs. Thinking is so close to doing, that it's hard to have to think when one cannot do. They took me over in the corner Room, and were good to me. Addie has gone away and she came and said "good bye". Why did she worry me so? When don't Mrs. Browning seem good to me? blessed? And I was glad just to listen to her and think how restful and dear it is to love. "Not then least then!"May Monday, 27 1872. O, Wisdom! thy name isn't ......this from Miss Grose over the Relief! I hear only echoes of what goes on for I'm sick. I have waived the matter, have argued, pleaded, postponed incessantly, but it's got to this that I am down here, on the bed, and forbidden under penalty of losing all friendships in this house contracted dare I arise and take up my bed! I teach one hour with my head in a whirl, and then resign myself to any thing, every thing, and "bark". May Tuesday, 28 1872. I am the Invincible Armada! The infinitive. To wait governs the Infinitive To see. I wrote that to Susie! and believe it. I reel around but am very thankful to be let alone and allowed to reel if I want to! School is nice. My hurry of letters is done away with and I shall be quite comfortable shortly, Very. To days track has been hidden in there, and all the colors find each other in the sun!May Wednesday, 29 1872. Annie is all in a Maelstrom. She makes it a duty to be happy as little as possible and stay so as short a time as possible. Georgie is a constant treasure, a sunbeam that is bright all the time! My strength what was once considerable is lessened as the square of the times! I get very tired but I "came up stairs to talk"! Just so! I will not worry, a pain to bear now that came near enough to ba a pain would make me so miserable. I just think. I can lay no plan for next year. Not one. I have been where I could not see ahead before. It was best in the after [...].May Thursday, 30 1872. Would I decorate? I said not. She was mistaken! Miss Grose and I went ahead with a flag and an umbrella and a flower or two. The former moralized. "Nothing but the consciousness of her position could sustain her". No more me, sez I! Mr. Pitt Hyde said the first business would be prayer by Mr. Williams! He said as some of the grass were not known he wished the veterans to take their places by their fellows! And then I laughed and Miss G. was moved. The mountain howitzers said much. Very much. A great deal. We came home for the loaves and fishes and found loaves but no fishes. Ever present with me has been my summer when Susie and I are to rest and condense the joy of many weeks into one!May Friday, 31 1872. Mr. Williams' methods fortify, are many and not forsaken. Weltha writes notes as follows "Don't commence at the butt end!!" Things are the matter, tired things and head panics. I came up stairs and say to myself, I will not think I will not see any one now. I'll lose myself in [Hannah] and will feel better. I do. Anne Phelps comes up after a while and I don't spit out much of any of the hardness that is in my heart lately. The bitterness that has to come over me when they have wrought much, loved much, and last much. Never mind. Now is a glorious word. We can still build if it be on the mounds of old attempts. June Saturday, 1 1872. Dear June. Have you some thing for me besides the breathe that came sweeping over me of the old Junes? Will your sunshine, your rains, your breezes, your freshness, be answered in my life or what will there be of it for you? All available accessories are before me, and I "dig" which is one of Anne's words. All digging is not for the present joyous, but afterwards it yields! Mrs. Williams consults me, says many things. I say a few. The day goes out in a reign of rain! R of R! I wonder where are my little chimney swallows? Does anybody know. I have not heard them, since when? Thermometer has gone down to 35 degrees. We shall keep cool!June Sunday, 2 1872. Where the first drama was a bed, my bed which came down. Think you my dreams would have been so uninterrupted my sleep so unbroken had I known that I was being balanced in the air by one wee weak nail? What startling disclosures do get to us now and then! Some of me slept and dreamed A.M. and P.M. Some of me read between times. Some of me talked with Miss Bissell. All of me went to meeting in the evening and saw the going down of the sun, and helped sing. Some of me thought and was sorry. To night every thought is precious for the Presence that fills and rejoices, heals, and loves freely. June Monday, 3 1872. And the mill goes round and round, and I if not a hopper what am I? On to the day of it, the good time out doors, the gala time up in the trees, the rest up in the blue. The whirl in the mill and the heartsick of it, and what did I do to [...] away the heartsick for somebody else? Ought? Anything? How can I tell? The harvest hours are so far away that they have in them no song for me, else I should not come up stairs so whizzy and perplexed! with the good time out doors, the gala time up in the trees, the rest up in the blue. Aggie's essay! and I handle it but it yields me no supply and I don't fast. We compile treatises in geography all of us do. Encyclopedias of useful knowledge, and think of State Boards and what is dreamed of in their philosophy! Yes'm!June Tuesday, 4 1872. I am the first Assistant plum. Statement deduced from Weltha's essay. Weltha multiplies oral statements, speaks of her and Annie, first as buds, then as blossoms, now green plums. Miss Grose asks for tea at dinner. And what scene doth mine eyes behold? Mrs. Williams arises in presence of us all, unlocks emerald treasures wafting ideas of Yeddo, and Chang chu for chu. Passes to mysterious precincts eastward. Is gone a long time. We eat on. Reappears, gets a cup. Disappears. Is gone a long time. The door opens and Mrs. W. does not walk in with the tea. She teas in with a limp! Summary. I'll never ask for tea for dinner. Out doors the great tea kettle boils, and the steam comes down into our eyes in rain! Peruvian bark enters my mouth last thing at night! I taste it in my dreams. June Wednesday, 5 1872. My condition is indeed to be thought upon. Much. I put on cuffs Monday, tight ones, and pin them beyond the possibility of a slip through. On Wednesday (I've slept in them) enough of my flesh has vanished to allow my cuffs to come off easily! I revel in dough nuts from mother, home, just think of it, and mother made them. First crumb from mothers table in twenty weeks, (weaks)! Three goodies. My pretty brown linen dress, [brought] from mothers fingers. Sue's letter and "Hedged In!" How glad I was in it all. The things that make for peace are hidden from the eyes of this house. Miss Grose and Miss Bissell and I are very wise. I say over to myself the Japan divorce service looking toward Miss House, "I no likey you!" Hedged In comforts me once more. Where is its poor little sister what I had before? I, evening with William T. meaning friend Ross! June Thursday, 6 1872. I've just found out where my flesh goes to what vanished as show by objects, cuffs. The effect of rain in hard substance is to wear them away. Constant dropping will [&c]! Now the weather of this week has been quite farmable to wearing away, and I've wove, crumbled, vanished? I need alluvial deposits. The Lord knoweth them that are His and I am glad for we have a hard time finding it out. The butter is abominable. Never mind, it's intentions were all right, it meant to be good! Miss Grose is [...] this day save by those who seek her [sanctum] sanctorum. Her supper is very tempting. Cold tea, one cup, blackish. Two crackers also blackish, some of the butter that meant good. Would we have such work? Not any! When strawberries are in time, came to day, and granulated sugar still abounds. Not a wee bit does she know about it until I act before her sun filled strawberries and granulated sugar!June Friday, 7 1872. I wish we could browse indiscriminately. We do not. We "take" mealls, regularly. I like it not after a vacation of fried cakes. School wheels more slowly. Some friction, but it's overcome and every body goes home thoroughly finished in all good works. Miss Bissell and I look peanut ward, and we go that way and come back like spize bearing the fruits of the goodly land. We do not eat. No. How can we when I'm in the office reporting to the Head and stay lengthely? Appear, friends, in my brown linen. All the world runs up to meet me waving palms and shoos! I draw heads from Susie's letter. There are folks in Delaware Co. Housekeepsers. There will be a place for me. Will I come? When?June Saturday, 8 1872. I write the following brilliant sentences on my forth coming essay, "To do one thing well is worth striving after. True power is a growth, not an accident". Be-entiful, be-entiful. Read more! This is where the sad part of it comes in. Frances wrote no more. She couldn't! She can't write, maybe she never will, maybe she won't go! There's still comfort but it's not in eight o'clock suppers. If I was home [...] were going to have egg, and fried potatoes, for supper. As it was, didn't Mrs. Williams dwells long on Miss Stephenson, who practiced on the piano twelve hours a day for 16 years! She wouldn't abate a year or an hour. That is Mrs. W. wouldn't. Miss Bissell says They always practice so in Germany!June Sunday, 9 1872. I slick up and evidences of it abound. I feel good while at it and was heard to sing, some. I go to what Miss Bissell calls the tomb but which is nevertheless a Congo church in my brown linen. So does Miss Triffy. Hers is not brown. Mr. Brainard believes that good nature is a cardinal virtue. He told us how to inculcate it and what he said was creamy and off the top! Out on the balcony it was nice, out under the trees it's nice too, in the long shadow of the grass, but its Sunday and we can't go. When I didn't read Mrs. Browning and Tilton I rested, joyfully! June Monday, 10 1872. There are rains and rumors of rains! Never mind we shall have grass. But Miss Grose adds "And no corn". This proves her theory of compensations! "Impartial fate that shakes out boils at most uneven rate hath shaken mine & here I lie!" This from Howard in the felicity of seventeen boils! No alluvial deposits, wrists or otherwise my theory of cuffs is imperfect. I forgot to add "Agamemnon & Elizabeth Eliza, and Solomon John & the little boys with the india-rubber boots!" I do so now. And my Eddie is going which makes me sorry. The class motto as suggested by me and revised by Mr. Williams must be thus. Our [aim]! [small figure]June Tuesday, 11 1872. One day there was a big noise in our house! It was me, running around! "What did I do?" Weltha asks did I ever know of folks paying for their diplomas before? I say "only doctors when they are matriculated". "Have we been that?" she says. I get the juice not of today in several ways. I'm glad to be out doors in the ocean of sunshine drinking in life and making me feel new! I write to Mr. Sanborn, "No, Sir". Will he make a big noise in his house? Miss Grose has just come in and would I go over to her house and have milk? I spring up [instantly]! It was sure! Would I just as soon have ginger tea?June Wednesday, 12 1872. June Wednesday, 12 1872. No Brandon. Not any! Glad? Hei-igh! Art is long. The teaching art much longer to me now than comfortably agreeable. Do I wrought? Only with my vocal chords and thorax! After sweaty, prolonged inelastic prayers I go up to Elena and resign myself to Oliver Twist. Wise perhaps. Perhaps not. It was far from being sunshine faith and the Dolly. The girls all feel good and I feel good and so. There's no variety in the way of making up! I sit on the hill at Washington's Headquarters with Susie only by faith today. After one process of instigation from our good natured postmaster Woulton I get that chromo done up & write O.S.Y.D. & its gone!June Friday, 14 1872. I sit and deal out unlimited constitution! Some of it, they know. Much of it they know not! Would I go to Brandon? Would I please go to Brandon? Miss Bissell says, Write! read! for the "immortal glory" of it. We all commence a stirring process. We are moved to go and do. The clouds move back and we are soothed! I trail down the park on a trail scenting of wild goose chase! Very much. A happy fate laid wait for us in Brandon and we five are decreed together! See me sitting up through the naps of other people, [yawning] vengeance on gold pins, and learning what it is to write, to read. Sleepy, ugh!June Saturday, 15 1872. I take to myself the immortal glory promised by Sister Bissell. She takes additional some to herself bysides for at her feet, ever cast the clothes of the martyr meaning linen talma! & she held gloves, two, and a hat! The circus added to the interest of the occasion. Why not? Intending to furnish for my log a connected account of thus highly interesting day the reordering of it here must necessarily be brief! My voluminous pin hesitates! My thoughts in Faking definite shape through the ad interims are settled on the evening prospect of Bates House, and the red eyed man! We are strong in spirit, ah heavenly! and we were found laughing even between the hours of two and three!June Sunday, 16 1872. A leaf [iver]. Home, [vesh] and several things. Keep just awake through church, although Miss House doth not! Come home and sleep until dinner! Diner. Enter Elina and sleep until supper. Sup. Proceed then to find that I am awake and its Sunday! Misses B. and Br. turn from the pathways of our fathers, and enter a path with here and there a traveler all of which means that we went to the Methodist Church. The minister said "we did what we could". June Monday, 17 1872. Elocutionary Entertainment! W.T. Ross and I perch up to see. "That's very good" says he. "Yes, I think so", says I. "How's that?" said he. "Fine " says I! And thus do I buoy up his drooping weak heartedness! The Good Ungrasped appears in blue silk with a "train" and is prounounced by Miss Burt "grace itself". Anne Phelps carries off the palm, for she did very nicely and looked just as nice as could be. I got to myself feet what were tired, and a regular old maid's headache. Moreover a cancer is forming under my nose giving my facial expression a red precipitate appearance. Peace Jubilee! Boo! Dont you hear it? June Tuesday, 18 1872. I rise betimes which according to Sue of W. means "awful early"! The early birds hop around to enliven my inelastic spirits and early trains come along and carry my boy off. I is sorry. We have a glorified sky and an atmosphere that would lift one up in spite of fleshly hinderances. We were lifted up! Who would think to hear the girls recite and all of us going on in the old ways that we were in the eve of the breaking up? Never mind! It't such a luxury to sit down and copy off that performance of mine. I like it! I come up stairs tired, and proceed at once to have the back-ache. The dress comes as the conqueror comes!June Wednesday, 19 1872. Echoes from the Jubilee. Strauss and the other fellows. A very ill-looking day today, giving us better than we expected! Also hopes I have opened a correspondence with my mother! Letters fly! and expectations sprout. Mrs. Williams broke out laughing unexpectedly at dinner. Very. Wherefore? She proceeded to explain such unheard of proceedings. Miss Bromley looked serious & she laughed to wonder how she'd look a week from to day!! Hard telling. Miss Grose is engrossed in the art of making her various, I, in the art of exuming them. Miss Bissell is on bisselled in the art of marching Master Edward Crocheron to sacred precincts and it all comes to a phiz, afterwards she bizzles over a dress in progress of construction! I, no little nomen, turn reverently to grammar notes!June Thursday, 20 1872. A very abstruse Botany lesson on the Circulation and conveyance of the Elaborated Sap! How's that? Miss Bissell is rolled away in Swiss Muslin we shall never see her any more. Miss Grose is pressed into the Great Castleton Seminary Herbarium and we shall never see her any more, only in a flattering cut pasture. As for me I go round fashter, and fashter and fashter! My forthcoming history has found a name, I did it! It will be called "[Ahsrahie] on Civilization in the U.S., Ancient and Modern recised and, enlarged, completely illustrated, and containing a full account of the Aborigines with Appendix!" Mrs. Williams gave me a Passion Flower. June Friday, 21 1872. Yes'm. Hat it is not. The memory of yesterday is enough! We are glad! I stir up Anne & Georgia on the subject of herbariums. They go! The buy, and I am free no more. (I write this in the intervals of hiccough!) Mr. Williams returns highly elated. Mr. Willard, not so. I am in despair. My passion flower has gone and shut. I unacquainted with it's charasteristics and in a bit of generous thoughtfulness for eyes that have never looked upon passion flower caress it lovingly and entwine it with water. This morning I looked upon a spring shut up, a fountain sealed, and am consoled by Miss G. who says it will never open! Intense amazement on the part of me! Elina is despoiled! I commence on the carpet and want for a box. Do yet. June Saturday, 22 1872. How do you progress? Come and see! Summary; a box to pack next in size to the Bomasein House, two herbariums to make, a room to turn! Tea to dress for, and a back that once was strong but now is weak! (Note, one does not need backs to make herbariums) Incidents! My trials consist in getting hammer and nails! Mr. Williams deals out nails like matches, companionless. My steps multiply. That I can get along with! My steps that are of no avail multiply. Which troubles me. Officeward, Query. "Do you know where Mr. Williams is?", and sighed immovably, but answered "No"! In order to have Miss Worcester, we have to take Mr. Brown. We do. Festoons hang over us. We look, and possess our [snils] in cedar! The herbariums please me and I'll show Sis how next spring!June Sunday, 23 1872. Miss Grose has succeeded in getting two verses from Georgie Billings, "God am love", "Jesus am wept"! I had just one of the best naps ever recorded, and it did me good all over! We then went down to bread and butter and platitudes and beheld a bouncing short cake with our eyes, from the kitchen window! Alas, not for us. How bitter to reflect on! A passage occurs to me. What good are strawberry shortcakes to me "save the beholding of them with our eyes!" Miss Grose arrives in state and we in state receive her. The graduates sermon whatever else it might have been was Boxalaureate! The last Sunday night says Miss Bissell on her rounds! The last Sunday night says Mr. Williams in the long-tailed prayer. The last Sunday night say the girls [...fully]. June Monday, 24 1872. Well? And then we all look at each other. Don't suppose for an instant we stand still to do it! Not once. Not a minute! Ex.....ation is in progress in the [...]! So are all things but meals. "Thou shalt not eat" says our Lawgiver, & do we? Look into our pale and sunken faces! Six of one hang picture on our class room walls, so do half a dozen of the other! We shoot high! Well! And then we all look at each other, neither stand still to do it. No, not once. Not a minute! Reports, marks. 10's, 6 and 3/5's, 7 and 2/3 'ds, 8's go into my brain ans set my nerves on a Tam. O' Shanter excursion. I put them away! Concert in the school room, and from shore to shore is still being sung to me on and on!June Tuesday, 25 1872. I. Morning. The girls have their wish, bountifully behold it rains! They watch the gate, the park, the door. We all laugh a little, talk some, and speculate. Dinner? No, not yet. II. Noon. Saunterings by O.M.Bromley author of Pickling and its consequences. Dinner? No, not yet. III. Afternoon. We all sat there. Just as we've done lots of times, and I in the chair before them, all as it has been and will be never again! The work kept in my hands until the last, the very last, and then Dr. came and the people fled! I got up out of the chair and in took it. The girls make their pens go hopefully cheerily! Dinner? No, not yet. Evening. Still the pens went. By and by the girls! I had that talk with the Dr. He made me see things and feel good and now I am coming back next year. Night. The tenderness that is in the midst of the Almightiness! The melancholy days have come, says Miss Worcester. June Wednesday, 26 1872. It is necessary for me to sit there, it is not necessary for me to live! Nor eat thinks Mrs. Williams! but I do one and do not the other. It is the first which I do! Pretty hard day. Frances. Pretty hard day! What Dr. knows about boxing as Dr. Webber says! What did he know? Ask me! Resolved that henceforth and evermore classes presented for boxing shall be previously drilled! Resolved that that drilling shall include the principal parts of lay, lie, sit, sink & swim! I do here by affix to this my seal in the year of our Lord One Thousand Eight-Hundred and Seventy Two! The next for us was joy and salutations and a good time. Dr. says they all shall wear white dresses tomorrow! Are we glad? Ask me!June Thursday, 27 1872. To begin with it rained and didn't and did and kept on and ceased! The [...] summons of the A. M. consisted of Dr. Fletcher. The line of march as was announced ran thus, Pupils, parents, corporation teachers and friends! We queried, which we were. Don't know yet! A church aisle, two pew doors, but one was taken and the other left, miss Grose took her! and he, never mind! so much for the A.M. The centering point in the afternoon was Miss Tebordo's essay. Scarcely less was Nancy's bow. I forget to say in the morning Mr. Williams made a pen. Howard says, "his sorrow is better than his mirth!" The other teachers thought so too! Things worked, riz, and became. And dim the shadows fall over all! I enjoyed to night. There were so many happy things, and so many good words for me to think about and believe in. O, it's all good says Barber. June Friday, 28 1872. We said the good byes down in the photograph rooms, and all were there. To Miss Bissell at the depot. To Miss Grose in the corner Room. What has broken off we shall not know until next year. One more look into my little room. The Elina that was and is and shall ever be! Turn over the leaf now and go off with Anne & I over the hills twenty miles. A revolution has ensued every time I have mentioned Orwell. I mildly expected earth quakes, maelstroms, volcanic action, newly opened geysers, or misplaced affinities! I was not disappointed. Castleton was hardly out of sight ere a misplaced affinity a la thunder shower poured and soared around us! We tarried at an old red house, was this the last? Why then this wetness? This dripping pan appearance? This is the place! Stand still my steed. June Saturday, 29 1872. I like this valley, I do so love a wide stretch of sky and meadow, it gives me such a feeling of perfect freedom, especially when days stretch before them as wide and free as sky and meadow, as full of places for the sunshine to fall, and soil for daisies to blossom. What did we do? O, you quizzy chick. Nothing fo course. Who ever ran up in the country to do anything else? Not a rudabaga school ma'am, of all others. I am porous. Look at me and behold an example of pores, innumerable! Of porespiration multitudinous! How jolly it seems to be company! Warranted to rest!June Sunday, 30 1872. Mrs. Phelps is perfectly sure that I am going to faint. Every few minutes this lady in a state of marked perturbedness chases me up, with "There she is going to faint". Meals are collected together every few minutes with all possible speed on the supposition that I must eat constantly or faint. I haven't expected to any of the time! I hear rumors of a highly exalted thermometer. Feel some so, though the [...] & coolness I observe is indeed expressive. How dare I do otherwise, in the presence of Mrs. P.? All things in weather and surroundings faining lassitude and disinterestedness we are addressed on the subject of the Freedmen's Missionary Association it being about the only subject in which something interesting could not be said! I am glad there are books in the morning books. Glad too that days live in what they suggest and in what God out of His fullness pours into them!July Monday, 1 1872. How am I to convince Mrs. Phelps that I am a skilful, ay, a successful traveler? How is she to know that I have unharmed and victoriously rode over continents, islands, penninsulas, isthmuses, capes, mountains and plains? That I never lost anything but veils and never carried a veil that I didn't lose, which proves that railroading was not the matter, that it acts independently and without veils. I can convince her of but one thing, one palpable & stubborn fact, that is that I shall faint so, to my experienced ears she gives numberless directions and [mentions] innumerable about cars, baggage, checks, [presdence], discretion, watchfulness, and partiotism. A half past four in the morning ride through grand old Vermont. By and by a car ride home. Aggie and Dannie waiting! Mother not expecting company. A bill of sale's hustling of things into one room and a Heaven help us attempt at a Biennial Reunion. July Tuesday, 2 1872. Yes, small world twirling round into space my sister has a word or two to say today. It's her day! Set the wild echoes flying, flying! We are all so glad for her. Glad to see the pale face hid in the beautiful white organdy, caught up with flowers, and here and there held by loopings of lose, glad to see her go away in the carriage, glad to see her stand among the others to be greeted and cheered after the long waiting weeks with less of white organdy and flowers and greetings than goings without, and self crucifyings, and patience. July Wednesday, 3 1872. If you want to know something definite in regard to the formative period of this planet, just behold our basement, our parlor, our back room, our bedroom, our back door, and in short all the occupied space included in fourteen dollars a month. Two revered dorms, Aggie and me, agitate. A revolution ensues, and things take to themselves quiet and settle down! We did a lot. We arose up and called ourselves blessed! So did Aunt Mary. Anne betook herself to "My Summer in a Garden", and slept between the chapters. I see just enough of Summer in a garden in our back yard to make me long and long and long for the country. Will he bring me to his banqueting horse? I know his banner over me is love. July Thursday, 4 1872. How surprised we were over our half past nine breakfast to see by the morning paper that the procession moved at eight thirty! No processions moved from our house at that hour. The spirit of seventy six withers in me after each day's holding forth like this. Rigga, jigga from, from every direction, and all things that I behold send out fire, smoke, and lava. My brother, to comfort us, puts a [...] in the front door. We are comforted. Our hopes set on fireworks rise and fall, as it rains and ceases to rain. We venture forth and we are dry no more. They always do so in Albany. July Friday, 5 1872. A cool breath like we had to day seems delectable. I've stifled and gasped so long. Agnes installs herself. Marshall proclaims the line of march, direction, distance extent calls off, and by virture of her office, suggests and reiterates. Anne and I follow, follow. We merinate in the contiguous shade when there is any. We learn how uncomfortable a thing it is to suffer and be hot. We suffered and were hot, first to see what Denison would take Anne's picture for, [&] second to see Broadway and the Art galleries. We merinated in the contiguous shade at Washington Park. Anne [muses] on these things in her heart. I don't. I fan. July Saturday, 6 1872. Once peace was the pillow for my head, not since these melancholy days have come. Now I say Let us have peace and there is no peace. The insect world hold high carnival night times. Bozzaris, cheers the band! The beauty spot in today lay where so many white days of my life have lain on my well-loved river. We sail along amid the glory of it, the beauty of it, and it sparkles and ripples for us, and we are happy. We get off at Cedar Hill and come back on the Eagle. We come back, not as we went, but hopefully, trustfully, lovingly, tenderly. July Sunday, 7 1872. And then Sunday came. Sunday, when the red and the blue get closer to each other than they ever do other days, and something in us answers to something above us, and recognitions write themselves in the new up-springing light. The light that is about the hard. The light that is shining on me as I go. Again Dr. Bridgman's words thrill me, go through and through me, and I miss not one. "Friend, where fore art thou come?". Jesus and Judas. In the know of betrayal, even with the kiss upon his lips, Jesus the loving Master calls him friend. The Cathedral music pleased Annie and I'm glad we went. How close things follow on each other. We come home from Ashgrove full of the music, and the prayer to learn that in the sacred house from us is the small pox. July Monday, 8 1872. I was glad to see the light break and the day begin. We had such a night of it. Tossing and fidgeting, and dreaming aloud. I wonder if the small pox itself is so very much worse than the dread of it. I plan an early start so as to let Anne see our cemetery on our way up to Troy. We have a guiet hour in this beautiful place, & the next for us is forward march! Long after the cars move on, I follow Anne over the well known road, on and on, past the Seminary, and the little brown recitation room, still on over the pleasant meadows, and wood lands to the quiet homey farm house where there is so much for her. So much that there has never been nor ever will be for me. I do so like that noble, unselfish, kindly man, her father. I have lots of time to think of all this coming back alone. July Tuesday, 9 1872. Martha of old was no commencement to my sister in having house keeping streaks! One has been on her today! Now small boys get out of the way! I believe fully that this morning I had the small pox! Of course I haven't it now. May not have it again for several days. Standing the heat does not work out patience in me. Flies are added to the discipline, flies that have the power of locomotion and thrive in darkness. If headaches endure for a night does joy come in the morning? She was mistaken! Aggie saith, "This is the way" and we walked in it. Three cents to walk. Two cents to ride! Which shall it be my little man. You pays your money and you takes your choice!July Wednesday, 10 1872. Well, I couldn't be jolly. I tried and tried and what is better calculated to awaken the most mournful sensations than to see any one trying to be jolly! It always makes me dejected! Having small pox for a neighbor is living face to face with a terror for which there is no relief save to wait and see! I can't wait and see and be jolly. Buying and using a cyringe has not conspired to a flow of spirits today. Aggie has been as merry as a chipmunk all the time since her eyes opened. She washed and has visions of white things and clean things innumerable! A blessed little shower passes over, hopping tides of clear pure water and sending to us a [sprightly] breeze. July Thursday, 11 1872. It seems as if the hope and joy and promise, and blessedness of the last Thursday at the Seminary & the Sabbath with Annie was long, long ago. I can't bring them back. I'm having a long hard time of waiting and seeing! The sick man died this afternoon, and they are coming soon to carry him away. It makes me in spite of the awfulness think of pleasant things. Of the shadow of the great Rock. Of being in Paradise today. Of coming close to know. I am in a fog, all along of Susie's letter. I am sorry it came today but if I wait, I'll see I am so glad Annie's letter came with it. It helped so! "Thou will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee!"July Friday, 12 1872. Barnaby Rudge is such an odd story, It's wild and dreams of not so full of little tender home things as some of Dickens other stories. I just like Gabriel Varden. I can't get up rested any more. It seems so strange for me to be kept awake. I who always sleep so hard and sound. We have had such a beautiful cool breath this afternoon, and it seems like a God send. We were so warm and sort of used up with the intense heat. Apropos of this was our visit to Mrs. VanZandt. We talked small pox in its various forms and stages and then varioloid. I build several small dams and sent the current into more refreshing channels when I could. I gave them long detached accounts of Vermont and the pleasures & charms of green bills & etc.July Saturday, 13 1872. "You see, he was not busy with his thinking, but his living". And that has come to me today twice or three times. A great many of those things come to me when I am writing to Sue. I never was more glad for those words, its hard at home, not to be busy with living but to walk gently and patiently before God, living and growing the right way. News local and otherwise centers in our household on Dannie's going away. The afternoon and evening was occupied in buying pants. You see we had to talk about it, then go for Aunt Mary, then come home and hunt up an old pair which we found not. Then Aunt Mary had to come up to signify that she was ready to go then we had to find the store and believe it closed. Then and only then we got to the pants. The members of this family approve, confirms. July Sunday, 14 1872. My brother flourishes like a green bay tree. So does my sister pretty near. Those pants are a perfect, not only fit but hit. Who shall take the glory, Aunt Mary or me? I reverse the order of things by taking breakfast after church instead of prior. It necessitated haste on the way back. What was Dr. Bridgman's sermon like? To me it was like a little of the Mount of Olives in sight of Jerusalem. I lingered longingly around it all day. Every word of the text helped me: Isaih 82-2. "And a man shall be a covert from the wind, a hinding place from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place and as the shadow of a great Rock in a weary land". July Monday, 15 1872. The silence is broken by a big noise in our house. It was us getting breakfast for Dad. You have probably heard ere this that Dad is about to go away. Breakfast being over we make ready. We bring a trunk up by hand. A drawing room car conductor sets up to arrouse the people at Sundry times and in diverse places. A woman is late, the train speeds, seven men lay hold on her, she runs along, they lift her up and our friend highly pleased shows us from the last car how "she couldn't get her foot up". The next most memorable circumstance was being shingled. During the process think of all that God says about barbers and believe it. Then I in full possession of all my faculties though deprived of much of the natural covering enter a pork store and determine by actual measurement, my [avoirdupois]. She opened not her mouth!July Tuesday, 16 1872. Ninety five pounds and a half say I. That's not such a [wery]. Now listen to me. Six new pounds a week is the word. How shall it be? I look at her. She looks at me! Silence and night were again broken betimes by a noise in our house. It was the arrival of my grandmother. We were glad. It cheated the flies out of half a meal! They feed on us gratefully, cheerfully, not having any hair to be cut, or train to go to, or weight to be ascertained I take refuge in saying we had chocolate for supper and baked beans. Once more. I flee with a fact to the mountains, a fact which tells how I went where the raspbery groweth, is picked and [buyded]. Mother did it. So did I. So did Aggie. Mother did buy ten guarts. I did carry them home. Aggie did [...] [...]! Then we all went to the flies!July Wednesday, 17 1872. I am not frizzled nor fried but burnt up, burnt all up. Well done! Before taking a bath I washed me all over with water. My lips feel as if a [...] had passed over them. My stomach rolls and surges like an intermittent geyser. My throat is a desert in a perpendicular position and our only fan is lost. Never mind, one must melt out the condensed frosts of a Vermont winter and I'm at it. I go to seven places saying "Have you lemons?" They answer "we have no lemons". I do not despair. My desperation urges me on. One man has lemons. I carry one home in triumph. Grandma is not silent. She knits and while her fingers and the needles go this way and that way she tells us of the summer she was on the island, that awful summer of '57 when cholera stalked forth and the plague up on the people fell! A new arrival. Our [wringer]. Aggie fastens it on a chair and wrings and wrings. July Thursday, 18 1872. "We will have a treat tomorrow" quoth my sister, "baked beans". They are without father or mother and emphatically they have no end of life. I still set away a dishful after scores of meats. As I write we are in the midst of a shower which is "evingly". That last word was the result of reading two chapters in "The Luck of the Roaring Camp". And so forth and so on, go our tongues, all of them. So do our fans when found. The uncommercial Traveler is read in bits. I pick him up, and lay him now. Read line upon line precept upon precept. Here a little and there a good deal. I like the scents of Easter Morning, it is flowers to me where no flowers grow. July Friday, 19 1872. Today has touched me where I ache and long, on my book side. It was gala time to me up there in the State Library. I came back elevated seven pegs and a pole. I make milk excursions this time having abated on the question of lemons. Whatever else my grandmother is, conservative she is not. Her radicalism betokens foretastes of what has reappeared in Frances. Very. Find mother desiring to depart and be with Mrs. Wooster which is far better. Coming back on the ferry boat with the red lights of the little tugs dancing over the water and the moon shining laughingly down and the water dancing and laughing too. What comes I think of but Her and the bank the water at my feet is flowing to!July Saturday, 20 1872. Haarlem Oil! How could anybody ever have anything after taking that? I smell it and smell it! "Approved by grace" says the bottle and I implore manifold grace to get it down. Aggie's end of yearativeness requires different treatment [...] and abstinence! Grandma unfolds to us Dad's exploits and Lyman's that [miserable] summer Fate threw them together. A beatitude has been added to my history in the shape of weather, this weather. Am so thankful to be allowed to shiver. Speculate in books. It ends. Speculative further in yarn and conjectures. Could I? May I? You can. You may. I shall foot a pair I may. I can. I arise and go reverently to Haarlem Oil. July Sunday, 21 1872. This is stiller, softer, holier! I was in the bay resting, a grand, deep bay overlooking the sea. A great life is before me majestic in its depth and possibility as the sea, and I rise stronger to meet it. What was Dr. Bridgman. I came home wrapt in the thought of self surrender, self sacrifice. I was in a still, shut in valley wearing pink and purple chains, taking in my heart the thoughtful tenderness of "If it were not so I would have told you" and that was Gates Ajar. I was on Red Hill thinking how I should come close and know: Now. Austiss saw the smile still on His dear face as it was left after the sinning woman went away and she took her place! Now the gold that could purely endure was beaten and last of all how the hills lie ever beyond the sunset and that was Hitherto. July Monday, 22 1872. And living assumes the shape of washtubs, suds, wringers, knitting needles, and stitches. Our only visitors were the postman, the milk man and the ice man! That makes me think of my incidental morning meal. I won't say breakfast, when it comes any time o'day. I open the door from the bedroom to find the first meal just vanishing down the throat of Grandmother and Agnes. Aggie had taken all the sugar, grandma all the milk, and they were assisted in there devotions by fried bread. What I was to do looked very large to me, but diminutive to the rest of the planet. I traversed nearly a block for a cucumber, sugar was borrowed, the milkman appeared in about an hour, and bread was fished up from the depths, and I took my morning meal! This is housekeeping. July Tuesday, 23 1872. A week of pills: Think of it and this, day, the first! Does he know? Who's he? How very indefinite you are! Well I've so far yielded my samples, as to go and see a doctor. A he. A him. Mrs. Foote comes and talks houses to me. I feel better and think how I'll tell my mother tomorrow! Susie's letter comforts me. It says "There should never be anything but truth between my little girl and me"! A name has been found for the trouble of so many years. O, dear, words, words, words. How tired I am of putting such things into shape when in my heart they live so whole and so complete! We are having a dear little shower and I love to hear the sound of the rain. Shall I read Dombry & Son or go to bed?July Wednesday, 24 1872. Grandma has made the last thing evident to my senses a panorama. The door being shut she gets into bed as she supposes a la usual. She feels around, all over for evidence of her location. Keeps still, feels more, finds herself in a shoveless bed, feels more. Has it, feathers? It has feathers! We hear sounds as of uneasiness and open the door. Grandma is cuddled in a mass about an inch or so from the foot, feeling around! I'm worse off, lost in the intricacies of knitting a heel without the feet of knowledge and belief. I've cast anchor. I'm feeling round. Mother when I visit at set time and place, place more set than time on account of Foote prints on the sands of time and more too, to start again, mother waxes highly elated on the subject of houses which necessitates on my part a visit to Troy!July Thursday, 25 1872. Folks upon folks, business wind in my throat, and hours without things, all along of going to Troy! A "no not yet" would have been blessed in my experience, but I had to hear "fifteen minutes ago" from a big fat very old man who might have said "no, not yet". It was all Mrs. Foote's fault. Then cause hours without things, a great many! But I bought shakes, pears, and I can wait in perfect bliss. By and by he comes and I am happy! I forget even pills and Haarlem Oil and heels to knit in my one thought of real estate! It has feathers! It can crow, and I want to buy it! So does mother. Where's the money? "Two hands to work addressed". And jollity over the green & under the blue that stretches from city to city. July Friday, 26 1872. Dickens says, Life is a great deal sloppier than he expected to find it and by and by I am going to [...] it. We've had some very fast rain by spells all day! Aggie held forth quite enthusiastically on the virtues of flank meat over wasting pieces. She next goes into a somewhat abstract analysis of the components of the gravy we had for dinner consequent in my weekly suggested remark that it tasted some like catnip tea. Then she fishes up stitches with four steel poles for grandmother. Her stitches today eel-like drown themselves in a sea of stocking. Aggie likewise builds up chemises from ruins. I build up written communication from nothing! Blessed, also once more is peace in the abdominal regions. July Saturday, 27 1872. I regain my senses on the subject of real estate, and theorize. A little leaven leaveneth a whole lump, but hadn't you better have the little leaven, before you build hopes on lumps? Trying to get well puzzles me. I'm in the condition of poor Paul. Some tell me to eat meat, some say let it alone. I must [heart] it up and see what decision he comes to! One enters into the kingdom of [hearth] through much tribulation! However I'll hang unto the Graham. Above all things argue not with Aggie or grandmother. In either case your sublimest logic is unavailable. Aggie dispenses [shot] that means all convincing and its a pity you can't see it. Grandma will fall back on what you haven't experience! I keep still. I think of Aunt Mary's large heart. July Sunday, 28 1872. It was cool and hot in streaks! My senses were called upon to remember the long space between church & dinner at the Sun. This on account of bread which I have come to learn is made edible by slow processes. Breakfasted at eight. Our next meal was 8:40. However [washcabin] once commenced it went on from the original impulse. Missed what Dr. Bridgman might have done for me in the way of thought and consecration, but could not walk to Swan street safely. I want to learn how to get well. I must care! I looke a little while with Elizabeth Stuart Phelps into some of life's deep sad chapters, and life, why it stands up before me like the intense earnest thing it is! "How often would I have gathered you and ye would not"! July Monday, 29 1872. Grandmother says, "Charlie gives the girls up to Syracuse, garters". When Hughes showed them to me I told him Mary had washed a good many pants for Charlie, and he's never give her, garters. Facts grandmother, facts and you believe in em as I'm finding out! It's all good old grandmother logic. Something like the grandmother talk we shall believe in when we're old, Sue and I. There were a few come and go, minutes in which it was a joy "not to be doing but to be". There was a joy in both in the cosy seat reading Margaret Fuller and Bacon. Before that and after that I took up the thread of my forsaken heel, and saw how. Yarn and patience! One to be more in the other to be spun out! Life is sloppy still. It has thunder and lighting for us too! Grandma says "I want to hear from Mary". Forth I trudge to bring back and take the good word. July Tuesday, 30 1872. I do not read a word of Human Organism. We have too much Magna [Enstauration] within house hold limits. The quiet precincts of first floor 99 Philip becomes the scene of Jubilate [Drs]. For days back it has known only the cries of the breadman, ice man, milk man, postman! The soup begun it. That is the dilapidation of temper that preceded the unusual demonstration in our house was consequesnt on the effect of the soup in its action and ejection. That is we were both cross. Aunt Mary came up, and [Agamemnon] Elizabeth Eliza, & Solomon John and the little boys with the india rubber boots. That is we all made a noise, and we settled down quietly. We betake ourselves to further action and ejection. July Wednesday, 31 1872. And it was so. Very much, and grandma helped. We feel as if the State Board had just gone. I expected to sleep tonight in the mansions of the rich and great my friends, but am here yet, and do not. Wherefore, my friends? Because mother is a [mouse]. Because we need refreshment! Every day we have a new house hold staple. Today it is baked apples and cod fish. I knit human Organism and read stocking heels. A new project enters my unoccupied cerebrum. Aggies too. A piano forseeth and we sit & play untold tunes on it that echo off and away, and resolve themselves into... cash! Well, we'll kill the bear Becky. Poor, dear, old grandma, has been so sick all day and all night & we are so glad to see her better!August Thursday, 1 1872. Many things, comprehending much and many people. Also a conclusion which summed up is adverse to Sir Charles Grandison. Thread and patience. There are four volumes more. The postman comes with loaded argosies. He brave in his hands Susie's lost letter and I do not dash my foot against a stone! Sue sends a hundred fold in this life. Dr. Tremaine sends greetings, and yes ma'am I may have the little girls, and more. Spiders a great many said to this two will you walk into my parlor? and we walked and beheld grands, squares, and uprights! Over the river and back, our river that brings her unspeakably near, and I'm glad yet. August Friday, 2 1872. I saw the elephant! Her was dressed in drab. The cirkiss came as the conqueror comes! I was on State St. bargaining for fowls which I bought not, peaches which I bought not, oranges which I bought not, and pineapples which they had not! Surely this is a "little old world". What can we get for tea? Our guest came not, so I am resigned to forego fowl, orange, peach & pineapple. Why, he not come? The answer is lost with Bo peep's sheep. Shall we leave it alone? Will it come home? Young Arthur you are not of the Round Table or I should not look in vain. Happily I told not my sister & philosopher! Aunts Mary & Esther walked in while I was in the middle of a letter to Susie. I stopped. Aggie was reading David Apperfield. She stopped. We brought in tea & sich & they partook & sich! At our later tea we laughed. Very much! August Saturday, 3. 1872. We are not laughing now. We did not laugh all night. You will understand when I tell you Grandma's last remark. "I hope the bedbugs won't fight Aggie all night to night or Frankie choke to death". This long morning gave me primary lessons in being bedridden. [...]. To cultivate memory, perception and language. Rose up to dinner, and disappeared presently. Let her! Wasn't Mrs. Akin good to sent me in the flowers, the pretty little flowers, all she had. The thought came from some very, warm place in her heart. I'm up now. Was a good while ever since three o'clock, when soon after mother arrived, & presently young Arthur who shall be of the Round Table. Yes'm! I shall not choke to night!August Sunday, 4 1872. Text. "Which because she is at all shall be for her". Ah, and how it goes on, "which hope we have as an anchor to the soul both sure and steadfast and it taketh hold of things that lie behind the veil". Are not all the beautiful things of the new life included in that "which", and I thought of it today because there was no breaths of the Long Orchard, no Pine Lane, no still shut in Valley, no bay and I was longing for a thought and a vision or the Veiled Guest. "To be with me where I am". Mother had sick head ache, all day. Grandma said it was a long, long weary day. Aggie scolded for delicate cake and I thought and cut papers. August Monday, 5 1872. Mother begins it. She drops her bread dough pan and all, dough downwards. Aggie, meekly, "Bread has fell". I meekly, "Yes, bread has gone" down. Aggie being left Chief Chancellor of cake, takes it out early. Sequel. It is not done. Her doom. She must eat it all. The man up in the State Library says as I enter "Come follow, follow, follow, follow me!" I say, "Whither shall I follow, follow, follow, follow Whither, shall I follow, follow thee!" The he leads me gently but firmly up to and through four volumes of Audubon's Birds of America. Now I vibrate to & fro, from 99 Philip to 70 1/2 Hudson Dr in? No, not yet. I have no faith in Halicarnassus. August Tuesday, 6 1872. In the resurrection morning Grandma will be the first one up. That I know. I was just in the middle of my second nap 2 P.M. when I am awakened by Grandma sitting on my foot on her way out of bed. "What's the matter, Grandma?" O nothing! only it is time to get up! There was donder and somthing struck! I was some scared but one becomes reconciled to misplaced affinities and thunder claps after living here awhile. O, for a wilderness in some, vast lodge. All basting is not for the present joyous but grievous. August Wednesday, 7 1872. The man in the State Library talks to me. Very much. He tells me concerning the Mammoth Cave, Scotland heather geneologies & skimmers. I look at him with big eyes. Gramma gets mad some and threatens but not much. Mother is in for pax, pacis, paci, paceni, pox, pace. She accomplishes pacification by suggesting peaches and me to buy one which I do. Agnes en route for School Boards and a place to teach, tells us on departing that she will not return until she is hired & paid one month in advance! She returns unto us [vied]! I write heaps to Dr. Austin. I plod my weary way to the far distant P.O. and it ventures forth, and me back. August Thursday, 8 1872. "What's a valetudinarian?" says my sister walking in the bedroom. "It's one who shoe's the old horse, shoes the old mare and lets the little colt go bare". It was the best I knew. Smoothness has comforted us today which accounts for the perspipring processes. Where smoothness is, heat tarries. We fan some. Of the vaccination I need and of say, "How does the old thing work?" Don't hurry nature! It needs, well I can't tell by the looks of it, but it seems to me it needs vaccine and another chasm. Problem suggested by the evening walk. If there is our vacancy and twenty-two who are entitled to it and fifteen more who want it when will Aggie's turn come? August Friday, 9 1872. Vanquished! My conquerors hold full possession and I flee. I love to steal awhile away. Once it was a big day at our house. It was today. He came. He talked, and we were hot some more. "And thou hast walked the streets, how strange a story". But it was not Thebes. Dr. Tremaine says to himself, "Now, they'll do". We are pretty glad. I'm glad more yet, because the little girls are coming and I looked & lo, on the desk a great multitude which no man could number. And I said what are these and whence came they? These are they which saw General Grant through great tribulation! So was I. August Saturday, 10 1872. I'm going to commence with the nicest thing first I was over on the ferry boat with mother, and in a carriage by us I saw Austiss and Richard. She looked just as I know Austiss does look, and she was talking with Richard. She has such deep, thinking eyes and such a pretty head. O, how glad I am that no one but me knows how I'm longing for Broad fields. If only a little piece of it could come into this vacation. At home things are real and hard, but there is a way out. We know not anything save "getting a school" and "earnen money", and "paying it back". Please don't tell me the old old story! "What I know about starving". "What I know about buying butter". "What I know about knitting". "What I know about borrowing baskets". August Sunday, 11 1872. Which wasn't broad and deep and blue and grand. But it went out early for in the early lamp light I went to bed and talked with God, and sent out flags to Susie. Grandmother wishes to go home soon, only she waits patiently. Her heart has grown very tender these last years and her voice quivers, always when she talks of the little tender things, Dear old lady. I bless Hitherto. That and Tennyson's Princess. One said, "You can't have more than both hands full at once". The other said, "O, tell her, brief is life, but love is long". August Monday, 12 1872. Through how many tubs of suds have I wandered this day? Only sitting, sit and knit, and nothing more. Mother was not as quiet as a weaned child, nor Aggie. Do they wash in Heaven? Do they suds and hang up? Please don't say yes, for I want to leave the great tribulations I come up through this side. To buy or not to buy. That is the question. All things looked and said Piano. The voices of the breezes & the birds played tunes and then said, Steinway and Sons. I shut eyes & ears & marched down to the man and I said, "No, sir". Then he lingered shivering and said many things. I grew less resolute. Said, "may be" man, glad. A crisis elsewhere which takes mother. A noise is heard and our Dan comes home. So wags the world away. August Tuesday, 13 1872. My repose is not unbroken. My breath gets snarled up or lost on its way up and out, and I get up to help find it. Wake up my sister who [rikuperates] recuperates! We all get up in a blue. The cloud is bigger than a man's hands. It has flown away, [hirdling] hurdling. It soon did when the mailman came, and the letter said "Yes, she could have the Fair Haven School". Poor child, she's had her worries, how that there is a place for her in the world she is cheery. So are us all. There's always a Halicarnassus where there's fish! I want to see some chunks of light and a passage or so out of my light places. August Wednesday, 14 1872. Another fish which sends our lines and hooks in another direction! Keep on. We have some courage to hope even through bigger baits than ours may have been cast. Cohoes, may open and take her in. Who knows? We, full of a good time coming send aprons wrought by our own hands to mother. Every thing happens between showers, while they have the floor and the heavens we put down the windows forbid all [drang] [its] take the middle of the room, and gasp, while it rains and thunders and goes on. Aunt Mary happens but does not tarry. A pie happens which we have for supper. August Thursday, 15 1872. To be sure I was mad. I looked for eleven letters. Was sure of three, and here I sit and bless. Well. Well. Suppose my days all went like this. Work and sick like. Made yards of trimming for my black alpaca. Where is it now? Vanished. Took my stocking out to the heel, knit more. Where is that. No friend took note of its departure. Not much to show for a day's work Frances. I found my breath and lost it again, and am looking for it. I wait no more but rush to Hudson St, 70 1/2, Find a [...] for my carryings on physically and get powder and return. As long as the Dr. is not [seared] need I be? Wherefore, my friends. August Friday, 16 1872. I am "song hing it". On my part there is evident reluctance. Just as the peep of day awoke with a head which was merciless. It kept on. My pleasure is enhanced by powders, nameless and sour. The postman arrives dripping. Papers two, letters two. Aggie wax is fervent over Mr. Hubbard's soon reply, I over a ticket to Williamsport. I trim dresses and knit. It looks as if I should take the knitting out. I do, often. Our boy is sick. He is still and says little and we're all so sorry. I can't help wondering what if he go in the country, that strange country, where even the dear little boys never come back. August Saturday, 17 1872. My stocking has all come out, and I'm back working away at first principles. The nicest thing in all day was sitting down by the window with grandma to knit, after the tea dishes were all washed & put away. I wish my life, the whole of it could be washed and put away for a long time. Little Dad wanders amid mustard and wet clothes, and dreams of health. Aggie exults over her little boy here to tea. It has taken the whole of me to bear it. August Sunday, 18 1872. It is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known. Does a girl of twenty-three know? The text and the sermon was in Isaiah. Was I left comfortless? How could I be with the shadow of the great Rock in the weary land? Went out to Kenwood with mother and I told her the hard long story of March 25, that it seems will never end. Then I sat down in the shadow of it till one came up through the meadow where the mists lay [dim]!August Monday, 19 1872. Which tells of a journey and expectations. Also of Green Island Bridge. Miss Monk is not a friar. Shee meets us and introduces us to the committee-in-chief. Aggie is assigned a place among the strivers. In the race run twelve but five receive the prize. We withdraw now to cotton mills and contracts and [erich] things, and so run the hours away. I do not find Aggie on the qui vive in my return but she is not spiritless. We all rally. A kind Father has watched & she has a way to ride to crescent, while I also move on. August Tuesday, 20 1872. Dannie thrives on my treatment, but not rapidly. It's too awful hot to thrive. Mary Bryant is heard from and my every thought of her is glad and sunny. My troubles are found abundantly in combinations with cake and clinkers. I cook a great while but not much. I live to see those I institute rolls start for Dr. [Frinde] and we three awhile let loose breaths. Found mother at dinner in the atmosphere of lapis lazuli. Cheery. The way is rough my Father. August Wednesday, 21 1872. I got up. Washed. Dealt in coke, cinders, clinkers and various things I rub too. The sun cooked a goose. Not unusual. Neither unusual for the goose to be cooked. This is very plain. Has Aggie a school? Mr. Ryan sends up to know. Dannie. Wither does she. Hopes build themselves on Mr. Ryan. Will he? I have rowed all my future prescriptions shall be evermore filled at Speigle's. Reasons are powerful. Poor little Dad is tired after his walk to the doctor's. August Thursday, 22 1872. Which wasn't as I'd have had it, a bit. Much coke is not a promoter of heat. I had always supposed so but it isn't. I never would have believed coke was such and [...] to all righteousness. The whole of it ready to be summed up. It's all a "no not yet day". My sister ought to be here and she aint. How interesting this author is when in a stew. But there's a dear sky for Mr. Hubbard proclaims she did run well and obtained. Mother came home earnest in huckleberries to be fixed or something. She enacts the dream of tunnels & jugs and is in a bigger stew than I. August Friday, 23 1872. And I stew yet, immoderately. Does mother? Don't know. I went at a certain linen overskirt dreadfully. Took it hard. My fingers were weary and worn. And so my eyelids were heavy & red. Did I sit in unwomanly rags? The saddest are these. It might have been. Remember that I got supper desperately. I didn't give up the ship. It was the day boat. It has got on futher. Agnes stalks in so do my hopes. Once more in my memorable life the beans have drowned! Aggie comes home jolly, and in a moment it is all jolly. Aint it good? August Saturday, 24 1872. And a certain woman went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves. It was me. Who is my neighbor? The nearest that anybody got to that was the boy at the fruit stand in Jersey who sold me peaches for five cents a quart and gave me Bible measures. Did I ever come nearer wanting anything very much and getting it than today! Behold my dreams of summer every where about me and I in the midst. Isn't it nice? "I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly". Just like today and many days!August Sunday, 25 1872. A zone of calms after days upon the unsteady ocean. Yes, and I look away back over it and far beyond to the next for Hopes. I looked up into the hills from whence has come help in other days, and it was still blessed to look and live. O, for one more sunrise over these hills to see from Jen's room. One of my little girls comes to see me and I like her big black eyes. How strange things seem to me, ahead. If I could only take to my heart what Jesus said. "That in me ye might have peace". "Be of good cheer. I have overcome the world". August Monday, 26 1872. O, Bozzy, Bozzy again. Life hasn't many better things than this. "He hath made every thing beautiful in its time!" And again we sit and take up the little threads just where we left them. It is the Father's good pleasure! It is all full of Sue, just the same neither one replacing or rearranging, and we do just as we used to. [Day] has been gathered to her fathers and Philip Pirrip is instituted in her place. Breaths from the Pine Lane came to us, and [...] steals into the house from everywhere. By and by we go up to Sues' room and lie down. Then we know soon that it is Red Hill. How do I go back after she is gone? With prayers and a bit of the kingdom in my heart. August Tuesday, 27 1872. And I wake up. I had to. It seemed to come very natural, only why couldn't the space between yesterday and today have been a little longer, so I could hold on to my white day. In the old carriage riding with George up to Newberry, a new piece on to an old garment. A garment that was taken off and put away, months ago. "In feelings, not in figures on a dial". Newberry sits in its hills as of old, and in it the old desolateness comes over me that comes of old. I see old faces in the old places and drive on. Visit Jonny Clark, See Mary Denniston and go to be my friends! Much to think of Little Benediction to say.August Wednesday, 28 1872. Why are we here my friends? Why are we here? Since in due time and under many laborious propulsions Mr. Tramaines at last gets us together and off. We follow follow and ride glorious through Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Uncle Thomas awaits us and we are glad to see something to be eaten from dishes, not lunched. Surely there are meetings and greetings, feastings and flows of soul and things. But my frame turns away from merry making and seeks a bed and my heart goes after a little boy, sick. August Thursday, 29 1872. It is beautiful on the river until the Catskills are in sight. After that it is rainy and cheerless on deck. The little girls look for the pretty things onshore and show them to me. I sit looking up to greener far away shores, asking only for strength in the hard near year, and the Lord of that country says, "Be of good courage and He shall strengthen thine heart". I can never quite get my heart away from the banks that slope down close to the river near the stone light house. O, ye, hers. We land to find nobody waiting. To find house cheerless where I'd left it warm and full. We make it as bright as we can and go to sleep. August Friday, 30 1872. Did Mark Tapley ever move? Was he still booked, "jolly"? I wish I knew. Mother gets away and comes over and we tear up. Even in today there is dim, strange pain. There are no longer any knittings by the window with Grandma. After the work is done. No sitting on the doorstep watching for the postman. No walks with Aggie after tea and comings home for a quiet time in the parlor. No more of doing work together or planning or wondering in the little bright back room where the sun always comes in. How little the rooms look like these things today! Who'll come in and do it now? A dreary walk off up to the freight house alone and a cup of tea and bread & butter at Aunt Mary's. August Saturday, 31 1872. Mrs. VanZandt and her dear, old mother were so good to us and took such nice care. We are glad to see Aggie, but we only sit on trunks in the old bedroom to visit. We say good byes around at last and buy tickets and take checks for Castleton. Even the woods has a dreary sound, how dreary who can tell but me? What am I going back to? The faces of the little girls look bright as they look wistfully out from their future home, but my heart sinks so that an awaiting gloom would be quite unlooked for. It's very dark and we have dark times finding the gate and a light and Mrs. Foote. Sept. Sunday, 1 1872. This is a drearier Sunday than I shall spend often. I will make the rest bright in some way. I take times of inspection through the little brown house No. 2 very much after the manner of a regularly appointed custom house officer. I can't just see how we are going to live in a shoe, but I give it up. Mrs. Foote's house keeping is more dreadful than my imagination ever pictured, and I'm in for it until deliverance arrives in the shape of mother. Sept. Monday, 2 1872. I begin by speculating and throwing up works. Then I approach Mrs. F. on the subject of writing the parlor and find her on the first attack invulnerable. If at first you don't & c. Unsuccessful expedition Number 2. Going over to Fair Haven with Mrs. Loveland in search of a school. Mr. [Westcall] shakes his head, and we turn around. Emphatically I throw up more [crooks] which means I don't do [...]. Things come? No, not yet. [Marius] riding up to the ruins of Carthage. Sept. Tuesday, 3 1872. After a most delightful reclining in Mrs. Foote's non clad bed, which also possesses the quality of long used little washed bedding, I rise and go at the windows and here the narrative must end. I've washed and scraped out all my strength and the story is too heart rending to admit of being produced. Still if Mrs. Grose or Mrs. Briggs who saw me should ever in the lofty spirit of inspiration wish to give it the world I should say with all the zeal of the departed Mrs.[...] Davis, "Take it!" One hope vanished in the shape of Aunt Mary's bread. Sept. Wednesday, 4 1872. An institution has become inaugurated, which I can call by no name and must therefore develop. I make it out of milk and water and butter and the juice of a joint of meat which has no end of life. This that I make we eat on our taters. I send up to R.G. to know if he would like any help in the examination. His answer foreshadows dimly what I may expect this year. "No, there are so few I can attend to them". We take up the line of march to the nine o'clock train to find mother. Sept. Thursday, 5 1872. Things look better. There is at least the prospect of a clean bed. Mother brings deliverance in her very eyes and we set to work cheerily, cheerily. I never went to my first day with such a heartache, nor with so little, to expect, but like Parson Avery when he was going down in the night and the storm and the darkness, I can challenge the promise of His word. I meet Miss Bissell first and she threw her arms around my neck and breaks out crying. Sept. Friday, 6 1872. Well its born and begun and I suppose all I've got to do now is to be born and follow which I do in my black dress and Nile green bow. I seize upon my brother and take him up and introduce him to the United Head, also Charlotte. There is evident agreeableness but that means nothing only for me so look out for him. Obedient to orders I go up and talk. I cannot see that there now exists any better understanding, but I knew before, and I acted under orders. My path this year lies neither to the right hand nor to the left. I have marked it out. Sept. Saturday, 7 1872. And then the piano arrived. I am glad to be able to announce that it is also only installed in the walls of this house not far from the hard finish. To bring it about cost many [grants] and many Olivers complained. Order slowly begins to rise out of chaos, and though we have many tribulations we have to be very thankful for good milk. My poor bones call loudly for that bedroom [up] from Syracuse. And Addie came, but not the Addie of old but Addie in a chair of state. Sept. Sunday, 8 1872. No, "inspiration is not spontaneous! It is not acquired". Would that I could speak with the tongue of men and of angels! Why should that be tongue? Why not, tongues? Will Dr. French want to knwo when he comes to make up his? At present we are all engaged in making up our minds! We know not any of us what a body we shall be, it may choose of chaff or of some other grain!Sept. Monday, 9 1872. Forward, march! his little tune to go to, Frances' for one of your easily entreated spirit! All things considered I am not placed to grow in a hotbed in the usual acceptation of the term. If I am its in the neglected corner under the eaves. Sometimes plants shoot up and grow to as near a bay tree as they could ever be even under eaves, sometimes little cold chickweed grows against the wall! Is a hot bed always the hotbed of popular defining! I [know] not. I insist I am in one!Sept. Tuesday, 10 1872. And they made merry! To their longing visionary perceptions came the image of a cart stopping at the door. An off repeated image lately. He brought much, and it was done up in swaddling clothes, and tacked and tied. They staid! It was a long expected bedroom set. Does Mr. Patterson know all things? Does he know how to measure the earth? I'm afraid he does not. He uttered dark sayings of old but we knew better. We knew that head board could be made to go up stairs. It came to pass! Sept. Wednesday, 11 1872. Has it ever been recorded in later eras that Oliver complained, save once? I wait to know that I may govern my actions accordingly. Mollie does not appear. We wait wondering. What of all the ills art cannot alleviate has made her, heir, and kept her from our boiled potatoes and milk gravy. Addie walks after the pattern of godly Sarah, Abraham's wife, but to me she says naught. She has for me no words, no kisses, and our ways are separate ways for now. Sept. Thursday, 12 1872. I am indebted to my mother for a clean white dress, starched like Kingsford and Son's cash, and arrayed in this betimes I proceed to the portals of the Seminary to call upon the teachers. They came down in Phalanx deep. We talk of the solemnities of the constantly recurring funeral rites in Seminary habitations and in the middle of walls that have ears send up perpetual protest. At a late hour I dream of home and mother, and the phalanx conduct me to the gate, the boundaries of those regions. Sept. Friday, 13 1872. Some day we are all going to take a ride! That's what we said we'd do, and though our plans are not fully sprouted we shall probably go. Mrs. Foote built a tub and we are all set down in it. Mother goes off about the size of our dwelling place and hopes it is not wicked for us to believe we shall throw off this temple of clay and hard finish for a more abiding one. That does not necessitate of each and all of us that we become [Disgenes]! Well, there are evening winds in the long elm boughs!Sept. Saturday, 14 1872. I believe Red Hill is nearer heaven. I don't believe Austiss knew. Anyway the hills over which we went today mother and Dan and I were infinitely nearer heaven than any places our feet have tred. In the land we have journeyed through, I found pretty ferns in the woods all along the lake road, and I stopped & picked them while Dad held the horse. Dan encouraged my [pinchgions] labors by driving off out of sight screaming back to me. What! take you home! Upon my word I never dreamed of such a thing!Sept. Sunday, 15 1872. Mr. Briggs and I are gaining ground fast. Dont mistake me. Don't I beg of you suppose that we skim along the ground with celerity, like other people, whose mares go. No, we are gaining ground in becoming mutually acquainted. He unbosoms to me his struggle at reading Scripter because folks won't see through it. He don't know whether God can change his mind or not. Think of his asking me! The Silent Side mine, is growing more and more silent as there is daily less to tell and more to bear. Sept. Monday, 16 1872. The one diverting object of comment is Mrs. Foote's house. The one ever returning question to be brought up, is, What shall we do with that piano box? It is no doubt a matter that will require the brain of a Newton or a Robinson Crusoe to fathom! All the world wonders, but then shall ask for a place to store that box and none shall be given thee! Has Mrs. Foote less executive ability than she supposed? O, [thens]. How is Lucifer fallen! Lucifer, son of the morning. I have just room here to tell that Mollie has come!Sept. Tuesday, 17 1872. Mollie looks upon the room she is to inhabit and the accessory, who is no less a person than Mrs. Foote herself, with evident reverse of composure. It is not indeed conducive to mental kingdom come, at the first glance. It is less so when the accessory takes out her teeth! And nineteen weeks is a long time. Mother's going to move, says she is. Not that a house can be had, or made, or hoped for. That's nothing to do with it. "This little house was surely made. To hurt each other's eyes!"Sept. Wednesday, 18 1872. When does Mrs. Foote go? She doth much deceive [me]. She does not go. Lately she catches mice. Let me relate an incident! A mouse finds his way to the shrine of her cupboard. The mouse don't know much. How should she get him out! Allie Wright has a cat. Hattie is stationed at the cupboard door to hold it tight while Mrs. F. goes for the cat. The cat is brought & introduced unceremoniously "Now, kitty, get it quick!" (Mew). "Come kitty" (Mew) "Have you got it kitty?" (Mew) "There I guess she's got it". (Mew). Did she? O, sad sequel. O, blighted hopes. The mouse is still alive. Sept. Thursday, 19 1872. Even so the weak things of this world confound the mighty. (After reflections on the unpleasant relations between the cat and the mouse. See Sept. 18!) Miss Thomas is not Gabriel Varden. She is not a land flowing with milk and honey. She is not the full corn in the ear. She is not an April day. I'm so afraid Mr. Williams will have one of those fits. I keep thinking of it. Dr. Perkins says he will never come out. Sept. Friday, 20 1872. The ride is no longer prospective. No, longer do we see it as through a glass darkly! It has been and is no more. The motive power was Maynard's horse, with printed instructions and warranted not to cut and run. We pitched under the shade of the sacred oak and pitched in mother's bountiful lunch. We ran around after it. Found one, ay all. It was a dentist! O, tell it not in Gath! Mr. Maynard has sent my gray hairs in sorrow to bed. Sept. Saturday, 21 1872. I wish these days would stay. Why need I when it isn't weather that keeps me fit to live but grace! Sometimes grace takes the form of weather. Today trouble took the form of a ruffle to be bound. Sure enough. Folks come and I see them and they go, and I'm properly thankful. We glory in a dinner of brown bread and milk, followed by excellent digestion. Does that help on the ruffles? Yea, verily. Mr. W. is worse than ruffles. I come back from that gent, ruffled.Sept. Sunday, 22 1872. There was a Broad fields air, and drawings near to the real, whole best. What ailed me? How can I tell? Can any one. Why should just here those words step in my thought. "The Heart that bled and broke for you and Roy!" Is it because I need to know and feel a love that can bleed to teach me what it is to go in peace. Hydeville held in it's lap land up things even for me who went thither sorely needing. I took up little ones and blessed them. I did not receive the kingdom as a little child. I never have. Return O, Lord how long. Dannie brings me two beautiful mosses from the woods.Sept. Monday, 23 1872. And so it came to pass through Steinways & some that Mrs. Bunker came to see us and sang. It did not come to pass that mother went in for that she'd never! No, No, not if I coaxed. Everything is pretty all around us, and I can sit down in corners, and other places and feel, how good home is! Mrs. Bunker can sing and she sings things nice and pretty to be sung. Annie and Addie and Georgie and all of us talk afterwards and so do the pretty flowers from Lucy and Mary Bibbins! I am not conscious that this ink is making a mark. Sept. Tuesday, 24 1872. "Doody, dood, dood! The beans have [droned]! The beans have [droned]!!" "Must we give in", says she with a grim? Do I rejoice to watch the flight of that [Loce Catalogne]? Ask me! Move doody, doody, dood! The sun turns a warm side usward, all the sides too that have turned this way have been warm. Neighbor Mayward invites me to see squashes, and squashes. I look upon and ejaculate. He says I know how to eat a grape. Asked me if I did. Think so. Mr. Guy appears and he comes not in which is kind. He must be regenerate. Is he. Who else is? All of us. Sept. Wednesday, 25 1872. Doody, dood, dood. The boils have [droned]. The boils have [droned]! One has got up on my ear! We almost went to Rutland but not quite. So we're here now. Distress is rampant at the Sem. and the office is the seat of all enduring persuasion. But Frank didn't do it. He didn't know any thing about it! Be of good cheer said all things lit up as they were by a radiance glorious to behold, beautiful to be near. How near was I to it? O, I could feel it and be glad. Sept. Thursday, 26 1872. That day when I met Dannie with Susie's letter to mother. The sad pitiful tender letter that almost made me cry. "What has become of Fannie?" "If she is sick I shall see her if I have strength to get to her". That day when through every notch there were flame and azure finding each other. That day when with me was the light about the head! A very stupid man also stuck his head in this day for No. 33. Sure enough, and neighbors administered grapes and gravy never tasted better. sept. Friday, 27 1872. Fun, but of a mild type. Believe me. Report no, report there, report ye or you! Other bliss awaits me. Mrs. Bunker is here. Would I come? Come I may and come I must and it was a bore. O, you cloud in my well remembered [Latham]. I remember not your name. I only know how bored you were! I have quite an existing consciousness of being almost and altogether thoroughly tired. Too tired to hem veils but I do. Too tired to talk but I do, and [...], [...]. Sept. Saturday, 28 1872. Fun much less and purely wild. I dream a dream and it comes to pass in Kansas, so does a letter. Then comes much to eat and little to pay, assuming the shake of hot well to do johnny cake, and in the middle of things and eats with us. Hope indeed maketh not ashamed but what it gets right here in this place for I shant tell. Proceed I don't walk. I don't get even out to the back yard. I stay home and sew some and write much and be naughty about trunks to poor Mrs. Foote. Dannie is uncommonly funny and I'm all upsot, but think maybe I won't be long. Sept. Sunday, 29 1872. And there is not indeed an end to all things, but good prospects. Come lets have a good time! Yes, Ducky. Why did the sun shine, and the restful tender green get right where I could see it and the Hydeville be kind, and the ride be jolly unless to calm me down and make me fritter to live? If religion consists in being pleasant to have about I might as well ask the dear Lord please can't I commence again? See me drawing near the Seminary a sure hiding place for oyster soup. See me meet the great powers unflinching. See the royal proclamation & me going from U.S. over in Canada unprevented! has there ever? No, never!Sept. Monday, 30 1872. I rise betake myself to dressing, scrubbing and other things Alexandrine [...]. Also needless Alexandrine I fear it is the last day of September. Would it be indeed a complete record should I omit to say that I put on my white dress and felt like I looked clean in it which was worth attaining even through unlimited starch. Mrs. Foote must be talked to. Mother declares it. I am to do it. Mother also declares that I take her to the solitude of my own apartment and dwell much on many things. "Does I like [auntie] Foote any more?" Probably so. October Tuesday, 1 1872. Have you come to me my honest well loved October or have I whirled round to you? I don't know. Does Mrs. Siddons? How funny everything Miss Thomas and I talk over seems. Our inevitable conversations are so sort of "don't know what to make of you" like that I fell uncertain. But we had a fire both of us. While I mused the fire burned! We shall probably hear Mrs. Siddons though hope sometimes maketh ashamed. I came to a day to day, this one when on me was my new dress, and my friends it was because I was of the earth!October Wednesday, 2 1872. [picture of can to get oil] The can that Mrs. F. gives Molly to get oil in. The invincible Molly, who plunges, who crosses, not with the trappings of royalty, but the one ancestral can. I take great comfort in earthly blisses. To be more explicit mother has just completed a calico dress which I consider an earthly tabernacle not easily dissolved! and where architecture is without a rival. Little Miss Bissell is the joy that cometh in the morning. All of her. October Thursday, 3 1872. As for me give me potatoes. O care not whether alien to American soil or native born, they are roots and rootlets of past present and future happiness. Bin Quirk even now is digging them in Heaven's broad potato patch! Bin Quirk's descendants on earth are tillers of the soil! Where's my knitting? My stocking half footed that I lied away in the vacation! Behold it, ye who have tears! One [annogomous] mass of ink & without form or [...]!October Friday, 4 1872. It there's one thing that might be improved its Mrs. Foote's line of remark! She fortified herself on two things. Business talents and house keeping. She continually doth proclaim to us, "Consider my ways and be wise". Mother institutes but one line of attack, "If she don't, I'll move". After that Mrs. Foote always does. "Something just shown her and withdrawn". O how we in our helplessness lift up hands to reach the somethings. October Saturday, 5 1872. It commenced by binding ruffles. I bind a great many. Who should come down to see me but Addie? That she would never come had long been a settled principle with me. She's such a queer Addie. Does anything come of it? We shall see. It's pleasant out doors through the quiet blissedness of the October day. There are laid up in its thiry days treasures incompatible. There are places prepared for us. Even earth can tell of glorified [...]. October Sunday, 6 1872. My infant class occupy my thoughts of late. It is with great difficulty that I can make Charley's Billings mind clear on the subject of Bible [rendition]. He believes to this hour that Cock Robin is one of the books of the Bible. Eddie Whitlock insists on my attention, he pulls up his entire wardrobe for me to see. Dreadful child! How can I make him know such occupations are not for Sunday. I have learned to tremble when ever Georgie Billings opens his mouth to speak. He has the voice of the ghost of Marley. October Monday, 7 1872. When the base and rate are given how do you find the percentage. That's what we talk about up to school! Can we afford a new oil cloth for the dining room? That's what we talk about at home! How can I come close and know? That's what I talk about all to myself. My often question is a dear one. What of all royal strengths in life? October Tuesday, 8 1872. Every day now sweeps away the dear, old leaves. The winds come like somebody's strong arms. Inside the cheer is coming which shall have to be for weeks and weeks. Mollie and Dan keep the house propped up. She thinks Dan is so funny, and she laughs at all he takes it on himself to say and do. Sue wants to know. Do I make "home bright and sunny"? How is it? Are you pleasant to have about? October Wednesday, 9 1872. Dan's music is very like the old lady's religion. She used to have it once but now she was old she didn't putter with it. Mother institutes a series of down beats for him to go by. One: two: three! But not he, is the one to take heed. You might as well hope to regulate the growth of parsley. Present weather does not encourage me to have my Japanese silk made. I don't see now as there's anything left for it to do or be or become but an upper bureau drawer. October Thursday, 10 1872. This wasn't the day we intended to do it in but we seized upon it. Tomorrow Mrs. Foote will be here. Tomorrow Madame Bishop will lecture! We sit down to regale ourselves over the promised hulled corn and milk. We are not silent. We talk a great deal. Miss House does not come, weeping. Neither does she return with sheaves. She returns with an apple and two cakes! And such a rain!October Friday, 11 1872. If you have seen me this day it has been with my head down. Here I have to say with humility and sack cloth that I have never heard of the celebrated author and lecturer, Madame Bishop! I atone by paying, no, letting Miss Thomas pay 20 cents to hear her. "Put not your trust in judges". October Saturday, 12 1872. The idea of trying to keep a diary such weather! Nothing new to tell, everything to see, and expect. Not the least of all are the October sunsets, which makes me think how thankful I am for two west windows in my room. Addie comes back today and is as chatty and sunny as can be but no, no, no. Georgie can't room with her. Its out of the question which leaves me in a quandry for Georgie. I build hopes on Mrs. Knaken. October Sunday, 13 1872. Poor Geogie. I make her come to our house and spend today, and I tried to make it as cheery and nice for her as I could. Besides mother has just bought a quarter of lamb. We domesticate ourselves in Mrs. Foote's room and talk over Harper's Magazine and other things, and the afternoon wears away while we say in our hearts, "How pleasant its been!"October Monday, 14 1872. And Mrs. Knapen shows me that my hopes are earthly, and sends down the girl to say so! I start out again and come back in a sea of rain and glory to tell that Mrs. Hoodby will take Georgie. Dear child! I'm glad for her. Mr. Maynard across the way is our unfailing friend! He showers upon my green tomatoes for pickling! We take them. They've all he's got. He can't use them! And Addie, child, what can I do for her? October Tuesday, 15 1872. This day has been set apart for peculiar uses. We always expect great things to follow, when we're the monkeys that did it. It consisted in the assembling of ourselves teacherally at Dr. Sanford's, which was all just and proper, and to conclude it well, let me say we were home at a very reasonable hour. The Dr. did not at all endeavor to make our months smaller, and dignity is an undeclinable noun with him! October Wednesday, 16 1872. I never feel particularly exuberant the next morning after dissipation! I have to be called more. It is a great thing to be among the called! I wonder why I don't see Annie Phelps more. I thought I should see her lots this time and have some of the old talks. I can't make school seem as I want it to. The girls are nice and all that but there's trouble somewhere. I work in a sort of problem all the while and if I ever find the value of x, I shall be glad!October Thursday, 17 1872. Addie don't get any better, and I'm afraid she'll leave school. O, blessed and benign position, where one counts scholars by ones, and trembles lest some highborn kinsman come and bear them away from me! O, it is so good Mr. Breacher! But still there are deeper things to feel and worship, and all worship is holy.October Friday, 18 1872. Folks can live and still not have things as they want them! They can still live and not do as tney have a mind to. Then significant facts are chapters from my experience. I know they're so. I rise up to proclaim it. I wonder if folks live to a great age who don't do as they have a mind to. That is a point quite chaotic in my mind. I'll ask Mr. Williams! It dawns upon me that there is no school tomorrow. Also that I shall not read reports for a week. October Saturday, 19 1872. The weather is like last hours with friends before they go. The looks are kinder, the times more gentle, as the hour draws nearer. So I gather the autumn leaves as they fall, and I paint the sunsets, and I take long looks at the grass, wondering if the time will be very long before the pleasant summer afternoons. Why my Saturday is almost gone before I really get set down in it. "How sweet it were ever to seem". Falling asleep in a half dream. October Sunday, 20 1872. Have you ever been over on the other side of the lake on the road to Cookville? What could have taken Fannie and her mother and Dannie over that road today? It was for the self-same reason that the people in Sabbaths long ago went up to the Jordan with John. The hills came down to the lake on every side and shut us in and the hymns were wafted for miles and miles where there were no ears to hear. God's witness was with the baptism and indeed "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased". October Monday, 21 1872. Which comes upon us in a hurry and carries off mother! I never shall lay down my consent! But what a day of days to go in. I shall never forget how everything looked when we were walking along down to the depot. Mother says, "Now try and get along", and that's just about what it will amount to, a getting along. I'm afraid Rienard we shant "get along as well as the rest of the world". October Tuesday, 22 1872. Here we are my friends, "not dead but in a serious collapse!" Nothing can allay our ills unless mother will pop her head in the door and say, "I'm back". She probably won't. "Where shall we find our panacea?" I must read to my brother some bits of advice to men in small authority! It's strange the devotion there is to a little brief authority! On hill. 2:40 is a new time to her to dance to!October Wednesday, 23 1872. All day I remember this. There in silent silver lights and darks undreamed of, hid in ever blessed memory of today, and I love best when the years tell me the day, one by one, to sit and hurt and bless myself with silence. Shall you. O, tell me, years, shall you lead me on from strength to strength, from glory to glory? October Thursday, 24 1872. And Mary sits on her budding bough, but she does no bow buddingly or bud bowingly. She can't with the toothache. It's a queer toothache. Sometimes it runs through all the fibers of her and one tooth seems the mountain that shall not depart. She lays down as a self evident truth that I do not know how to manage. My full belief to this very day is that I do. So she goes aroung with the red [rubia] on her head. (It is used as a bustle when not called out. As a bandana,) Peace is not her pillow yet. October Friday, 25 1872. "O, for a lodge in some vast wilderness!" Dont ask a question but come and see our house! Anybody'd think that I had opened a correspondence with the Borrioboola Gha, and was acting as their missionary! Let me reassure you, my sphere is home. Lately I am gliding on forever. I am here. I am every where. Money is the root of my evil. I'll let it be no more. I'll have a girl. I'll rush as if to embrace her. October Saturday, 26 1872. Which speaks for itself Horatio. As I think of it one day later, the whole appears to me in a mixed savor of ends, and delayed hopes and constructioness. The hopes had to do with clothes to be dried, the constructiveness with a dinner to be cooked. I've alway felt my head grow, it seemed so large, and the flow of [heads] to that organ does not build me up. I thought of this birthday of little Sis almost the first thing this morning. We creep off to bed after binding long drawn out ruffles, rather sorry than otherwise that our fate is to sleep [...] aus sheets!October Sunday, 27 1872. What has today been worth? It's wise to ask it as for me, I only know that my good opinion of myself has progressed in a descending series, and if I don't retire presently and shut up, it will be out of the question ever to think of recovering. What I may call, a calm opinion of I. Half of the house is gone and I wander round wondering why all things look so to me. As for meals we browse indiscriminately. By and by we go up stairs, and lie down and read Charles Dudly. O, Gail, and Mary tells me of herself, in threads bright and mottled and grey and broken. October Monday, 28 1872. what makes me get so tired, so right down tired. I almost wish what I never wished before. That there were not five days in a week. That there were not forty weeks in a school year! A Marcy is revealed to us in the form of Mary Welsh. My house keeping takes to itself, wings. By great exertion I work out a tabulation, to give tomorrow, but its too much. I have nothing left where with to originate more so I take to sewing. Soing! The process is not as restful as one might reasonably expect so I betake myself to the process of disrobing which is accompanied with speculations as to. Will the fire keep?October Tuesday, 29 1872. No, the fire will not keep often. Die it may and die it will, we too often alas realize! I get up cross, so cross, so cross, so cross as never was! I do nothing rash which comforts me and my friends. I make a resolve, a huge enterprise for me. I depose and say that I will not drink any more tea. This is doubtless a very wise conclusion. I hope doubtless it will be kept but time waits to know! I dress up in brown and blue, and things and call betimes. The call savors of sewing hour. Dr. Sprague teethless and ever so to be of cactuses and muskrats, or three rats, caught at me! Think of it! Ah, and of the great discretion and capability of the new girl!October Wednesday, 30 1872. Did three weeks ever stretch out into space so far, so interspersed with sterile soil and sandy flats as these now upon us, with Mollie gone and Mollie gone? O, but there's a kind Providence. He gives us Mary Welch. With her comes to me at last a balanced state of mind! and [gotable] bread. The girls undergo their first ex...ation which in their minds eye begins with o. Agnes says, "Thank you". Aunt Sarah says "Send to me", and exports to me flannel samples! Ivory. Do I want a flannel suit. Possibly. Do I know. Probably. For the rest I can only say, "To bed to bed O Sleepy Head!" October Thursday, 31 1872. Which was tangible in what it brought. Chiefly, baked apples and a Gale! Both appeared at supper. "Will you have sugar?" "If you please". And sugar twenty miles away! House keepers will have dilemmas. I'm one therefore be. My little girls are getting dearer and dearer, and they light up home. October dies, and it takes its glory and its glow with it. November will be cold, and spring far, far off. Will the year be hard all the way? November Friday, 1 1872. I go to school. That fact is settled beyond question or gainsay. Sometimes I teach school. Other times I only go! It rains which sentence will stand for many days in this connection for it rains constantly since I began to be lonesome for mother to come back. Addie is simply wretched. Which makes me to stand in a puzzle. I've got to help it some how. And shall I forget my chromos which come? It happened yesterday just before the Gale. More it came about through Dan. "Left them for you to catch!" Then I forgot Dr. Sanford's call! Didn't!November Saturday, 2 1872. A fulness of things which makes me feel good. I've lacked and suffered hunger so long and waited. It began with dear Mary Grose and her little letter. It came upon tender, grieved places, and the tears had to be, because it tred so softly and with such loving [...] wasn't ready for kind unquestioned confidence and tender appreciation. It came upon me too suddenly. Pretty soon Sue said, "Is there room in the brown cottage for a piece of my "wonderful fingers" work?" There was room. And the giver came to my heart. Addie is fixed, so you see I did study it out. [Rumor] of a new Normal teacher crowd thick and fast, and I wonder on. November Sunday, 3 1872. It comes upon me early, for Addie wakes me with kisses. I do not stay, early waked. I sleep more. "Is Mr. Briggs going to church". I send Nellie over to enquire. She brings back a "He is" and I think I won't get ready quite yet, and don't. It's sad to relate that I get in the midst of neck gear and he comes. I get on something and present myself to Mr. Briggs. He explains to us the action of gravel in the feet of the [equus] family, and so forth. The Lord's table brings with it a nearness that I needed sore. An hour of prayer would keep the nearness and I need that sore, indeed. Addie come over and lets me say things to her. November Monday, 4 1872. And so you've come again and again you bring to me good cheer! I commence by all of us going to ride. I find an old man and I bring home honey. I found a land that flowed with it! My evening looked two ways, toward mass meeting and card questions! While I stand in the "don't know scale", Addie knocks, "And would I help her with Algebra?" What do my eyes behold but the hall full and the yard full and the stairs full of closely wrapped folks who stick our their hands and there countersign is Normal! Our dignity! Where is it? All stuck up with lasses candy! "You have the idea Frances". Verily my days have been prolonged like a stick of molasses candy. November Tuesday, 5 1872. I wake up early to pick up chips in my new silver basket, and to try on my handcuffs. Not that I arose betimes. I never do. I lament even now that I had to walk out at seven to let in Mary Welch. Her treatment at my hands is purely homeopathic! She thrives on sugar crated management, we'll soon be as lazy as she ought, might, could would or should! She devotes a great deal of her time in my employ to the cultivation of her mind. I hold her up as a pattern to succeeding kitchen girls who foolishly do not take the time! [Girlsy] or lament? Which? November Wednesday, 6 1872. I have lived to see things ironed up once more and the house to be little in peace! I live to tell of that good old-fashioned article grandma designates "elbow grease", as being used in small quantities by the water of this novel without a hero! I usually combine that with water and soap in small proportions! Not the novel but the elbow grease! Mary has groaned in spirit. She has even disfigured her face that she might appear unto us to complain of the looks of our yard, and now the tooth has carried her away, for two weeks, and nobody now can carry away the yard. November Thursday, 7 1872. Pleasant mornings' like this, the fire goes out. Then Mrs. [Fut] decides she won't go, and Dannie is lonely, lonely. Other things turn up coincidently, long afterward in the evening. It takes the whole of me and the morning to build a coal fire. Result. I don't do it. Cause. Wet sheets and a flowing sea. Patiently Lottie and I trudge to that inveterate nine o'clock train. P.M.! Its the coolest train that runs. Acadia desolate. Sad tale of Acadia. The teakettle boils and sings for no mother tonight. It's taken off and gets cool like that train. November Friday, 8 1872. I keep getting madder and madder because mother isn't here! Dan keeps propping us up with ainy metaphorical cushions such as saying, "Maybe she'll come today", "Maybe she'll write!". It's just like going to heaven in the sauce of the Deacon's application of it. Close by, near to, a little way off, just far enough to see what I have lost! No, Mary Welsh you and I will have to journey on together, yet a space and a little bread and apple sauce with now and then potatoes will look up in our faces, to make us think, "How unlike the place from whence we fell!" November Saturday, 9 1872. There's great things in store for the upright. Housekeepers get to those joys early, they die young. I know a great deal about it now. Mrs. Foote has lost her savor. Wherewith shall she be salted. I can't stop to hunt that up and keep house too. The latter I wait to do. Mary Welsh waits to do! I know what mother will say! My house was the house of the clean, but ye have made it!...November Sunday, 10 1872. Sundays Mary Welsh goes home. It is not a case inapplicable to other days. Of these I do not speak. Friends, I came not here to talk! By super human efforts I got to Fair Haven to see Friend Witherby. I took day trains, possessing all the aggravations characteristic of local freights! Poor Mr. Proctor. His slight acquaintance with me has cost him so much. The visit was nice, so nice I got to talking, some like the Sundays in Miss Mason's room two years ago! When the hamlet is still I find me set down at Hydeville!November Monday, 11 1872. I begin by sending home Mary Welsh, and going without bread. Through my housekeeping and Mary Welsh's the mice have got into the cracker barrel. Home is very cheerful. The poetry of home after the day's work reminds me of all the sad words of tongue or pen! Also of the Cotter's Saturday night conjugated negatively. Every body's horse is sick. Our witherto noisy village is quiet. The tramp of the steed is no more known. November Tuesday, 12 1872. I am on a rampage today. I came down as the Assyrian came down, but without a cohort. Nothing about me is purple and gold! Mrs. Foote hears me out. We have a sitting together, but not in heavenly places. I make urgent protests that I'm tired of doing the work for two families, tired of paying rent for rooms she occupies. I'd rather content myself with working for one family and supporting me. I don't want to be too ambitious. She harkens to my words and makes promises! November Wednesday, 13 1872. And one quarter of the dreaded year is gone. It has not brought a pain that I was not ready for. It has brought all the smiles and hopes I hoped for. I am only sorry to see the retreating form of summer, and the grim visage of the Storm King. The usage of an order on the bank would not be given to me. No, not a bit. I'd welcome you. I'd hold out hands as if I would embrace you. I rest hopes on reading my title clear next Monday. Hope so. November Thursday, 14 1872. In which Mrs. Williams atones for a change of which she was entirely innocent, whereby I out of the order of things in her view of eternal fitness get invited to the swear-a-way. Of course I went not, but Halicarnassus did. I sit me down a dress waist to trim, and a pensive [hour] to spend. We have dreadful times browsing. We eat potatoes and crackers mostly. Miss House is dethroned and Miss Bissell gets talked to for saying "Hash please"! Never mind. I sit at home pensive and sew. Good! November Friday, 15 1872. In which the house looks like as never was, and school crosses the equinox. All of these things move me, and I wait. She flies! She flies! Who flies? Miss Bromley. I sit down happy. Later. Whew, how cold it is to go up and read ruperts, but she perseveres and never minds it. Then she comes home and finds "Bits of Travel by H.N.". more felicitous than "Bits of Normal School" by R.G!" I close my book in humility and long for mother and a revolution!November Saturday, 16 1872. She goes about to revolutionize and the events before hostilities commenced Charlotte can tell for the agitator wasn't yet risen commencement of hostilities! Expedition against the kitchen, under Sink and Table! Expedition against Mother's Room, under bed, bureau, and oilcloth. Expedition against the Hall Table! Points Noted! Sedimentary deposits removed! Prevalent order succeeds him! Turnips, potatoes and cabbage dished up! dished down, dished away! Treaty of aches-la-good night terminated this war!November Sunday, 17 1872. I ride to church with the Professor, which was foreordained, and therefore not I am responsible. Down in my heart the Sunday blessedness finds a place, and I feel once more, the joy of Him whose sin is covered. Yes, washed in that blood which cleanses from all sin. Christ is much in my thought and his words come very near. I get back from church and cook a dinner. I feel pretty well satisfied that with materials at hand, the dinner was an elaborate success. It might be well to remark that all the details that make up a dinner we were out of, been [...]staple, (crackers) had [bailed].November Monday, 18 1872. And the sounding aisles of the dim words rang. Has anybody the slightest protest to make? As for us, we are tired of crackers and milk, and no bread. Tired of expecting to grow in grace in household pursuits! And mother comes as a messenger bringing good tidings. She thinks she's got to the wrong place. She thinks she's come to Mr. Squeers school, but we reassure her. A revolution is immediately to ensue in housekeeping arrangements. We are to know the blessedness of extension tables, and casters, and silver forks! November Tuesday, 19 1872. Peace is once more restored and the family spared from shipwreck by the inauguration of mother. In the afternoon Mollie comes, and we are all together and things go on as they did before the fall! I set apart times and seasons to talk to Mary but in vain. Folks come and talk and talk, and supper is set before us, and we kill the bear, Becky. By and by a pause ensues and she is enabled to tell me, what Dr. French said and ad infinition!November Wednesday, 20 1872. The procession from our house to school slowly moves this morning! My work begins with a row. It promises to be a big one and Addie is the driving wheel. "If May takes her seat she'll take none". No trains left Quebec that Sunday! All the weather has just now to do is to wait for snow. That too is my business. That flowers and suns, and blue is not for me well I know. I too have only to sit and wait for snow. November Thursday, 21 1872. My face today is like that of Long Tom's. It must be when the girls see it in their dreams! I go up stairs in the Normal Hall to be alone. Things go so wretchedly I cannot teach! Addie comes up softly and puts her arms around me and says, "What do you want me to do about the seat?" I look about as pleasant as the piano box and don't want anything. Poor Addie goes down. I call myself a narrow neck of land chiefly stone, and say, "Addie will never come near you again!" but she does after school and I make myself more human!November Friday, 22 1872. Mary packs her trunk and says in the indicative mode future tense first person negative, "I will not stay to graduate!" Mine not to ask her why. Mine not to make reply, and so that's how things are at present sitting. My hairs are beginning to go down in sorrow. My reports are rendered and I come home rejoicing as those who have hope. I think so often the year cannot go half fast enough for me.November Saturday, 23 1872. It ends by Mary's unpacking! all through the machinations of the head of the family. A new state of things is to ensue. Mary is not to sleep with Mrs. Foote. She is not to sleep at Mrs. Briggs. Mother having provided some better thing for her. I keep at work on tabulations. They are without beginning or pausing, and they have no end of life. It's cold and bleak and home looks cheery always now. November Sunday, 24 1872. Yes. O, my Sunday you come after a dreary week and its grand to run away with Mr. Briggs. The ride over fits me for anything that may follow and I almost always come back a better girl, even on top of Mr. Briggs Scripter? Where was Daniel when Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were cast into the fiery furnace? Why don't somebody tell Mr. Briggs? Addie comes over for a Sunday visit and we have it. She teases hard. "Will I go home with her next Wednesday?" November Monday, 25 1872. Famous as being travelistic and redolent with return checks Miss Bissell and I build no more hopes on teachers. We rise on the ashes of former expectations and go without them! Not the ashes do we go without, but the teachers! Georgie, Addie, Mrs. Hawkins & Miss Heath flank us round about. And Anna Dickinson is glorious yet. To me she will ever float in the cloud that I have builded for her, so long as her words thrill me, fill me with an impulse never known before. November Tuesday, 26 1872. Mother is good and gives us a three o'clock breakfast warm: for to me it falls dear reader to announce that this day broke for us in the parlor of the Bates House! Our little eyes were never made to stay open so! I do not exemplify the live teacher this day. I am dead to the world as soon as conscious will allow me to get home from school. November Wednesday, 27 1872. In which Dan is sent to buy a turkey. Mother said she sent a turkey to get a turkey. He brings one home fat and fair. The teachers duly announce their intentions to smile on us tomorrow and all goes as merry as a marriage bell. One, only thought adds to my course I had hoped to finish with joy. Mrs. Slater and the rest take my train tomorrow. One comfort blesses I do not take drawing room cars. November Thursday, 28 1872. Which is named Thanksgiving, and it sends us to church, and keeps our heads down through a "long-tailed" prayer. I had said "Come and it shall be very quiet at our house all day", and we made it so. We just sat around the [cool] stove and talked and sang some of the old hymns. Then we went out and had the dinner all to ourselves. I wish I could make home seem as good to other teachers as Sue always made hers seem to me. By and by it was four o'clock and we all go up to the train. Only I am taken and as I ride on and on I wonder how East Wallingford will look and what the folks will be like. November Friday, 29 1872. We wake up to see a big snow storm that commenced away back in the night. The dear, quiet night that shuts our eyes and gives us visions. How good it is to me not to have it hushed and still only but to dream and dream of yonder amber light. That will not leave the myrrh bush on the height. Even though we wake to say, "Two handfuls of white dust shut in an urn of brass". Addie thinks she wants to be at Eliza's. No means of transportation appears, so we foot it up, and get much dampened. Comfort begins to dawn in the figure of a fire up stairs and a bed, and in animal comforts, we delight ourselves, but the spiritual remains for us by and by in the coming night. November Saturday, 30 1872. A day when I wanted to go home. A windy, snowy blowy day, when folks wanted me to stay. I took well meant advice and rejoice Addie's heart much by saying, "I will stay". That's contrary to the good old hymn which says, "I will go, I will go". We have a downright good talk sitting by the window, and then we take rocking chairs round the stove, and crack nuts and eat candy and popcorn. Loads of it. December Sunday, 1 1872. It lays me out and gives me pains where I called for peace, but taking in the uses of things as a whole I am pretty comfortable. For just think in the after part of the day I bundle up to take my first sleigh ride. It landed us at "Rufe's". The event of the evening was not church which we all went to but Tesh's head which came to an untimely end. The untimely end was the leg of the sofa, and Tesh made a big noise in the house. Tesh has not learned the uses of adversity. November Monday, 2 1872. The antecedent of an early train to this individual is broken repose. I broke some of mine and scarred the residue. We were up and faithful. Do you suppose the train was? Not at all. Dr. Hayson kept us from solitude and we owe him for that and other services unhesitatingly rendered over eternal thanks. I build hopes on reaching Castleton at ten. We deal in freight trains. The first breaks into in the middle and we are the rear car. Rescued by a train that comes up behind and backs us in. Train 2 is expected to start at 10:15. Moves off at eleven and even that is second best. But where is Addie's satchel? No Normal School this morning. Harps hung!December Tuesday, 3 1872. I wish there was more to tell, of me and other things. I appear this A.M. clad in my new green and blue plaid. That marvelous plaid which took the combined brains of the family to select and at last seized by Frances in a moment of desperate despair. (A Last Ditch) My feelings fluctuate and fun lies dormant. Mother's grain does not run parallel with mine, hence invitation! O, for sunshine, Faith and Dolly. December Wednesday, 4 1872. A mercy is revealed to me in the form of credits but I live to tell that they are not surplus credits. You'll see me trudging home from school earlier after this. I have resolved! WHY? The teachers with great success assisted by the well known Mr. Briggs, sleighride back and forth, up and down. It's all well enough to tell about, but just you be there, and if you wouldn't sing Aunt Nabby too. Whew, it's good to be free. Our feelings are greatly soothed at the price, only six cents apiece. December Thursday, 5 1872. I buy my little book for next year. It has a dear little garnet face. I take another color hoping that the color of my days and weeks will also change. I take to my heart the wee hope that they will grow brighter or I braver, More. The rest of the hope expects deliverance from R.G. Not much of anything else was inaugerated! It did not even snow. A deal of comfort lives in brown cottage number 2, and Sue sent a little more. "Does Frantiss member?"December Friday, 6 1872. Lottie inguires of weather. What would she like for Christmas. Mother has decided that she would like the pater, familias [Tremaine] to buy her a hood having abundant faith in his power of selecting! Dan thinks Nells' hood looks like the caboose of a freight train. We all resolve ourselves into a committee of Puzzled Dutchmen. We are all so glad we rush here tonight. I get back safely from my report renderings and feel as if I might be comfortable for a week. Then I [paste]. December Saturday, 7 1872. I am pasting yet, and the midnight hour is near. Most of me is paste. A great deal. Mother makes me nice flannel waists to wear. All things look wintry, and the air goes through me and fills them full. I just enjoy this cold bracing winter weather. I don't while pasting but when I put the book away and go out for a run. Mr. Knapen comes down upon me like a wolf in the [fold]. His cohorts all gleaming with equation of payments. I won't says I. December Sunday, 8 1872. Couldn't go to church for maybe the house would catch cold in the rain. I wanted to suggest that there could be no danger possibly. I never knew him to catch anything. If I didn't go to church what did I do? Ate a half past ten breakfast of boiled rice, moped around in a drowsy aimless attitude for awhile, then went off by myself and read of days with Susie, and arms around me. It was good and I went to sleep, and slept and slept. True, honest, on Nells expressive vernacular, waking up seemed like being off and coming back. December Monday, 9 1872. The persecution of the Scottish Covenanters has a parallel. I am that. I Addie had only appeared on the scene in the snow storm my martyrdom would not have missed a pang. As it was I lived out of it and came home at three minutes past four. Afflictions may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning. I am glad of that, but what's the promise when afflictions endure all day? My tendencies are all in the direction of scrap books and I wish I could, but I can't. December Tuesday, 10 1872. Addie appears on the scene, and I am superlative by martyred, without even the parting triumph of a Scottish Covenanter, that the cause was worth it. Mother adds to my enjoyment of the day and I fly. I fly. Who fly? The evening partakes of two calls. Anne Phelps is way up, high up. Then we present ourselves meekly before the dignitaries of the institution of Carmin in this community. I learn many things. Wasn't any of [...] in Dr. Sanford's piece. All he said was in his piece he wrote. Three years ago tonight I sat before Annie Dickinson and a new piece was added to my days and years. December Wednesday, 11 1872. Jim Smith said he didn't see a darned a thing. That's when the girls enquired what he saw in the tourmaline. It's all Mr. Williams doings showing tourmaline and things. I never do. It's cold enough to freeze a Sphynx, but bites are not forever, anymore than other things I could mention. I could tell if I would says our friend Mrs. [Fat]. Consecration day is like a chapter of precious stones. There is to every thought and experience its own peculiar color and with the light of the Redeemer upon them they lend unfading glory to the day. Indeed all the borders are precious stones. December Thursday, 12 1872. Which was a pretty good day, two foldly! It brought cash and relieved a little debt or two that had grown old enough to distress me, and it kept the second course class on most commendable behavior, but it brought no milder weather, no longer days. Mrs. [Hoadley] comes to call, and the call, induces active and prolonged exertion in all of us. Very prolonged. Of me tis written. Her teeth, they chatter, chatter still. December Friday, 13 1872. It partakes of "Why are we here my friends" but is not distinguished for hilarity. Dr. Sanford says, "Come hither all ye weary souls, ye, heavy loden, teachers come", and we list, list, list. The Dr. moralizes a great deal, and jokes once. The joke was mild in form concerning the name of R.G's daughter. "What's Trip's name?" We explain. Apropos before this [friend] of the family and I take a sleigh ride and Dan drives. December Saturday, 14 1872. I must not forget my lesson on fence viewers apropos of last night's visit. Fence viewers must possess qualities not possessed even by Chief Executive or high priced officials. There are three per town. One, tall to look over, dumpy thick, to see through & appreciate width, the third, equally short to peep under! O, how glad I'm here tonight. I spend another stupid day, pasting my life to stick it on something, and some sticks and some does not stick. I put both stick and sticker away to wait vacation. December Sunday, 15 1872. Which came in gently to stand among weeks, the weeks behind, the worldly never resting weeks, and the weeks ahead, the unknown, dreaded weeks. And I find the Eden Shore, just a little while, and I tarry and rest. I walk through the propecies of Daniel XI, and it seems too grand to me for utterance. Then I tell Susie things. Of how hard I am trying to be the [mortal] that can purely endure! How I cannot turn my eyes away from the hill from whence help cometh, nor my heart from the dear Christ "with the pity in his eyes". December Monday, 16 1872. Did I know Weltha was very very sick, is the first thing somebody said to me up to school. No, I didn't know. By and by school gets out and I go to see her. "Miss Bromley what shall I do about my essay", is an all abounding question. Miss Bromley fidgets around to find out but yields afterwards no peaceable fruits. December Tuesday, 17 1872. "Let if sear". That's what Anne Phelps said about my conscience, and then I did. Mother thinks so readily, but then mother's mad at me. The centre of oscillation lay behind those four inviting pillars of the Sem. and the subject matter is ice-pitcher. It's much talked up! "So what do you think of that my cat, and what do you think of that my dog?"December Wednesday, 18 1872. Dan brings forth, and goes on. He is mild in his requests for Christmas. A watch and a gun. I go down into the deeps and fish up a headache which is much enduring. Mother from the goodness of her heart broils spare rib. Dannie would fain fill his, with the spare rib, his sister did eat and no one gave unto him. Mother's closing remark is much like the following, "Dan is a growin boy". December Thursday, 19 1872. Tarnation is not a very good word to use. I do not advise it. Let this stand to refute all testimony to the contrary. Addie invites me out to sleigh ride way off where we please, and she comes back saying, "Too bad, Take the little teacher out and freeze her". Then little teacher says, "No, guess not", but inside has fear of it. She don't tell. The pangs of hunger, who can paint them? And yet I had [one], and folks came in layers, and still no eat, and at last I am glad to take refuge in a little piece of apple pie and [exit] [hints] a hungerless sleep. December Friday, 20 1872. Which came to an end in the midst of cedar. I was there. Mary and I talk up or as mother has it "cook" up, wonderful things to be brought out next week when I en route for Albany. My sakes. You don't know how we fix it. I do. How we shall get mother into it, we don't know. We decide to break it to her in driblets, and succeed beautifully, until we come to the color of the silk. There we would never meet through sufficiently produced. December Saturday, 21 1872. In which I use the word tarnation. See Dec. 19! I repeat I do not advise its profuse use, but experience today that it expresses certain stages of feeling in me better than lies emphatic words. The only decent thing I do is to buy mother an oil cloth. I didn't feel good. Mother advises tea. Give me liberty or give me death! I lay down "My wife and I, unwept, unhonored, and unsung. December Sunday, 22 1872. Fragrant with the memory of dumplings, mother's best. There also rises up in it other smoke, slow curling wreaths of graduating dresses, and lace trimmings and Albany. The night that announced this day might itself to be announced and hereby is duly announced. A very well written and a much needed essay might be written on the "Duty of Slats in Bedsteads". I find myself all night forever climbing up the climbing wave", for want of a refugee slat. I awake to hear the four winds shriek, from the four corners of the earth. December Monday, 23 1872. When much was wrought. Besides the attention of the people was attracted to the weather. School was a shadow that declineth. Mary meantime is learning that one enters the Kingdom of State certificates through much tribulation, especially if they wear silk. But Ella Mills has an uncle. In the evening great things transpire. Very. Mr. Williams forgot in the event repose of manner, and said he knew but couldn't tell it. Indeed it was a great event. December Tuesday, 24 1872. Rising betimes again means "awful early", but mother event is about to transpire, at once. I wheel away on an early train and riding before daylight gives me an extraordinary feeling of being above the common herd, when for the time being we suppose are in bed. Cohoes is a freezing place, but Sis is glad I came! In Albany I see visioins and dream dreams! It's so jolly to be in the good times and everybody looks so glad. The silk is bought all the rest are stowed away and I hurry to Auny Mary, and blessed fate, they are alone! Cosy little visit, then off, then Murdoch. Then home to a splint bed with Sis!December Wednesday, 25 1872. But not long to lie on splints. We are up now Merrie Christmasing! We get home and our shouts rend the air! My Christmas gifts are spread out before me and I take an inventory! Perfume from Dad. Handkerchief box from the little girls. Set of toilet mats from Miss Bissell. Diary from Aggie. Wedding cards from Fannie Taft. Addie comes to carry us off, and its go, freeze, thaw, go, freeze, thaw!December Thursday, 26 1872. The transit of Venus is to be next year. Who said so? The man with the Stella-Tellurian said so. When he was through telling us, Mr. Williams got up and said, this was a funny little ball we live on. It went wabbling in the air! In the evening I am waited on by Judge Bromley. What is this I hear? A weapon formed against me prospering! I call mother to a council of her & I. December Friday, 27 1872. Dan has set apart this day to himself as a birthday. Strange nobody partonizes it. Goose vein seems to be his motto, and the rest of us appear at the little end of the [horn]. Was it ever so cold before? I can't keep ward no way, Impossible! Mary and I hold long consultations! Mother and I hold long consultations. But we, what can we see or know of the misty, unknown weeks. The pain, or the peace of them!December Saturday, 28 1872. Nowadays I always have an essay about me somewhere. Just going to invent one, or fix over one or go at one. Then I write Milton for Mary. An awful job, but see me, aint I ready for it? I get into the middle of the second book and then I put it away until Monday. "Roughing It" by Mark Twain, is perhaps inferior to Paradise Lost in literary merit. I am afraid it is, but then Roughing it is a Paradise Lost, every word of it, and I read between spasms of Milton. December Sunday, 29 1872. Dan says Mary's bustle is like a bay window. Indeed I never thought of it before. Mr. Briggs is on the qui vive. "When does Sunday begin?" That's what he wants to know. Elder Grose give up the pulpit to him and it moves on. While Charley and I hold concourse Mr. Briggs most impressive speed to me was when he wondered what "scripter they'd fetch up". The rest of the Sunday goes on in streaks composed of chicken gravy, and writing up, and psalm tunes. The consequent noise makes me give vent to the following, "My ear drums were not made to split, Nor any other man's". December Monday, 30 1872. When does Monday begin. Poor Frances. She knows too soon. It began before she was ready. It came with torture in its wings and not one but all the weapons formed against her are prospering! She sits down in the dark telling mother, without seeing the helping hills, or the pity in the eyes. She say over to herself, "What vein force, went mean gain from naps. If not, what resolution from despair". "This is a specimen of my handwriting before I took lessons of G.A. Stockwell". December Tuesday, 31 1872. Things are talked over and speculations increase for an unheard of thing is to transpire on the morrow. Mr. Willims has actually lived to invite the Normals to ride tomorrow. Is that all? He has even added to that. He has invited them to supper! Let me describe myself to you. I look like the ninth boy in the row while the eight before him are taking a whipping. For we walk by faith not by sight!Memoranda.Memoranda. In all the ages Love is the truth of Life. Men cannot injure us except so far as they exasperate us to forget ourselves. No man is really dishonored except by his own act. Wouldst thou bring the world unto God? Then live near to him thyself. F.W. Robertson. Better be a nettle in the side of your friend than his echo. The condition which high friendship demands is ability to do without it. That high office demands great and sublime parts where must be very two before there can be very one. Let it be an alliance of two large natures mutually behold mutually feared before yet they recognize the deep identity which beneath these disparities mutes them. The essence of friendship is entireness, a total magnanimity and trust. R.W. Emerson. I have read that those who listened to LordCash Account, January. Chatham felt that there was something finer in the man, than anything which he said. Characters, a reserved force which acts directly by presence and without means. "O Jole, how didst thou know that Hercules was a god?" "Because", answered Jole, "I was content the moment my eyes fell on him, he conquered whether he stood or walked or sat or whatever thing he did". R.W.E. "One self approving hour whole worlds outweighs, Of striped stories and of loud [...] And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels, Then can say with a [...] at his heels" He only is advancing in life whose heart is getting softer whose blood warmer, whose brain quicker, whose spirit is entering into living peace. Ruskin. Cash Account, February [Loons], Queen's Gardens. Lar among the moonlands & the weeks far in the darkness of the horrible streets, these feeble flowrets are lying with all their fresh leaves torn & their stems broken, flowers that have eyes like yours, which once saved you can save forever? Will you not go down among them? among those sweet living things whose new courage sprung from the earth with the deep color of heaven upon it is starting up in strength of goodly spire, & whose purity washed from the dust is opening hid by hid into the flowers of promise, still they turn to you and [joy] you. "The Larkspur listens, I hear, I hear! And the Lily whispers, I wait". "[Arms] into the garden [heard] For the black bat night has flown Come into the garden [hands] I am here at the gate alone." Who is it think you who stands at the gate of this sweeter garden alone,Cash Account, March waiting for you? Did you ever hear, not of a Mande, but of a Madeline, who went down to her garden in the dawn and found one waiting at the gate when she supposed to be the gardener. Have you not enough? Him often sought him in vain though the night sought Him in vain at the gate of that old garden where the fierce reward is set? He is never there, but at the gate of this garden He is waiting always, waiting to take your hand, ready to go down to see the fruits of the valley to see whether the juice has flourished and the pomegranate budded. There you shall see with Him the little tendrils of the vines that His hand is guiding, there you shall see the pomegranate springing where His hand cast the sanguine seed: more, you shall see the trunks of the Cash Account, April. angel keepers, that, with their wings wave away the hungry birds from the pathsides where He has sown and call to each other between the vineyard rows. "Take we the foxes, the little foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines have tender grapes". Oh, you queens, you queens! among the hills & happy greenwood of this land of yours, shall the fox have noles, and the birds of the air have nests, aren't in your cities shall the stones cry not against you that they are the only pillows where the Son of Man can lay his head! Ruskin In a valiant suffering for there, not in a slothful making others suffer for us did nobleness ever lie every noble crown is and on Earth forever will be a crown of thorns. (Carlyle) The deepest pathos and the quickest gayeters hideCash Account, April. angel keepers, that, with their wings wave away the hungry birds from the pathsides where He has sown and call to each other between the vineyard rows. "Take we the foxes, the little foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines have tender grapes". Oh, you queens, you queens! among the hills & happy greenwood of this land of yours, shall the fox have noles, and the birds of the air have nests, aren't in your cities shall the stones cry not against you that they are the only pillows where the Son of Man can lay his head! Ruskin In a valiant suffering for there, not in a slothful making others suffer for us did nobleness ever lie every noble crown is and on Earth forever will be a crown of thorns. (Carlyle) The deepest pathos and the quickest gayeters hideCash Account, May together in the same nature. E.B.B. There! There! all this was in my heart and it never was said out till now. F.W.R. O my brothers, God exists. R.W.G. There are graces in the dimeanor of a polished and noble person that are lost upon the eye of a churl. These are like the stars whose light has not yet reached us. R.W.E. Once taste is forever growing, learning, reading, worshipping, laying its hand upon its [...] because it is astonished, carting its shoes from off its feet because it finds all ground holy, lamenting over itself and testing itself by the way it fits things. Ruskin. Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful we must carry it with us or we find it not. The rest of beauty is a finer charm than skill in surfaces, in outlines, in rules of art can over teach, a radiation Cash Account, May together in the same nature. E.B.B. There! There! all this was in my heart and it never was said out till now. F.W.R. O my brothers, God exists. R.W.G. There are graces in the dimeanor of a polished and noble person that are lost upon the eye of a churl. These are like the stars whose light has not yet reached us. R.W.E. Once taste is forever growing, learning, reading, worshipping, laying its hand upon its [...] because it is astonished, carting its shoes from off its feet because it finds all ground holy, lamenting over itself and testing itself by the way it fits things. Ruskin. Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful we must carry it with us or we find it not. The rest of beauty is a finer charm than skill in surfaces, in outlines, in rules of art can over teach, a radiation Cash Account, June. from the work of art of human character, a wonderful expression through stone or canvas or musical sound of the deepest and simplest attributes of our nature, and therefore most intelligible at last to those souls which have these attributes. R.W.E. To see the King in His beauty is the softest and most unearthly attainment. Can any one be keenly alive to this, who has no heart for external beauty? R.W.R. A man cannot speak but he judges himself. Every opinion reacts on him who utters it. (Emerson) I slept and dreamed that Life was Beauty I woke and found that Life was Duty. Is not Gods Universe a Symbol of the Godlike; is not Immensity a Temple; is not Man's History and Mens History a perpetual [Evengel]? Listen and for organ musicCash Account, July. thus will ever as of old, hear the morning Stars sing together. Carlyle Art is never Art till it is more than Art. Kingsley. Show me the man you honor. I know by that symptom better than by any other, what kind of man you yourself are. For you show me there what your ideal of manhood is; what kind of man you long inexpressibly to be. Carlyle. "My fairest child I have no song to give you No lark could pipe to skies so dull and gray; Yet ere we part, one [...] I can leave you For every day. Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever, Do noble things, not dream them all day long. And so make life, death, and that vast forever One grand, sweet song. Kingsley. To me it seems we best remember Him by prizing loving all the things He gives. Miss Bromwell.Cash Account, August. Who could have suspected diversity in a beetle or theology in a mass? What's done we partly may compute. But know not what's resisted. For several virtues I have liked several women; never any with so full a soul, but some defect in her did quarrel with the noblest grace she owned and put it to a foil. The soft sad eyes set like twilight planets in the rainy skies with the brow all patience and the lips all pain. My hair was black but white my life; The colors in exchange are cast! The white upon my hair is rife the black upon my life has passed. If there were not an eagle in the [feathers] of birds must then the owl be king among the feathered herds? Yea, this is life; make this forenoon sublime, this afternoon a psalm, this night a prayer, and time is conquered, & thy crown is won. Cash Account, SeptemberCash Account, October. Cash Account, November. Cash Account, December. Cash Account, Summary. Memoranda. Memoranda. Read: Bleak House. Dickens. Vashti, (Humph!) Augusta Evans. Real Folks. A.D.T.W. Patience Strong's Outings. A.D.T.W. Boys of Chequasset A.D.T.W. Sartor Resartus. Carlyle Tale of Two Cities. Dickens. Great Expectations. Dickens. Old Curiosity Shop. Dickens. Reprinted Pieces. Dickens. Culprit Fay. Drake. Lothair. Disraeli. Hannah. Miss Mulock. Oliver Twist. Dickens. Little Women. Alcott. Vacation: Little Men. Alcott. Barnaby Rudge. Dickens. Memoranda. Hard Times. Dickens. Uncommercial Traveler. Dickens. Luck of the Roaring Camp. Bret Harte. Deerings of [...]. Virginia Town. Her worshiop. Carlyle. Life Without and Within. Ossoli. Society and Solitude. Emerson. Summer in a Garden. C.D.Warner. Woman in the 19th Century. Ossoli. Novum Organism. Bacon. Sir Charles Grandison. Richardson. Essays and Sketches. De Quincey. My Wife and I. Stowe. Roughing it. Mark Twain. These Easter hymns Love I [was] you to have. I have put them in book. Room [Elins]. Thursday 22, 1872. Nansie, Little Wife, Fannie is glad, as glad as she knows how. Dear Teacher. Good Night, and a kiss Laura. Emma, Mary. Anne. Jan. 24th.
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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Date: 1874
Text: Merry Christmas, From Sister.Fannie M. Bromley Castleton Vermont "Be brave and earnest and strong." "The highest is only attained through the high"- DIARY Jan. Thursday 1. 1874 What we began with - One wish makes us a little happy and an aggregation makes us a good deal happy - and we began our wishes. The pancakes evinced a disposition to be of proper thickness and quality - which we also began on. There were tickles and ripples all through the day - The shake of Col....
Show moreMerry Christmas, From Sister.Fannie M. Bromley Castleton Vermont "Be brave and earnest and strong." "The highest is only attained through the high"- DIARY Jan. Thursday 1. 1874 What we began with - One wish makes us a little happy and an aggregation makes us a good deal happy - and we began our wishes. The pancakes evinced a disposition to be of proper thickness and quality - which we also began on. There were tickles and ripples all through the day - The shake of Col. Parker's hand in his New Year's call - (see how I was blessed-) will vibrate through me for the first six months. I have reached a limit - I have written to Elizabeth [Stuard] Phelps - and Isaiah still [dear] Isaiah --- "You should go out with joy and be led forth in peace"- 2 Jan. Friday 2. 1874 What was done - what to do- A glance told her both! A storm is in prospect and I go to school without mittens - What if I had a lover and he should find my gloves - They are not "always genteel." My sister will be judged at the last for spoiling my digestion or else for having so little strength to resist fried oysters and chicken gravy - The days seem long when I stay up all day - and I mind it today. A petition goes forth from the ...- who sorrow not as though who have not hope. Gertie has her head tied up - indicative of all kind of ... terms which attend neuralgia headaches - Here a glance did not tell me what to do - I know not 3 Jan. Saturday 3. 1874 What we felt like doing - some of the ills that flesh is heir to fell upon each of us to-day Gertie's head is still tied up - Aggie has general debility - and I have general restlessness. But we all work - I have never ceased to be thankful that on me has fallen a good share of this world's work to do. It spares me many many hours - ... and I ran away in a Greek lesson ... - My head is all wrong - and I suppose I've got to ... to right it. I feel restless and I want to run - ...like ... - of the fact that somebody has better success teaching grammar than in ... precious time . She enquires "How's that" - And I echo -"How's that". 4 Jan. Sunday 4. 1874 What Mr. Ayers said It has been good for me that I went to church to-day - good for me that I went to the brick church. It's a cheery sign when I come home to think - There's something impressive in the thought of that whole [armor] we ... to put on - that word whole [rivets] my attention - And again I cannot escape from the other thought of Christ going from pew to pew to find this virtue and that virtue - this grace and that grace What would Christ, the Lord, find in my pew? Aggie begins to get her things together for a go -- I don't like to think about her going - I'm afraid my ... plans for . . are on sandy foundations - It seems as if ...would call for her ... but I wait in ... 5 Jan. Monday 5. 1874 What I feel like - You will know just how when I tell you that in order to get my sister to that mournful train I closed not my eyes- scarcely- We went mournfully about a breakfast which nobody ate - and sat on a trunk nobody came for until I went and brought the man that ... - A sleety, slippery, dismal, aquatic morning - O dear why must if fall to us to bid good bye to ours - such times as this - I feel like all tired ... stupid things, but there is a [next] for Hope. The first something - the ... of prayer was quiet and soothing - Who of us did not feel like praying- "Create in us a clean heart O God" - And O do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion.6 Jan. Tuesday 6 1874 What the weather is attempting - When I find out I'll tell you such performances as it is guilty of is beyond all natural and acquired knowledge of meteorology on the part of me - The first that was ... of me was sitting before the creator - no morning Light and trying to transform inert matter into a glorious world. "O we are little sunbeams - Could I get to the prayer meeting and be Mr. Maynard's disciple this evening too? It was possible. By bringing out... skill she did both - The meeting fills me with thoughts - its [sic] so grand to think of that mustard seed which in very deed was the least of all seeds!-7 Jan. Wednesday 7. 1874 What befell some people and how some people fell - Libbie Whitlock's example in Compound Preposition came out a horse and a quarter yesterday - Today she said she'd found the other three quarters - The walking never was worse - Castelton is a sea of glass - ... said there was one thing she wanted to see - Mr.[Hoodley] go by on the ice - coming home from church her unlawful prayer was granted - for by ... side Mr. [Hoodley] fell heroically The prayers to-night were for families - sick ones and schools - What came forth from the hearts of the fathers - was the holy place in the meeting - I cannot help thinking what beautiful [ever] sacred things might be those that should come from the hearts of others108 April, Saturday 18. 1874 In which its something else I'm up to - Upon me has fallen a conscious weight - I am almost to the depot - in the bend this side of it - before I wake up fully to the sense of it - Upon me has fallen the responsibility of the much talked about class-rings! Very truly! Also the responsibility of a box to be sent to Dan! I live through them both - I sit for a picture and almost make the man not live through it - At the latest both are alive and may recover! I am in my parent's arms - and my salary is a comfort to other people9 Jan. Friday 9. 1874 What [time] we live to - Sister Nichols and Sister Croft are making their crown more brilliant by adding to their faith, virtue and to virtue, knowledge - and to knowledge a firsthand ... We hear that mostly - The smiling face of Providence is not [hid].. - We are blessed with a mild, benign temperature and to folks whose mothers are gone and to whom the Morning Light is sovereign it is a blessed thing - After school it is so pleasant that Gertie and I walk. In the happy manner of Geoffrey Chaucer I give ... a Canterbury Tale - Subject of the prayer meeting - The missionary, the Sabbath School teacher and the minister It seems blessed to a heart bare - heart hungry to close these days with a prayer meeting 10 What wa - I live too fast - So much is most certain I am a little busy and a good deal byusy and so it keeps on. To sit down and not think of anything in particular to be done would be a day of days to a head that swims - I write Greek exercizes and I get girls ready for examination and I answer the door bell - After my hands at last drop and the light is out I want to think of our absent boy and pray and pray and pray for him but I am too tired to lift my heart to the heavenly hills. This is not the way I was made to live and my release seems far off - The prayers are solemn and the Spirit [draws] nigh - Righteousness and joy and peace in the Holy Ghost Jan. Sunday 11. 1874 What ever shall be "Their echoes roll from soul to soul and grow forever and forever." There are a few such echoes - and they roll up from a tragic three years - O God give me the life thou didn't give thy Son. I am glad of the Sundays - glad to see with my eyes shut a man on a cross - glad to be more and more ashamed to speak of burdens to that man on the cross- And home - all of it makes me sorry - Where is the blessedness I knew - And Gertie will surely get homesick and tired - Poor child. 12 Jan. Monday 12. 1874 What Miss Ryan's latest excuse is - It has grown to be a wonder with me what that young lady will present or produce next in extenuation of absences from Sunday School exercises. Her cousins have all died one by one making her presence each time necessary, Michael or something or Timothy or something has made her folks a visit which also demanded her presence. The lady where she boards got sick and died and her aunt has fallen down stairs! What is there left for one to do but go to bed? All things of to day are willing to be put away - it is growing cold We are beginning to pay for April weather. A man comes seeking board. I give him [hopes] 13 Jan, Tuesday 13. 1874 What I do mostly It begins to be rather doubtful who shall cut and run and at the same time - it begins to be pretty well known who must be green I [bear] more and have my being in preparing for examination - Not a very gay life to lead you think! One thought propels all things - "Be ye also ready." Gertie is tired tonight - Poor child it worries me to see her do so much - Think of her stirring in the kitchen, carrying up coal - lifting cinders. I never felt so much as if I wanted to ... A call from Mrs.Samuel [Wilhams].14 Jan. Wednesday 14 1874 What of Betsy ... I a genteel lady always genteel have to inform you that this is the fourteenth that it heralds the last week that it sends us dreams of the 21st - The graduates are in the key of very flat - the music of which they fondly dreamed will not be - and the ... rests in the soul of the principal. He is ...day I wander forth in a storm of ... and ... [Judge] B a committee of the whole - Because I am a genteel lady always genteel he invites me to go to ... with him and Ella Do you think I'll pass? 15 Jan. Thursday 15. 1874 What can one do to keep warm - Perhaps School master Brady of ... can tell. It has grown to be a serious question with me - Almost everything looked toward the coming of mother to day - "She cometh not" she said. We console ourselves with an oyster fry. A vacant day - no music - no ... no dreams - abstract vague reality - a living on - a band that will not play with me any more. I am walking in the way that I should go in Greek-16 Jan. Friday 16. 1874 What happened at half-past eight. I had grown very much convinced about this world's being a fleeting ... - I have felt some like retracting from this strong position since the appearance of mother. She does not find much ... either fleeting or otherwise. We have ... one at least and, he bears the noble name of Hyde - .... know a nobler name a richer blend than they. Then ... of a rehersal - Don't tell. This kept me form meeting my mother - but she came and I am at rest - 17 Jan. Saturday 17. 1874 What was and will not be for along time again- There's ..., a wonderful consolation in the latter part of the above - One can sort of accomodate themselves to even a worse world than this - and worse things in this than ... yet know when there is a prospect of releif - And so as I go over and over the questions before so ... with my heart full of care for those before me I stand it well for me - as I know it will not ever be again The ride over to Farm House in the ... frosty air was like a hope of heaven in a field of graves - How I ... in my every thought 10 Jan. Sunday, 18 1874 What my eyes behold! It is for me once more to behold him whose grandfather gave him a [cart]. I have never seen the [cart]. I listen to him from Judge Bromley's seat and I am erect and very alive - He tells us this time nothing whatever concerning the chariots of ... - but discourses on peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see God - The Bible lesson was a help to me - in my own inner consciousness there was a joy that I had been reached and helped - That in the hand that reached and helped - there was still an infinity - and I cannot quite fall away from it even in tired busy weeks - like this and the next19 Jan. Monday. 19 1874 What Susie says - and Miss ...! I have truly plenty to think of to-night - and I can be glad even with examination before me - and around me - a message long and heartsome from the other side of the Mississippi - A message more than heartsome - sweet and sad from "Our Home"- Dr. French appears armed and invincible - He says to me "Don't stay here" My heart rises up and says "I won't no -no "but I must wait. A few souls can - He only of all others says "Go to college" - Everybody here says "no no" - After all one must know oneself and then - act alone - That comes the way most things get decided - It is very stormy to-night and the walking is not for unsteady feet- 20 Jan. Tuesday 20. 1874 What fails me - Examination was designed to make my pleasures less - So much is not to be contradicted or opposed - My courage sinks to low water mark to-day and I whirl about and turn about - Most tortures in this world have an end or at least moments of repose - and mine ... - My works do not have much of a tendency to follow me - Susie's question puzzles me and I am chased by them everywhere. R.G.- "I have the pleasure of introducing Miss Julia M. Thomas"- "Am I my brother's keeper?" "Am I a soldier of the cross?" The above is a synopsis! 21 Jan. Wednesday 21. 1874 What stops - It opens with a snow storm which does not stop - Out doors the snow will cover you up in a few minutes - It's like .. days in ... - We all graduate with a prayer at one end and a benediction at the other - and no music - Then,we all come to ... house and eat cake and ice-cream. Then everybody goes home and I get my remaining ... of mind in getting and attempting to realize faintly what everybody has said at me - In the last month "You will have a little rest now"- My going away for a trip or my staying home and not going hangs by a thread - which shall it be?22 Jan. 22 Thursday 22. 1874 Whats the query? My moments of unalloyed bliss are so few which of course means my vacations that its a serious matter for me when I come to decide what to do with them - Gertie and mother and the cozy home charms and Greek and French and ... and Greek History all put me in a chair & chain me. The .. blood in my veins, and my backache and my head that turns and the ... whistles all pull me off to - well wherever I want to go -23 Jan. Friday 23. 1874 What is dreamt of in my philosophy - Things seem to turn in the direction of clean clothes - but I am still undecided - In this chaotic frame of mind, I step aboard the 1-30 train and find myself moving quietly toward the cruelty we all dream of when mother's gone - Something entirely [even] to me ensues - Bromleys by tens and dozens get in at each successive station - until the Bromley millinnium is suggested. It has never occurred to me before to be thankful that I was a Bromley - I've been sort of thinking that way as I chat with Judge B - and his blind brother and hear about the silver wedding they're all going to - Well - I at last after undergoing amputation at the hands of a barber find myself eating oysters with ... and rejoicing over the appointment of Mary Bryant24 Jan. Saturday 24. 1874 What this is called- My attention seems to be drawn rather at the outset toward my night which did not pass away in song - but in chills and fever - and a burning spine and yet with all my crude disjointed ... and broken slumbers I rise with new flushed hopes to go or not go to [Syracuse] - I am carried ... through scenes which ... over bridges near the stretches of sky and meadow toward my native country only by viewing a ... of dreams to-day - The red and green is ... into my ... wearily - and a card or two is sent to wailing eyes at Dansville - and night comes on - which means a [splint] bed and can't it mean something cheery - Has not the night a thousand eyes - Hath not He set his love upon me?25 Jan. Sunday 25. 1874 What holds me- Not always beneath the deep or beyond the stars are the answers to life's dearest askings - To-day the word and the gift were nigh - My heart is very tender to-night God's loving spirit may find a resting place for the depths are stirred and there is no bitterness to drive the Blessed One away - There was a simple story of [manna] There was the preaching of the Lord Jesus Christ in its grand simplicity and Dr. ... heart was full - I said his closing words over and over going home in the horse [cart] - Venture on him, venture wholly, Let no other trust intrude - none but Jesus, none but Jesus can do dying sinners good - I feel so to-night like venturing wholly - I was real glad to see Aunt Mary a few minutes 26 Jan. Monday 26. 1874 What has been Hopes next - This looks like business- I need only give you a catch word or two. "State Yard School" - "Register and keys" - "Miss Kennedy don't do so" - Think of Hope in this [barbarous] place and wonder and be silent - Not a very gay life to lead you think - but it will lend courage to any droop of your spirit if you will try and remember first of all that you are away for a change - and next that when your day is over you can rest on [splints] I've had a ... time in the midst of realities - That sounds good - All benefactors of the human race do just so - I go home to enter the [morasses]laid for me by Elisha Jesus 27 Jan. Tuesday 27. 1874 What the prospects are - There is evidently a misunderstanding on the part of State Yard juveniles in regard to the relations they sustain to me - We do not appreciate each other - Poor little misguided heathens - Just think of their persecuting me all day and not a ... in sight - Some [Olivers] would complain I find it cheerful to give orders and take the children up in my arms and carry them to [execute] the orders - This is not a self-acting machine - I take to ... quite early - After a small dose of the sweet [restorer] I fly to my Greek - How comforting it is to find that the pages I have gone through with travail are ... to me as the unknown exams and exams further on28 Jan. 28 Wednesday 28 1874 What I am up to Don't forget the place - I am still found carrying children around at the State Yard School - You will be surprised to see how soon they will learn to walk - I never carry children long - Miss Hastings and I take rapid strides in getting acquainted - We are on the way - In the evening, I ... away - My lifeless remains were interred in Aggie's chair near a [register] - and my basket was full of ... and vermilion paint - I further distinguisheded myself by an object lesson - The lifeless remains made a melancholy effort - Some .. pleases ... 29 Jan. Thursday 29 1874 What is equivalent to that which Aggie and and I put ourselves in [splint] beds - puzzled - whether that which will really be what or go to sleep without knowing - taking on trust what we can't reconcile - Matters you see are in a ... state - It seems beneficient that Almighty hands are provided to take care of the things that grow too great for us - To get Mary Bryant here - Mrs. [Loveland] there - at the proper moment - making the connections is too big work for me - I drop it into the hands that have never let me down - The evening seems long and heartsome I can take comfort in an evening with Miss Hastings - and Aggie comes after night school and we talk and talk 30 Jan. Friday 30. 1874 What a queer world I find me in - The hands that were let down have taken my burdens. All things dovetailed and Mary is here - Some of this goes to prove that the world is queer - I came out of State Yard to-night without a tear - I didn't greet any ... - I rejoiced in a deliverance and in the trip before me - Here I am awake to find myself in Schenectady laughing as nobody has laughed since the panic - and my hostess is Miss Hastings - Think of that - and don't deny that the world is queer - The lecture by Prof. Wells was a treat - so was the sight of his face and the things I could think of when my thought grew restless and I am - Ah - There are dreams that never die - 31 Jan. Saturday 31. 1874 What of the night? The star of promise is shining clear and bright saith the watchman and unto Him of Calvary the gathering of the people is - I sit once more in the ever sacred room and I am buying of Him gold tried in the fire and imploring white garment that I may be clothed - As in the olden time I am found knocking, knocking at the open door - This covenant meeeting is full of Jesus - but when I turn my eyes to the old places I see them filled by strangers - and only here and there are those I left but it is [right] ... - or it could not be - We only learn in this way - that this is not our seat I stay with Sadie and there is much to tell32 Feb. Sunday 1. 1874 What the first day brought -33. Feb. Monday 2. 1874 What a spurred one on34 Feb. Tuesday 3. 1874 What form the next trouble takes - We have ups and downs at our house but chiefly downs - Since Dan's postal came and Gertie's sleep forsook her - What Dan means is entirely incomprehensible - we are left to worry about it - which we do in a manner never before attained It was a mistake sending a boy down in our family - but we are knowing so well about this matter that the next generation may all be boys and we'll be ready for them - One can live and worry too - The latter doesn't kill one - at least not me, any more than teaching with ... That tests endurance - Beyond that we need not look - 35 Feb. Wednesday 4. 1874 What everything tended toward- Becky, it wasn't a bear - not that but a bundle - bear-like in its proportions - We hope it will get along nicely without us - It will be an item to many people that they saw two girls go by with a bundle - Don't proceed - It is harrowing to my feelings - That boy of ours - why is it that he writes us not - We are all sitting in a tub of melancholy waiting and and hoping Helen - bless her heart has not given me up - She writes once again and with sincere contrition I promise all to myself to be good and not make her wait any more - Will I - Shall I - A moment to tell her -36 Feb. Thursday 5. 1874 What I think to-night. It is after the prayer meeting and my thoughts tend that way - I seem more in the atmosphere of God's great help than I have been in months - His rest is around my restlessness - I can venture on Him, venture wholly - I go up into the long night and my meditation of Him is sweet - I recall past moments when He was infinitely dear - and my soul is nearer the Eternal Moment - the assemblage of just souls made perfect ... I have known since my ... days began to go on - [Dannie] does not come or write and we are still much perplexed - I revel in three days at home - Mother is feeling miserable to-day and I am very sorry 37 Feb. Friday 6. 1874 What does and does not happen - It does not happen that I take Mr. Maynard's [horse] - nor that I get a letter - nor that any word comes from that boy - nor that I read my seventeen lines of Greek - not at all - It does happen that another bundle goes and that I "am one of the means" - that back numbers of the Weekly Herald arrive - That geography questions replenish the earth and subdue it and have dominion - That the mercury sinks to the depth that never dreams of thaws - or feels for mortals who were born in other latitudes - I am glad mother is a little betterr -38 Feb. Saturday 7. 1874 What comes to us - It is a day of sharp bitter frost of a keen cold air that lurketh about and for which there is no help - The good word comes from the boy that he's well and our hearts take a rest - It is such a blessed giving from the King immortal invisible in answer to my feeble asking - Dannie cannot fall away and be our disappintment not so long as I ... him up to the everlasting Arms - Work makes me feel good today - it is so nice to work at home - I keep in the spirit of it all the time and can hardly be persuaded to stop - I've had wonderful times visiting ... and Windsor and Brighton39 Feb. Sunday 8. 1874 What comfort I have learned - "A Presence fills my valleys and gilds my mountain tops - breathes upon the plains and they spring up in lilies and roses, flashes upon the waters and they flow to spheral melody, sweep through the forest and they [tremble] into song" - "The fire is unquenched beneath - You go your way not disconsolate - There needs but the Victims Voice - At the touch of the Prince's lips, life shall be perfected forever"40 Feb. Monday 9. 1874 What there was of it - One of the prominent features of the day was Mr. Maynard's horse - It will live in the memories of those who saw us - It came over about noon and we chased the horse away - We could easily with that type of horse - The afternoon was a rare one - just cool enough to keep the snow - just bright enough to keep us - Snow flew from those swift hoofs thundering south - and each [move] of the charger was [strained] to full play - Did I not guess that Mr. M. would wait for the stud at our house - Forewarned - forewarned ! Did I recite a Greek lesson ? I fear not - 41 Feb. Tuesday 10. 1874 What is if - ... All our heads meditate one theme - It relates to a rag carpet and no carpet and a new carpet - It ends in our coming into possession of a new oak and green ... too pretty for us - and the rag carpet being taken up stairs - Patience Strong would know lots of pretty things to say about this - There woud be no end of comfort in her thought of it and it would be like a piece of ... to Patience and her mother As for one I shall like its pretty brown and oak and lighter green more and more as I live where it is - I build a castle in Ann Arbor and in its glow is my oak and brown and lighter green42 Feb. Wednesday 11. 1874 What became of us - There never was so much done before for thirty cents - In this world we are all blind leaders of the blind and in our blindness it seemed necessary to offer one of our rooms to Anna [Ostrander} - and in Mr. Maynard's blindness he said we might have his charger for thirty cents to go to [Ostrander's] and in further blindness we passed the heads of the [Ostrander] family on the road - and then came the ride from Ghent to Aix dramatized "For one heard the quick wheeze of her chest, saw the stretched neck and the staggering knees, And sunk tail and horrible heave of the flank, As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank"* for thirty cents *Robert Browning "How they brought the good news from Ghent to Aix"43 Feb. Thursday 12. 1874 What! and did you : The bell rang a year ago this morning and Fanny do you remember that I promised never to make you walk up to answer its call another first day February morning This seems my girlie like one of the questions I was not allowed to answer - like one of the problems when the slate and pencil were taken from me - and in so wonder why I am made to stay here - I go up again to answer the singing of that bell. The girls bring good cheer - There's a spirit of good ... - a new ... a golden age breathing in the very air of the Normal Hall I go home from it into a cloud that settles black and grim - and ... - It's only like what has been so many times ... Talk to Gertie44 Feb. Friday 13 1874 What can she do!" I suppose this is one phase of the woman question - That makes me think Prof. Tyler of Amherst College has spoken thro' the columns of Scribner's Monthly and he turns the farrow and ploughs up the subjects to be considered in women's education! The "peculiar" nature of woman" - In "Her proper sphere"! O Tyler - "so new - so universal, so individual"! But to come back from my wandering - what can she do - The answer seems to be to start a school - to be its pivot - its motive power - and its [waste] of material! Also to be able not to write to Helen ...[Allen] - not to get a Greek lesson - not to do any writing or take any ...45 Feb. Saturday 14. 1874 What did she do: - Friends I come not here to talk - You know too well the story of our thralldown! Do you have tears? Prepare to shed them now! How many expeditions to the stores I was guilty of statistics shall never show - They shall show however that Mr. M. brought over a stove - that it was elevated to the upper regions with our arms - that it is the worst looking stove I ever saw - or carried up stairs - They shall show that I carried around pipe - and my ... - and Greek was not - The weather was full of April - Our hearts sang and we said - Is it spring! Dr. Sanford with hope big with immortality could [say] - I believe this is spring - It was ...- Storms may come - but it will do us no [harm] to be glad even when it cannot be -46. Feb. Sunday 15. 1874 What the dear lord is to us - so much, so very much - how can I tell alone - Let Isaiah tell how he is a covert from the storm - a hiding place from the tempest - a shadow of a great Rock in a weary land - Let John tell how he is love - Let Psalms tell how he is a shepherd tending - Let every thing tell how he is a tender Father pitying It is safe and best to hide in the shadow of his wing - To let him cover our defenceless heads - To-night a thought of life came over me of life as it is and will be - a life that must ... - and ... is sufficient indeed for these things 47. Feb. Monday 16 1874 What I know about Elisha ... - He is another man who was designed to make my pleasures less - He grows more and more incomprehensible and I can't perservere and never mind him! Anabasis is studied and forgotten and it returns [into one] void - an unfathomable void - The passages that I pour over and pour over appear for a little time and vanish away - ... comes and she brings all the cheer that she could gather from [sunny] weeks at the farm - Up in her home there is such carrying of lambs in their bosoms - such gentle leading - such comforting as mothers comfort - I shall always love the house at the end of the ... road - 48. Feb. Tuesday 17. 1874 What I think of - The present is a busy, hard present - it makes me what I shall never [reap] - and it is a weary ... lately - but the past has in it a gorgeous land - "Here are cool mosses deep and thro' the moss the ivies creep - The music of ... old ... full soften them "night dews on still waters between walls of shadowy granite in a gleaming pass"* - Dark and stern may have been my walls of shadowy granite - yet always have the night dews fallen - always has there been a past transfigured - My love - Yours is a sunny face that lights up my fears - no sunnier ...has ever shone upon one I can best keep your birthday, dear one, in lifting up my light in immitation of yourself - And today at the thought of you a laugh steals into my heart - *Alfred Lord Tennyson "Song of the lotus eaters"49 Feb. Wednesday 18. 1874. What new business devolves upon ... pupils are not ... The scarcity of an aricle in all cases governs the price ... Normal students - new ones are more precious than rubies - And so as they develop any signs of being lost to us I [leave] everthing and call upon them to remain - Even my ... Greek ... has been forsaken for this - I have forgotten the assembling of myself together and only stand trembling lest another sheep be dead - This is not a state of being in the [main] desirable - Gertie is sick - sleep frightened ...- the sweet restorer will not return and she is simply miserable - It is a shadow on the pretty ...50. Feb. Thurs 19. 1874. What is a trial balance - I look the first thing to see if the girl I worked upon last night is here - She is not -So I fall to musing - One of my life problems has taken a definite shape - It seem to be stated as follows - "How will you get a Normal scholar? How will you keep her? Are you ingenious enough to make the solitary place be glad - to make the wilderness blossom? You may study how - I feel so unsatisfied and forlorn to-day - can't find ... and no pastures are green. Who so harnesth ... the apple if mine eyes [and] mother said something cruel loud enough for dearie to hear - So I go down into a black evening51. Feb. Friday 20. 1874. What the final decision is - I don't know what the number of this final decision is - there have been so many since the first that I have lost track - To-day proclaims one more - it makes me tired and sorry to have all my plans for Gertie fall through so - and not one thing to make up their loss - The creatures of my brain are very dear to me and I work for my plans - There have been cheery things to-day and the traveler I have been on smoother waters - without much of any head wind I could go better with the breeze if Gertie would only be good ahd work with a will at her music - I quote myself as an immortal example of working against ...- this in Greek 52 Feb. Saturday 21. 1874. What I do not know - Here I am perfectly at home - It is perfectly remarkable the things I do not know - As a general rule I keep away from them - I don't proceed a great way from the known to the unknown - As it happens I have spirit most of today among the things I dont know - It's still Elisha James that's at the bottom of it - I may well say it's all Greek to me - I send my 13 and 14 to Prof. - with many a pang - Jennie has been so sweet and dear since she came back - Gertie has been grim all day - and mother has spent her existence in painting - The weather is an approving smile - So seems the world away - "O - the hills I crossed and came not to you - love -53 Feb. - Sunday 22. - 1874 And Death is dumb - How dumb is only known to those who miss the touch of a vanished hand and the sound of a voice that is still - How dumb Death is - we are [growing] more and more to know - for not a word or token has entered the silence for twelve years The ... was full of breaking on the cold gray storms of the sea - for there was a vacant seat that shall never be filled There were white flowers tied with knots of ribbon - fresh from the ... for her burial - There is a giving of the kingdom by and by and it is the Father's good pleasure! 55 Feb. Tuesday 24. 1874 Fall we may and fall we must - We are indeed fallen creatures - Watch one of us going up that hill - Its like the frog going up the well - We attempt but little in the walking line - for it takes so long to go a little way - I sort of creep up the hill but it is no ... a spectacle in [broad] day light - I can live to-day better than I could yesterday for the sun blessed us And Gertie's gone - I am sorrier than I can tell but I [am] too much like the pumpkin eater- "I couldn't keep her " - I come back from the [car] with more pain in my heart that it expresses - and a vacant night goes on - goes on - It is the end of a chapter that begn in [radiance] - 56. Feb. Wednesday 25. 1874 The time of the singing of the birds has not come! This is demonstrated by the snow-storm - Mr. Maynard came over yesterday to take me as he said the last sleighride of the season I was not home and [never] got it. Now he will have to come again - the snow has made a last apearance once - When people in this world begin to advertise their last appearance one needn't be in a hurry -56. Feb. Wednesday 25. 1874 The time of the singing of the birds has not come! This is demonstrated by the snow-storm - Mr. Maynard came over yesterday to take me as he said the last sleighride of the season I was not home and [never] got it. Now he will have to come again - the snow has made a last apearance once - When people in this world begin to advertise their last appearance one needn't be in a hurry - There is ... for one's feet and I half reconcile things though I do want spring - I can't wait to see mother's floor navigable once more - Jennie is a comfort - She has never seemed quite to me as she has since she came back - A blessing on her red lips - 57. Feb - Thursday 26. 1874 "[Aint] very well-a-day" - I can't conceive of teaching in this status but I can do often what I can't conceive - After one is up and at it there is always a supply to carry one through - A somehow to venture in and attend to ones ... - My somehows are good and faithful servants - I have got in deep deep water and I can't swim - I sit and shake in presence of my ... and with a ... I cannot express - Me - analyze Shakespeare - We eat at the table with these gods! No wonder I have a headache - No wonder my brain sits weary on my spine - 58. Feb. Friday 27. 1874. In which Jennie becomes Glory [McWhisk]! How could I tell what had happened - And when Miss Miller came up after school so wisely with "Jennie's going home isn't she?" - Was I going to appear less wise than she? - Not at all - So I said intelligently - "Yes" but I went to the post ofice [sic] wondering - When I got home I found Leonard there! Yes verily my friend, the sky had fallen for Jennie and poured its treasures into her lap. The tea-table was jollier than it has been in many a night and the shining ..., the dinner words rang - "Not for ...59 Feb. Saturday 28. 1874 In which some of the sunshine is carried off - True - True and on no better vehickle [sic] than a slow freight - I like Leonard's laugh - It means something - I build dreams of a tall brother who shall have whiskers and a seal-skin cap and be good to me some day - I set me to analyze Shakespeare - Light Little Lark - this sitting in the presence of the gods among Kings! My conceptions are not lofty to-day - but I get to a stopping place - I always do Miss ... comes not - but she will come next week if or if not - Well - Hope it's ... - It is so nice at home - O make ... long and sweet -60. March Sunday 1. 1874 In which March comes in like a lamb Yes - a lamb without spot or blemish and my heart and eyes look lovingly into every sign of the blessed spring - one feels so good at its very mention - I take long looks at mother and the cosy sitting room and enjoy and enjoy until I am dizzy with the blessedness and the delight Home never seemed so nice as it does this winter and it is the Father's good pleasure - A man from Bar Harbor preached - I have great ideas of those men Any one who has seen Yale College is great - So I was doomed to have a fall - His preaching was not good - Yale61. March, Monday 2. 1874 In which the wind is south - Then I feel sure [it's] spring - but old men shake their heads at me - They say "no - no - no" - They are ready to proclaim a storm - a wheezer - a roaring lion seeking whom he may drown - but then I have in my heart a song why not sing it ? Ah! - Believing I rejoyce with joy unspeakable - Some of the vacant seats are filled and I feel more like teaching - How blessed the latter when according to ... I've lately "poked". What it is to teach and not feel like it is one of the never to be unraveled mysteries - There is no danger of my ever telling for I am incapable62 March, Tuesday 3. 1874. In which it comes to me that the rainiest days like the rainiest lives are by no means the saddest! The heavens opened upon us and what was a threatening has become a reality - But school must be taught and Fannie must teach in any case - In a query as how I was to get home without transport - a knock announces an appearance and I embrace my brother - I find myself almost elated - How proud I should be to have him turn out well in this evil generation which ... to destroy them - How my heart calls unconsciously for this as from the great God who had a Son in this world and gave him power to overcome63 March. Wednesday 4. 1874 In which I worry about Susie - Seven weeks it is nearly - and its long to wait - I ask so many things and wait and wait - Annie McDonald goes and I try to help her off - and help her to friends when she gets there - I know she'll get kindness if she falls into Aggie's hands - [Then] there's one more vacant seat in Normal Hall - and one more gone beyond me - Not so much as a shadow of a [lesson] to-day and my courage lags - Even English literature is a [howling] wilderness! Very - I come home and fall into the hands of a [book] - ... I might have expected I would -64. Feb. Thursday 5. 1874 In which there are signs of [hulled corn]! This as you must know is one of my strong points - so I make it to head my chapter - Mrs. [Headley] is awful good to me lately - To-night she lent me herself and husband coming from prayer meeting. Gertie writes strange things of her doings and Mr. Willard. This is a strange world - I feel so good to-day - so well and not [nervous] with this new head of mine! My Eng. Lit. class still [struggle] and dire and flat [[breathes] Shakespeare business - It's fearful!65. March, Friday 6. 1874 In which there is the coming of a pale face - poor little white cheeks and its mother's little girl! [It's] nice to see her - nice to go up to the train and bring her home - nice to hear her tell about Mary and Annie and the folks - I hear the clock strike twelve and still my eyes are open wide! My thoughts are on a march to-night - I have very much to think of lately and my course seems more and more plain before me - It seems more and more to lie far away and to call me nearer and nearer and my thoughts to go hither and thither66. March, Saturday 7. 1874 In which are seen the effects of [hulled corn]! Behold me I stand before you a victim to its emanating influence - Why was I not warned? A head to-day unequal to Elisha Jesus, a stomach quivering - eyes tremulous ... - Well, you'll learn! It [doesn't] act like spring out doors at all - [It's] murky and dreary and still enough Aggie declares for a land where Sabbaths never end! Ella and .. call and I feel like seeing them - I am sort of wrapped up in those ... girls Am I a foolish little teacher? Life is brief yes - but is not love long67 March, Sunday 8. 1874. In which I am glad to feel that there is a rest that remaineth! It comes over one sometimes and I creep away in the shadow of it and tarry and tarry! I have thought too of [Kike] to-day and how grand life grows when it is laid down - of itself - Have we not power to lay it down - ... not [God] promise us power to take it again - We are all together at home once more Sunday - all around the sitting room stove tonight - There is a shadow of a parting next year - O make your good nights linger and your ... long and sweet - for these loves shall die? not in thought nor yet in tears - 68. March, Monday 9. 1874 In which we all laugh mortal! Hear the mournful sound! We see the ecstatic vision of snow - and feel the [the] wind in our faces - O - sad delusion and I am the deluded one - Those old men will be right - and our teeth shall chatter, chatter still - I am found at the old stand and there are somethings inside that are not snow or wind! I look for John ... but see him not - and who else will answer? Aggie feels better to-day. She has an account to settle before my brother's tribunal - It relates to how she found out things from his diary - I sympathize with him - I have feelings on that point - Memorable March 9 - Another I first beheld Castleton 69. March, 10 1874 In which I shall probably have a sore [mouth] ! Those painful evolutions through which I passed last winter have not repeated themselves on one of late - They are not far away - I may yet have a sty - There was more in yesterday than there has been in to-day of hope and caring and satisfaction - but these are crowns and crowns are not given each day - I hear such glad reports of the girl's prayer meeting - How I rejoyce in the thought of it. It is sunny and cold. It is less like spring than the November nights weeks ago - and I [must] stand and wait70 March, Wednesday 11. 1874 In which there is no [star] of promise! How could it be so cold and windy the on the very verge of April! It will teach April to be unkind! How could Jennie stay away so long when we want her so? How could some of the girls still fail and fail! How could all the surface ripple forth discontent - and chafe and numb - When love is long? There are some of my girls that will never let life look very dark to me - some that are priceless as these priceless days that are taking them from me!71 March, Thursday 12. 1874 In which Ella [Marsh] didn't do it enough! It was an Algebra problem - "Well, have you the answer? Yes - but I'm afraid I didn't do it enough" - My comments are inward - This is so muchlik Marsh! I know on e thing through the day school! I know one thing through the night - Greek. I have had a dreary feeling - I want to paint ... a beautiful picture ... the hearts of my girls - I long and long for it - and I have been71 March, Thursday 12. 1874 In which Ella [Marsh] didn't do it enough! It was an Algebra problem - "Well, have you the answer? Yes - but I'm afraid I didn't do it enough" - My comments are inward - This is so much like Marsh! I know one thing through the day - school! I know one thing through the night - Greek. I have had a dreary feeling - I want to paint such a beautiful picture [on] the hearts of my girls - I long and long for it - and I have been [doubting] lately - I can't erase mistakes - and I am longing to right all things - to make myself felt forever - so that nothing shall separate - If I only only could and I love them so73. March, Saturday 14. 1874. In which Uriah carries off Dan's candy - It lay on the kitchen table - the only piece of last night one from our house ... - the ... - There it lay - We are fallen upon evil times - It doth not lay there now - It is a prey - and Dan stands unto us desolate - Uriah dost devour widow's houses. I am a ... There's lots I don't do. [Anybody] could mope a little. It could thaw some and not try very hard - I am all ready for it. And I forgot to tell you that Jennie's back - and the sunshine came along with her - right along - My ... is our preying ground. I may make a night of it - 75. March, Sunday 15. 1874 In which Mr. Stone is a sounding brass - and Mr.Hadley and Frankie [Burt] are tinkling cymbals! My seat is number 50 and I occupy it with my sister. Both of us have colds in our heads - A great many - The sun shines in ... the window - and if my tooth didn't ache there would be a May in my heart - I was one of the wretched last night that sleep forsakes To-day we visit - It is one of the summer days to which we may never wander back - There are dear patient fingers that make ice cream, and candy, that iron Aggie's dress - and fill the day - and they will be still some day when these summer days are gone75. March, Monday 16. 1874. In which "John Dooley he knew" - This Dooley who is a fairy with the reddest lips is an elixer of life! - she unconsciously prolongs ... - This by way of introduction for the day had to strike its key - and she [goes] it a merry time - in the midst of my forlorns measured by the condition of my body - which looked through to ... minutes before [fire] ... It is is not - I'd forego the scenery, the people , the [beetles], the ..., the soil if I could only have the climate, the eternal spring! To-day there is a faint prospect of a Vermont spring - very faint I stand shivering on the brink of Greek - 76. March. Tuesday 17. 1874 In which a streak of thaw occurs - Our bosoms glow - The old men do not shake their heads and say [there'll] be cold weather yet - They may think so but they do not tell it to me - I am in my martyr mood to-day - That is I go about kind of pitiful - and work with my teeth clinched and my hands holding on hard - but muttter no word about it - This mood is well for those who learn of me - The ... versus Willard - or ...versus a] J - ... is progressing in Schenectady ... had a ... time. The stove pipe in Normal Hall has another improvement - a white rag tied around it and fastened to the stove-pipe with a stick what plans are devised for our comfort - Think of it 77. March, Wednesday 18. 1874 In which I have an uxpected shock - I needed a stir to break the monotony - otherwise how would to-day have differed from yesterday and last week and ad infinitum! Dr. French has enough of him to break most anything there why not monotony? - He broke it in many pieces - He scares me but he knows it not - he leaves me rather exalted then otherwise! - My [Thomson] class is going to Poke - They commence that way - Jennie's learned a new word - "..." - On the whole I find it very expressive! Dan is [joined] to his sick room - Let him alone - There's more spring than there was yesterday78. March, - Thursday 19. - 1874 In which I am perplexed but not in despair! A memorable day - I heard a robin sing - and this the 19th of March only! When in this latitude have mortals recorded such a statement? It covers the year with a new goodness. I feel under the weather a little and a good deal forlorn - I drag Fannie around - I make her teach and write and translate - and the child [doesn't] want to - Even Mich. is a terror to her - An anniversary day - we must not let it quite die from our memories - The veined sardonyx stands for this - for it is a life-story full since of the tederness and the pain and the purifying - 79. March, Friday 20. 1874 In which there is a change of base - I change my previous habits and become a visitor - a guest - I roll away out of sight of Normal precincts or Liddell and Scott - and all without stopping once to see how my [bow] is put on! Emma Alland has a pretty home and they all sing and [it's] grand - I envy girls with a father - You would like to be up there to night Hope ... - There is a plant here they call heart's rose - and we love it - Hope and I - I shall rest and it remaineth - but [Helen Birrell] ought to be with us - I think of her over and over to night and say half sadly to myself "And never wander back" - 80. March, Saturday 21. 1874. In which I see cousin Euliza - This is not suggestive of as much an arrivent as followed for she has a husband , George - who evidently was designed to make our pleasures more. I am glad to hear something that [isn't] school - It is a benedicite? I love such peeps as this into other people's homes - Love to sit by the parlor windows and watch those who are enjoying the grand weather out doors or look around and enjoy the cheery talk - [Its] all making a new world of the one that was growing to be a very old one - I would like a home like this and a nice [funny hubby] perhaps - but my kingdom has not come - 81. March, Sunday 22. 1874. In which a daughter prophesies I fancy this sunshine is for something - I foretell a speedy coming of arbutus - of harpers harping with their harps - I know that April shall bear in her hands the fullness of life! I went to a Baptist church and listened as I was told I should listen to a Baptist sermon - It didn't hurt me - I have been homesick lately for my dear, dear church. I do so want something to do in the beautiful work. I seem to have a nice sounding in my ears - Give all your life to God's work - Be - O be about the Father's business! 82. // March, Monday 23. 1847, On which I postpone the fulfillment of prophecies for the time is not at hand - It gets cold, so cold we forget all about the joys the world could give last week - and alas! - could take away - I am tired of buying coats for a contrary naughty boy who will trade [hens] and get [hens] when we [don't] want him to - [Don't] let me worry about it - If there's pain in the air [don't] let it rest ... - In the place of it let me grow patient and be busy with my living - Let me lay down and lay down and lay down- that I may take again - Deny - deny - deny - thyself - 83. March, Tuesday 24. 1874 In which I cannot face a frowning world! - I have got pitched up to-night very high - not in hope nor yet in courage - but on mounting billows - It is akin to [bathing] my weary soul - - - - - but the seas of heavenly rest are farther on - Dannie is headstrong and unreasonable - school stormy and discouraging - and my head fairly quakes in want of rest - and all of these things move me - I seem another person to myself these days when I work so - Jesus is the Savior and nothing do I need to-night so much as to be saved - O could I see the ... that is like ths Son of God!84. March, Wednesday 25. 1874 In which there is more faith and the Dolly - There is a happy in the bright morning times when ... make together strong for whatever may be to do or hear!" The day - O - How much you are to me - It is ever a trial to be out of doors - but I hold on hard and tremble lest such days be taken from us and we go back to yesterday - and day before - How many of God's best gifts do we hold solemnly - almost without breath lest we lose them! I take a breathing spell from English Literature but there's enough else to .... O - if I can only keep tender loving feelings and be patient - nothing elese shall worry me!85. March. Thursday 26. 1874 In which I am "pleasant to have about" - The rarity of this perhaps accounts for its being recorded! The whole day has been like a hope of heaven - I love these new fresh days to take last year's ... and ... of sleighing and cold ears and noses - and then think how very comfortable we are to-day - this March day! Evening ... of a ... - meeting followed by a not very comfortable introduction to Mrs. Col. [Parker]! Then I went shouting through the streets to Mr. Co. [Parker]! [It's] pretty nearly time I had a letter. I am tired of looking and not finding! Very!86. March, Friday 27. 1874 In which I ought to be a source of great pride to my friends! Chiefly on account of my socialiste abilities! Mother sends me to see a man about renting our front room and I spend the evening and do not mention it. A [man] of ... dawns upon us - he visits us in the capacity of - I stay & converse with him after school. This Mr. Williams does not smile upon - as he trots around the floor picking up little pieces of chalk! March is still smiling upon us - and there are signs that the waste places shall be made glad! -87. March, Saturday 28. 1874 In which we concoct large plans - They have to do with two old people - a dear refreshing lady - and a joint affair of hers with a cane! Our plans remain in ... until Monday dawns! - The first chill fell upon me to-day - It will be followed by the frost by and by - For that we shall leave the cosy home in early fall is now inevitable - We shall be more sorry than we know - It has been a grand day and the ... people have all made a grand march out doors! - It seems so strange to feel the shackles of my room so unceasingly - I ... myself for taking one moment to play or take in - but I shall [rest] and the time is at hand - 88. March, Sunday 29. 1874. In which thoughts come to me out of the pleasantness. In this the day is like ... - Everything in that was born of a pleasantness and it feasts upon a glory - or a revelation - Does any one often discern the things of the Spirit - unless their minds grow to that heavenly repose that is blessed evermore with the presence of the Spirit. I long for a Sabbath recognition - to be lifted up by unseen hands - but my prayers though they help me - do not [transfigure] - I must walk more and more by Jesus every day - if I would know the things which are spiritually discerned! 89. March, Monday 30. 1874 In which our paths have been directed but not our way - The super structure we have [built] for three days has fallen and we muse sadly and half fondly on seeing our plans fail and wonder what the Heavenly Father has in store for us that this must be forbidden! The sun still shines by day and the moon by night - and now and then even there are faint twitters of birds - There's always something to take comfort in and mother looks around for them - My Greek lessons [Ex.20.] returns to me and I feel dubious enough! - Jen's laugh fills the house to-night - Blessed be it - March is still cold -90. March, Tuesday 31. 1847 In which on, on, on the plans come marching! The theme is not grow grand and majestic - but ... as it proceeds How hope takes hold of that which is in ... - and Aggie sends a coaxing letter - So that's what we talk about - Mother declares that the future Mrs. Cole will be obliged to eat frozen potatoes! Jennie takes this so to heart she fears it will cause a [separation]! March blows us as he says good bye - blows us good and hard - Yet the sunshine is everywhere - and warms us not - I work at high pressure with a headache. I come home at noon and find no boy -91. April, Wednesday 1. 1874. In which I lift up mine eyes to the hills! It is ay a comfort lassie - and help cometh - for there is spring enough everywhere for me to smell the sweet breath of the pines, to see the water running in deep wild spots, darkened by tall trees - and to watch the sinking glory on bare hill-tops. Then we come home in the moonlight and I thought of Susie and ... - I think Susie must be the poetry of my life for there's no bountiful, worshipful thing but brings me thoughts of her - All before this lay a day of hard work with a headache - and thoughts that roll and roll and puzzle me -92. April, Thursday 2. 1874 In which [it's] "shall we" or "[shan't] we" and we do? - Jennie's anticipations and mine are usually freighted with uncertainties! Last night we weren't going - We weren't going this morning - The day was a ... - our headaches were raging and we summed up our conclusions rapidly and winged our flight - What a change from the school-room to the skies - We saw people and things and visions of things! One fat fair man whom it heard talking of sales of 40,000 and cash profit in ... thousands - Took out a book and read it and lo it was the "Character of St.Paul!" The very Paul who fought to win and ... corruptible things such as silver and gold. Schenectady will ever stand in my memory veiled in moonlight - and again and again by faith I shall walk under the arch and wander on the college green93. April, Friday 3. 1864 In which I abundantly renew my youth! The morning scene smacked of creeping out before another soul was up - and getting off with a good-bye to an early train! At the Normal there were stairs and rumors of stairs! - There were hours for things - Very few changes sit on the face of things - The girls all look and act just as we did: - and the boys, as our brothers did - The teachers are as of old - and invincible armada - It gets to be afternoon and we seek a city: - Cohos - We do not find Aggie at the bottom of the hill lonely, lonely - but on the serene summit - far, far above the starry skies - We are abundantly entertained - I could fill your judging ear - if there was room!94 April, Saturday 4. 1894. In which level ground is a myth and flat surfaces things of which we have dreamed! We have been through the process of doing Albany - Much of our business lay between heaven and earth - We couldn't even ask to see a trunk without being sent to the fourth floor - There were no arrangements of flowery beds or other things to carry toward the skies - Light-seeing in large quantities produces lassitude. I am quite sure Mr. Stone (pa) would say it this way! - Aggie and I are safe, safe at home and the trunk is by our sides! - There's more to tell and my spirit is willing but flesh is weak! - 95. April, Sunday 5. 1874 In which we are in the "beauty of the lilies" and Easter time! - "Ah: well for us all some sweet hope lies"* sings this spring morning! - Sweeter and sweeter it grows as we rise to the calm of the Seventh day - and this blessing of the Easter chimes: The morning was still for us just rested - In the afternoon we went to vespers and saw the altar Lilies - and heard the organ - The service was all music and I felt better - If Aggie's Sunday's are all like this I don't wonder she cries for mother! - Miss [Hasting] entertains us with detailed accounts of lassie Marie St. ... - Poor little almost sick sister went to bed early - * John Greenleaf Whittier. Maud Muller 96. April, Monday 6. 1874. In which time of our departure is not at hand: This has to do with the whole family - and touches on the questions shall we bring our flight southward now or shall we wait till the birds go! - [It's] answered on my consciousness already - There's too much to move me here - and I am easily [worn]: - I find there was a joy waiting for me on the journey - It seemed so nice - This day belongs to Susie and I - It is five years old now - and we love it not less - but more - There is a shadow about it even lurking in the blessed daylight for I have not heard in eleven weeks - and I fear - lest the shadow I feel is a part of a shadow from him - Why [doesn't] somebody write and tell me! ---97. April, Tuesday 7. 1874 In which April assumes her proper character - There's been great carryings on here in my absence - The snow veils every hill-top and covers the streets and everybody is as forlorn over it as hens in a ... To-night there's hopes of bare hills again and perhaps dry feet! School is such a treat to me when I feel like work - and I do to-day every inch of me - The girls will think to-night that I have been pleasant to have about - perhaps - and so I come home comfortably off - Dan writes of a sprain - [consequent] on his morning to Sunday School - The last part of the ... is a shock! - 98. April, Wednesday 8. 1874 In which I buy Hamburg eggs - It comes about that the melancholy days have come again and Dan's hens hold up their little heads and clamour to set - mother having seen a picture of a Hamburg fowl (foul) - she must have Hamburg eggs - I must get them - It comes about that this is a means - and through it I become acquainted with pa [Stone] - and the fifth lady of his ... Mother and I still sit on the ... of indecision - and we can't tell how to fix it! - 99. April, Thursday 9. 1874 In which our plans are still status quo! - We are waiting for the children and in the meantime my mother thinks and thinks and thinks! - I go to prayer meeting and hear about living above the world - I am less in that atmosphere than once - The work of the world, hope of future, ... draw me and chain me and the perfect devotedness to the weak and lowly Jesus is another and far away thing! Bring every thought into subjection to the obedience of Christ!- I have work to do - and the field is within me : I must learn to die daily ! To carry about in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus! - There's mud and snow and spring is a legend old - and mythical! -100 April, Friday 10. 1874 In which the old men are right! - I have held fast in hope until to-day which shatters every one! - There has been no snow storm this winter like it! - And the snow blows in our very faces to ...! School has been sort of snarled up and not soothing - but we can always say "a little more sunshine tomorrow"! It's so nice with mother today - What shall I do when I can't work by her or talk to her next year - I can't bring myself to see! - The days will come but now they are hidden from mine eyes! Mr. Maynard presents me with an apparatus consisting of two sticks! My only fear is lest my good mother use them for clothes-pins!101 April, Saturday 11. 1874 In which I am a social being - It's not the best day in the world to develop one's social faculties - but such as it is I take and trot myself out - I ... between mud banks and snow banks - Frank ... Marshall, Esq - East has the wrong pig by the ear! He is not [deep] - He needs appurtenances! He firmly believes that I am the candidate - the probable victim - says if I 'll ... around and come for B I can begin in May! Poor little misguided man: - Mysterious must have been the ways of my letter! I eat sugar on snow! Nice new maple wax - and I hold the new baby - Now what do you think? 102 April, Sunday 12. 1984 In which there is a crimson and a blue! I do not find myself alone - The Sabath lesson makes one feel still more sure that the Spirit is in my heart - That it can help me to bear - and believe - The sun was a ... by shining on snow that will not thaw : - I try to write a letter to Susie but I'm not worth much to-day! - It would seem not much harder to squeeze or drum "words that [burn]" out of a brick! - Where did I get this cold and what did I get it for: Poor little robins: how can they be glad and sing with their little toes in the snow!103. April, Monday 13. 1874 In which we made it do - It is a dreary opening with a week to take its keynote from it all the same. And my cold undoes me! But I stand it: My writing if submitted will bring the same criticism which has fallen upon J. Croft - "Illegible from incorrectly formed letters" - There may be better signs tomorrow - hope so - not of penmanship but of weather! Morning sessions for classes seem not to pay - It takes too much [dismissing] to get the folks together! The nose (noes) have it - snuff and be undismayed 104. April, Tuesday 14. 1874 In which a wave of troublewells over my peaceful breast - It takes the form of Andrew McMullen and the substance a coal bill. I have been so in hopes those old bills could wait a little longer- I feel bound hand & foot this Spring with Michigan before me. Well I haven't got any further than well - yet - School partakes of Andrew McMullen - and the sitting room by the coal stove! Sure enough. There isn't much "[Broadfields]"... about any thing that has had to do with me today - Far from it -105 April, Wednesday 15, 1874 In which the foundation of theology is sure. I made a spasmotic attempt to get once more over to Greek - and found the opening statement unanswerable - some old professor of Harvard College has made a written assertion and convinced a continent (named Maynard's) My teacher wisely tells me that if he had written it in Greek I never could have read it! - How thankful I ought to be that so much light illumines my darkened understanding through my mother tongue. I write to Andrew - Time away from the thought - At last at last there is word from Rosbury and my heart rest -106 April, Thursday 16. 1874 In which we are exhorted by a disciple of Dr. Edwards - We also hear more from the same individual about President Finney - Dr. Edwards passed through two remarkable conversions. He thinks he wasn't converted at all the first time - His friends think he was! I go to prayer meeting but my thoughts are not there - My spirit does not enter in and partake of the near the holy things of the Spirit - The service which had to be sung was simply dreadful - O how I long to go in and out to find pasture! - but I'm swallowed up in work and it will not let me A summer with Susie is near and it may hold in it something of the blessedness [intense] of the old summers -107. April, Friday 17. 1874 In which we are confronted by another snow storm - And it isn't one of your common ones either - It means it all - Mother knew what made me worry the minute I came in to dinner - I did want for once the power of forbidding another flake to fall! Andrew McMullens reply was like a big snow bank falling all at once. I gain resolution from despair! The lamps are not lighted early - We sit in the light of the coal fire and have a long long play - Jennie can laugh for her mother is better - We have one of the good old times in the rocking chair - Mother joins in -108 April, Saturday 18. 1874 In which its something else I'm up to - Upon me has fallen a conscious weight - I am almost to the depot - in the bend this side of it - before I wake up fully to the sense of it - Upon me has fallen the responsibility of the much talked about class-rings! Very truly! Also the responsibility of a box to be sent to Dan! I live through them both - I sit for a picture and almost make the man not live through it - At the latest both are alive and may recover! I am in my parent's arms - and my salary is a comfort to other people109 April, Sunday 19. 1874 In which desire has not failed - Heaven has sent us a reminder of itself in the day - a suggestion of what may be - somewhere I felt like resting my heart in the tenderness that is with the Almightiness. I asked for bread and received a crumb! I am not an apostle of Congregationalism - He can't knock me into this way - Never mind - the doctrine - the beauty of God - and the glory are all about us - and one who is meek and lowly of heart can give rest to the soul! Mother and I have a nice visit - We talk of the time when Dannie will be through school - and bring joy and comfort to us - when the old debts shall all be paid and our new house shall be ...! 110. April, Monday 20. 1874. In which there comes a reality! And of course it was something for which I had not in the least calculated! I thought I'd put away headaches with my old clothes - and such a one as I never put away (for I never had it) was upon me to-night and to-day! My head sort of performed through the day increasing in volume - It ended in a smasher and the daughter of music is laid low. There is a brightening smong the girls who are to graduate! They stop and take on hopes. The weather adapts itself to my state of health - it rains and performs - In the meantime Mr. Woodruff the reverend sir calls! -111. April, Tuesday 21. 1874 In which I am of some consequence to myself. The reason is obvious - I am invited by my friend, philosopher and guide to take an airing - Not in the carriage that cost [$.21] cash but in the other one. The reason of this is likewise obvious - It is muddy. There is nothing cheery in the weather - It sinks one - I am buoyed up by things that have nothing to do with the weather. One prop is a letter from Dan - It is also tending to build one up to be able to sit up all day - Mother's enterprise is rewarded and the chickens are born. This is a strong prop to mother - Lillie Clark's face is so pretty and she's so bright around home112 April, Wednesday 22, 1874 In which our family is increased. This is some of mother's doings - looking forward to funds to settle up with when the change comes - Bless her heart - As to me I am not such a very smart - Mother says I have typhoid symptoms and suggests I fly like a bird to the mountain of homeopathy - Since I am no disciple Of blue pills - I am not ready to vote on the question - Miss Eaton has gone down to Manchester and found out that I am a good teacher - so she returns satisfied - The sun and I are trying to so let our light shine that others may see our good works - We have a sorry time shining - I was not born to shine!-113. April, Thursday 23. 1874 In which I shan't play any more! - Not with this April - It lives but to deceive! - A cloud bigger than a man's hand covers our heavens and pitiless flakes of snow fall - and mists come up not to be penetrated. I feel so much better every way - My typhoid symptoms vanish - It is like old Seminary times to hear the girls upstairs! - Its almost the only thing in these times that I care to keep in mind. These are pleasant days to me after all - full of the work I love - more than full of the light of young faces - and loving hearts - These I go from to I know not what - and the time is nigh. The prayer meeting had in it something to bestow and there were the promises of love114. April, Friday 24. 1874 In which I neither sit nor sing! It's sort of Friday nightish - and my key partakes both of the nature of sharp and flat - Besides my pictures haven't come - Mother shouts over two new aprons - and I over a pair of new gloves - "[Pit]", Jennie made me! The felicities of the day have been exceedingly augmented by good Mother - Mother wants me to write a poem. I want to - I'd love to - but the sources of poems are not Mrs. [Munchmore]. O - dear no! - One precious button from my new gloves is gone - Who's got the button ! - 115. April, Saturday 25. 1874 In which the sun goes down upon my wrath! - If I ever had any love or respect for this 1874th April I have thrust it from me - It is gone - We are in another woeful snowstorm - and the wind blows and it's cold enough as mother says it "to freeze the hair off a dog" - I suppose all one can do is to shovel the paths and hope to busy myself with things I've been putting off to do - essay subjects for instance - A dear letter from cousin Mary [Struter] Dodd lays hold of me like everything ! "You cannot do too much for your mother - If you could see things as I see them now you would love, trust and indulge her more than all the world" - and this from one who has just had her mother taken away forever! The pictures - I can find no fault with. There said the ... "Now she'll do" -116 April. Sunday, 26 1874 In which I am drawn from the skies! - The [hosts] of sin are pressing hard - and a boy throws a shovel full of snow in my neck - I go on to church pretty mad at that boy - The ninth regular snow-storm in the series was delivered today - and as I told Sue my spirit sinks to depths unsounded - But there's cheer inside at home - Cheer and chicken! - I am very tender to mother all day - can anything ever take her away from me: How weak I feel to keep her and yet how strong I feel to keep her - I write a few verses on the death of Mary because she wanted me to - and they don't sound very good - My old passion for rhyming has gone from me - 118. April, Tuesday 28. 1847 In which I don't know what to do with Fannie. She has spells, days - It is not a little blessed that these days are a long ways apart - If she'd said much it would have been cross. - She didn't say much - Work moves not under her fingers as of old today - Greek is hard to make from English. Some of the classes are stupid and the review in Phys - a trial weekly to me. - How thankful I am for little ... of discipline. I wish I had enough nerve to make me behave - The night settles down cold - and it may storm - I think I'll walk after school but I don't - What comfort is there in such chilly afternoons for footmen? O for the power to be a son of God! Miss Willard sends me a dear little bouquet of flowers -119. April, Wednesday 29. 1874. In which the key-note is still weather - It is pitched low - If there's any more snow in those upper regions I hope it will come quick - It has been a dreadful day - The snow blows and the wind that blew off the steeples in Bennington is upon us! I am so cross I can't stand it - I'm having more than enough shadow to temper the glare of the sun these days. I can stand the sun a little while - The ... in the little bouquet has helped - It holds me fast without a spoken word - like the soft hands stroking into ... in the dark - The side of life purely real has consisted in sitting perched with the end of my backbone in the angle of my chair - in buying codfish and carp - ... I'm delving into ...120. April, Thursday 30. 1874 In which I relinquish this April without a struggle - my breast is unmoved - I am perfectly calm. This April all along has been having tears and preparing to shed them - Their departure impresses us in the same manner that the departure of Miss House would. Mr. Williams shoots an announcement at me from his loaded gun - I have known him too long to be much scared! Judge Bromley happens along and says tain't so! - However my evening is as good as spoiled for I am too stirred up to work - Mr. Maynard was overwhelmed in prayer meeting - Twasn't from Pres. Edwards or [Finney] Lillie Clark is nice to me and she comes part way home with me bless her heart 121. May, Friday 1. 1874. In which Miss Willard's little Bouquet contains all the May flowers that I have - I don't know whether taking the year all round we shall find any May at all - No one has found any April! That box makes a start for Grandma - We take to wondering what the ittle old lady will say when it gets to her! Normal work is growing on my hands and we all keep good-natured and it moves! - We wish each other happy May Day - and we say by our faces cheer up - and the days move on - The folks that go home ... away in a dream of glory and they who stay - say to themselves ... more! 122. May. Saturday 2. 1874. In which I have an up and a down! - I take to a change of employment and bring into use a new set of muscles - This is well - my little [man] ! - In the work here and there, doing this and that my heart sings! - It's like being on the farm - besides the sun shines some - Mother feels good too - Her little chicks are a joy forever - Jennie says "Lets us lay an egg and hatch one" - Mary ... amuses us so much - She sort of exhales an air not of this clime, nor like it - but purely Irish - Don't think it is to be [despised] my worthy friend! You don't know - it's spicy, aromatic nature- it's tending to thrive!123 May, Sunday 3. 1874. In which I consent to live - It begins to smile outdoors and the desert places are going to be green again! I have a nice time in the early morning writing to Sue before any body is up - Mother and I chatter chatter through the day and we ... lots of times how Grandma looked when the box came and what she said - I wrote to the boy too - and I lay awake and think of the snares laid for his feet and I pray that God may give his angels charge concerning him - He must not make mother's hairs silver too soon - I think over and over what Mary wrote - "Trust her, indulge her, love her more than all the world!" -124. May, Monday 4. 1874. In which heavy, heavy hangs over me! I go up on to the Monday slopes slowly and not steadily - I can't get into it at all at once to ponder over in any [heart] the things that R.G. said to me last Thursday - and I take fire and it smoulders but is not quenched - I guess I shall stand it - I've been through an extended process of standing it - Other people have got out of Castleton alive - and perhaps I will. The girls prayer meeting was well attended and the influence was holy. A man was a shelter from the storm - a hiding place from the tempest - as rivers of water in a dry place - as the shadow of a great Rock in a [weary] land125 May, Tuesday 5. 1874 In which I have the cramp Judge Cook tells about in meeting! - It must be that it is not intended or adapted to build one up - but to make one bend over - There is nothing alleviating in this ! - It's cold getting up every morning since the fire went out in the morning light- That's another thing I stand though another insists that that is the cause of aforesaid cramp - Aggie writes ... of orders about making that newly arrived spring dress and Aunt Mary announces Grandmother's satisfaction and delight - School is more beingnant - I feel more like being glad and waiting for the little [behind] ones -126 May, Wednesday 6. 1874. In which I am expected to go in Miss [Underwood's] society! I am taking giant strides in this world - Who would have given me credit for such a spirit of progress? - My next upward move will take me to Mrs. Adams to tea - Already she may be making wings to put on me when I leave my low chrysalis state! The visit at Miss U's was ... of tongues and things! Other events are [over] likewise - The arrival of the class rings - the letter from Dr. French - My thoughts are sent [Fair Havenward] and rest on my possible performances. How interesting we are to ourselves! - 127. May, Thursday 7. 1874 In which Mrs. Briggs hears something! - George Eliot does not know Mrs. Briggs - What a treat she would be to her! - I in my more limited way enjoy what my slender capacities allow me to appreciate - Mrs. Briggs is the medium of communication between the corporation and me! The latest bulletin is exciting - Mrs. B.[Briggs] has just returned from the 99 cent store where she bought Mr. B. [Briggs] a pair of pants, a coat and a vest - Poor little man - Did she make him try them on in the store? Did she let him tell which he liked the best? It's cold to-night and not the least bit consoling! I've been sort of patient and comfortable through a worrisome day - Shall have a little [credit] - yes - [her] shall!128 May, Friday 8. 1874 In which it becomes necessary for me to see not Doctor of Divinity Cole but Doctor of Medicine Cole - I do it in my usual tremulous manner for things are at stake. Things seem to look like not not having any [house] - so I take refuge in a flaming cole - a shining light - I am some comforted but none too much - There's something pleasant in the day - but that is none too much - I think and think what we will all do - and how we will get along - but it comes out that I canna tell - In the meantime I write to Michigan and ask Pres. A... a big question And so the days go - 129 May, Saturday 9. 1874 In which a warm rain makes the grass look green - To stand in the door and feel a warm breath is very new - We place a faith in May - I find my discipline takes a new form - it's one of the times when work is a discipline! I sit still and hold ... hand all day - I take great comfort in seeing ... taking the joy and pleasantness when I can't possibly go - Dan writes home for shoes and pants - Mother has sick headache and threre's dishes to be washed and bread to be baked - but I put in and help - and send mother back to bed - the kitchen is an ... element but I can't sample bread - not good bread so I let that alone and by and by mother is better130 May, Sunday 10. 1874. In which a breeze has swept the ocean. There are tidings from afar - and Dr. [Lyndley] brings the gospel message - It is a day of days to us who care - Every line from missionary lands is pleasant to me - A man who has preached Christ and Him crucified for thiry years among the naked savages of East Africa - can say things that I want to hear - and I came home feeling better than I have for weeks - There is a preciousness in the thought of hearing all and following Christ and I glory in the [loss] and count it all gain - but it is not for me - is it?131 May, Monday 11. 1874. In which melancholy days have come - This does not smack of weather. It might be imagined that I write nothing else but for once I chronicle a [dread] which weather has not founded. It is with [form] in or by examination honored by the also sounding title of "preliminary". The girls gather in a manner tremulous - and they tell me they are scared. I vibrate cautiously with sable-draped banners - between questions to write and paper to read - And so on - and so on 132 May, Tuesday 12. 1874 In which we live in the prolongation - so we do not of hopes and blisses but of the preliminary - Life all seems to drive today at one point and [untie ] itself in one joy or dread or hope and yet how little all this will be to us some day - How much of our building O let us ask will live? Let me build strong and ... and make it not with hands - The years are telling us not seldom "How vain is all architecture save that which is not made with hands! I moralize ... but I musnt - Let me stop now and turn and think133. May Wednesday 13. 1874134 May. Thursday 14. 1874136 May, Saturday 16. 1874 In which I am a victim of circumstances - There is a table in the sitting room and a chair by it where I sit - I do not [give] myself away - My expectations look forward to so such consummation. All there was left of six hundred has been engulfed in one dismal morass - examination papers - I have now piled them away for the last time and look at them not lovingly - In the mean time ills have settled in my side and it moans piteously - Some folks are ... it rains - but my work has no weather in consideration - 137 May, Sunday 17. 1874 In which serene is the sight in "the soft May weather" - My heart rests and sings - It has nothing else to do to-day - Every moment is precious and I say at [home] with H. ... O moment over too soon - and morning left behind"! - The pale grey hours descend and in the stillness I am left with God - In every stillness there it is - and he is nigh even at my very [doors] - The dreamy deliciousness of this whole day tells me that coming down out of it into tomorrow and next day and next day will be hard - but will make with thee the tabernacles Lord and remember the day the hour after them are our ... -138 May, Monday 18. 1874 In which one girl gets tired - Not a little bit my friend but too tired to think or be good - But as old Mrs. Spencer says - "Its a good deal to ask anybody to be good all the time!" - The last of the examination on its last faint echoes dries - and I am not too tired to be pretty glad - I think of Thursday night with an inconcieveable dread - and wish I was on the other side of it - Seeing R.G. in the office does not [conduce] to my exhilaration - It never does - Besides it rains and night throws a mist over the early departing day - neither can mother make a fire - 139 May, Tuesday 19. 1874 In which the things that make me tired are not less - A lodge in a vast wilderness has had a pleasant sound of late - If I go nobody will hear of me again very soon - I am a living martyr to the present ideas of popular education - and I scold to myself about it - which martyrs never do - What kind of essays do others thus victinmized write at this time and condition of nerve and [cerebrum]? - You can find plenty of [sick] in any editor's waste basket - There is nothing comforting in this thought - [No] bulletin has been recieved from Mrs. Biggs to-day - We must get our milk there -140 May, Wednesday 20. 1874 In which we meet in our annual capacity! - Very? After daily impressing upon those who bear the normal name the magnitude of the form granted - the G. of P. says go we may, not only - but go we must! We haste, haste, haste - The introduction to Fair Haven [census], toils and sufferings is marked with the most soothing of rain-storms - I land satchel in hand at the Town Hall, our banquet hall deserted - I find there Mr. S. [Thomsen] and a few waifs - He approaches me - Would I like a place? I musnt - of course I don't know where the place is or who the folks are - but that doesn't make any difference. He afterwards irons my ruffles by telling me when he found out my [station] that he might have known I had a place in the hearts of my pupils.141 May, Thursday 21. 1874 In which I am scarcely less than the hero of Chippewa and the Thames. My courage has risen to a tremendous height. I am so supremely desperate that I shall be carried through the day with confidence scarcely less than H.L.D. Potter : - It is a source of great joy to me - It makes one appear so [flat] to get up half scared to-death - but not I - I am to-day incapable of being scared - Dr. French told me to stand behind the big desk and ... myself on tiptoe and say to the people - "It is I - be not afraid!" For a graphic account of the day's doing I refer the gentle reader to the R.G. which does not mean Williams! But you won't ... know how good Winnie and her mother are to me! 142. May, Friday 22. 1874 In which we all stay - My thoughts seem to hold themselves to two points - R.S.'s (not Rutland Globe) lecture - and Mrs. Kilborn! - The "Relation of the school to the state" is an intensely interesting subject! - in a dreary hall on a rainy night! in the place of President [Buckham] - Aint you glad you came - The after part is worthy of history - It will admit of being told in [Goth] - The nomination by the honorable committee with extenuating circumstances - shall I ever forget it? Poor Mrs. Kilborn, how little mortals know! The midnight walk home to Emma's was and is not - "The clouds unexhausted still combine" 143 May, Saturday 23. 1874 In which we make our best bow and and arrive at home. O, happy fate - Shall I forget to speak of the gallantry of Prof.[Gilby] - and the invite to spend summer with him? That would be heartless! Mrs. Kile congratulates me on going to Michigan and sends me on my way with "success to you" - Prof [Gerby] ... his not - and the Dr. says, "Good bye Frankie" - I am home soon on mother's bed - and I'd rather be there than anywhere I can think of - One serious trouble what shall I do with my ten dollars? 144 May, Sunday 24, 1874 In which a "rest ever begineth" - I feel like just resting today and I do - It has been a hard week - and I have climbed up to look back on it - The Sabbath ministers unto me of the good - the precious gift of God and to make giant strugglings toward the light - My thoughts of heaven are [alloyed] with thoughts of work and dreams that centre not near the ... I never needed more a tidal mass to sweep over my religious life and carry me in its strong arms out of myself - Will not God grant it soon or shall I live this way? 145 May, Monday 25. 1874 In which there's another chance to take school up bravely - I think these days and ... - a few of my thoughts are those that do lie too deep for tears! - Some of the coming pain has just touched me - a pain that is of the present does more than that. It is the hour when I wish that I had been more patient with the girls - that I had clung with both hands to Jesus knowing so well - my easily besetting him - How many times I have tried to bring a [pact] and welled upward in resolves that have vanished like the billows that bore them and left for God no gentler story - "Life 146 May, Tuesday 26. 1874 In which I am again in the crucible - I've been set down in the old 1872 days - with girls to fix over and see what's the matter about - and what not - This new performance makes me [stare] and [move] - Its strange for Queen to have a [kink] - and Ella March - However its not as bad as it was and it will pass away - I go to bed but I cannot sleep - I think and think - Life teaches me at so many many points - and who is sufficient for these things ? Is God's strength made perfect in weakness in my case? but do I pray? 147 May, Tuesday 26. 1874. In which questions are at issue - There's a great many things to ask and its about dresses and what kinds and I refrain from the rest - These are questions of flesh and [sense] - The question back of these never asked but always there is "Shall I pass?" but the work never slackens - nor the hopes fail - My need fails me and performs - Every little nerve sends up its feeble protest - but there is no help - I must work Fannie and if she runs over and vents out cross things - how shall we punnish her - Ah! The punnishment is swift and sure - There are ... of pain - unknown and known148 May, Thursday 28. 1874 In which my banners are sable-draped - This is not an unusual case of late - Mother's banners don't trail in the dust like mine - but they do not wave - She does not [lend] them to the breeze - for she is ... and Cole - thou art the man - He is for her the pestilence that walketh at noonday - We are not made happy in the consciousness that we are to depart not knowing whither we go - Yet there'll be a place - How sure I feel about it - the ringing of the bell in the [Congo] Church - I have too many irons in the fire looking toward Balston & the like - Well -149 May, Friday 29. 1874 In which I am speeded on my way - and have unexpected good fortune. My getting to the train after teaching until one was a desperate undertaking. The train and I have in sight at one and the same instant - ! I am off - out of the [crimson] into the blue! How can I tell about it! - I rush on through ... land, gorgeous land - and as the cars stream into Troy the first face is Aggie's - What grand - good fortune! Then we look around and buy a great deal - We feel pretty good about it - and catch a glimpse of [Ad] in the drug-store - Poor lonesome boy! Every thing favors us - We ride on lofty chariots of triumph and creep into bed late - 150 May, Saturday 30. 1874 In which the past and present meet joyfully!151 May, Sunday 31. 1874 In which I hear a sermon by "Dr. Smith"-152 June, Monday 1. 1874 In which I stream again into Carlton - I don't forget that it is the first day of June - neither that I ought to be glad - Will a June ever come in which the life that is in and about me will not be transformed into one Red Sea of work and hurry throughout the "then if ever perfect days"! I take up the little threads and spin on - Neither do I forget that I ought be sorry - The little threads are almost woven - I can see the end - Slowly - slowly vanishing is it all - the hands that [gave] are slowly - slowly taking away - yet is not life still full of grand opportunities! -153 June, Tuesday 2. 1874 In which I find plenty to do - You may have heard something of the kind before - I hope you haven't heard all there is to it! - This weather is the weather of which Lowell [writes] - The days are fresh as the first [rain] glittering on the [soil] - the ... are there in which ... comes into the garden! - There's work to do and some of it is hard unappreciated work - Life is full of grammar and arithmetic - and essays - but the blue is somewhere! The tender blue waites far off for the ..., asking ...!154 June, Wednesday 3. 1874 In which mother and I think we have made up our minds - and we wait results - It is a source of gratification to first person singular to get as far as this - We have looked at houses, and taken them through preliminary examinations, and caused their owners to rejoice at our departure until it seems quite time for us to conclude - The end now seems to be that we shall not spend vacation in Castelton - Since I sent the letter we feel more easy - The next problem in the book has to do with Dan. Will he begin - or will he be loth : Questions to be answered to-day tomorrow or shall be beyond these - We leave daily the things that are behind and daily press on to the things before 155 June, Thursday 4. 1874. In which we hear not about Pres. Edwards or Finney but of a grand old Baptist named [Miller]! Let me tell first about my Webster's Unabridged! - I embrace it - I hold it in my lap - and wonder and wonder how it is that people live without Unabridges! - It puzzles me that I have lived so long! The prayer meeting is made up of several seats full of ... females and three or four or less divinely appointed males whose mission is to minister in spiritual things to these several seats full of females. Their ... congregationalism hath [sealed] - I muse on my way home156 Friday 5. 1874 In which I cut away and think. I [don't] cut'n me that would be well but - I don't do it - I cut for immortality - for scrap books - The rest of the day was complete in itself out of doors - There were things laid up in it of which [heart] hath not conceived - but the [weary] part of it was up to school where the girls didn't know why should it make me nervous lately - Is it the weary protest of the poor, little nerves? - Greek remains untouched - and it reproaches me from every part of the sitting room 157 June, Saturday 6. 1874 In which my desires lie in direction of a ride and not in the direction of Botany questions - But I do not take the ride and I do take the Botany questions - I can't set myself to work - I have to drag the child to it and pin her with a star - She has things in her mind. She is restless & she runs. We have ... - a great many and I try one - Addie [Taft] comes and her coming has had an uncomforting effect - A. J. McG. has come and carried Jennie off and mother has lost her dear little Hamburg chicken - A joy forever is a joy nevermore158 June, Sunday 7. 1874 In which I feel no Sabbath [touches] except the rest of it - My spirit is O-so willing - but I am on my tired, tired month - and I am so far from God I can scarcely know how to find my way back - I think in my cry for rest I too often forget the cry for pardon and strength for the daily burdens - I in all the mistakes of the year as they come to me know - the one great lack has been forgetting to nurture wholly on Christ and let him lead - I look mournfully over my mistakes - I do so want to stand as the index of what a true teacher can become159. June, Monday 8. 1874 In which the days go on, go on - to-day has in it a tenderness which is very grateful to me - a good and perfect gift for a dear letter is before me from my Sadie of old - It kept me awake far into the cool and blessed summer night - I begin to feel how near, how very near we are to the "never wandering back" - The [leaf] will soon turn and all of us shall wander "out of the quiet way." The sadness is inevitable and it will grow more and more as the paths come to the one place where they must change - O days most sad and sweet! -160 June, Tuesday 9. 1874 In which Dan has a silent side - Very - Mother says "Why [don't] that boy write?" I give it up - That boy is an intricate problem - School is pleasant to me - [It's] one of the days when I resolve always to teach - Aggie sounds in our ears that a house has been hired and now mother can sleep - Jennie is wrapped in a cloud of blue tarlatane - A cloud of witnesses around- Hold me in full ... on the essay question - Another sound for a change would refresh me161 June, Wednesday 10. 1874. In which another chick's dead - Mother's bulletin from the hen-house grows more and more dubious - Our chickens die in childhood - They are as the morning cloud and early dew! Their flesh is grass - Coming home from school I find my good mother in a tempest - Dan has written a letter and she can't read it! Her experience in missing children has been that the more you send them to school the worse they write! - I don't feel my best today. It seems kind of hard lately not to have any difference in days - but I have the same old [round] when I feel pretty well and when I feel pretty bad - But to complain is weakness -162 June. Thursday 11. 1874. In which I think over something mostly. It relates to a letter which I wrote and the manner of its reception & what somebody'll think puzzles and worries me - [It's] cold - we've had another jump from heights of melting to ice-stratas! - O have the all gone feeling in me - not in the pit! - but most everywhere else - I have a nice visit with Jennie - They grow nicer and nicer as the time gets so near - The little links ... will never write again hurt me - in the thought of it - "And the years glide by" 163. June, Friday 12. 1874. In which herbariums fail me - This the direction toward which things have looked today but I feel too good inside to be cross about it - Sometimes I have been a trifle vexed - but what friends would have vexed me [tonight] I'm glad I am just as I am - mostly - I feel so up - when I am up and so down when I'm down - and [its] nice to enjoy with all your might when you do enjoy - even if your sorrow is great in proportion - I feel glad to see the rest coming to know there'll be ... days - It seems to me that some day when I read this I'll want to laugh at the way Ella and I heard the concert -164 June, Saturday 13. 1874 In which it is what do you think of that, my cat? - and what do you think of that, my dog? - I sit still and [cut] mostly, and when the train comes I go over and get a letter from Ad. It doesn't stop my wanderings - and my heart fails me - still never mind - Of life this is so small a part! - Those herbariums are to be a means of grace for they discipline me by never coming - The pile of Christian [Unions] I can ... grows less - although I've set every vertebrae a quivering Mother announces the birth of a thriving family of chicks - which calls for a still further "cook" - 165. June, -Sunday 14.- 1874. In which "pa comes." Where upon there's one glad girl! Very! - I know of another and her pa don't come - A Sunday has come and no one can take its joy and blessedness from her - and she's glad! - With, from, in and by today have been the [Hyers] Sisters! - And I listened. [Its] good to listen to them and Rock of Ages is sung which is far more [exceeding] Mr. ... is a howling wilderness - some. At the close in his peculiar rises and falls he gave utterance to those memorable words -"Whose voices are tuned in unison with the angels ... will now proceed to take up a collection" - Pa Stone hasn't heard them enough - They haven't done it enough for that worthy sire - He entreats - One little song more!166. June, Monday 15. 1874. In which Mrs. Rice is heard from. This is chiefly of interest from [an] account of May's death, and the message of Ad's - I love to read of a triumphant death - It seems so much easier to think of walking through the dark valley - by and by - I feel glad I wrote to Ad since this came. When I find myself [destitute] of something to worry about I can stew because the herbariums don't come - There are still papers upon papers to cut and my interest in the business languishes! What sense would there be in an existence to ...167 June, Tuesday 16. 1874. In which Mr. Cole spends his life and exhausts me in measuring! - He has measured every available inch of exposed surface in this our habitation - he has measured the well - he has measured the hens - he has measured the clothesline, and more - he has measured mother and I. It may seem to slight observers a condescension on his part thus to favor us - but we groan under it - There is news - Herbariums arrive - This calls upon me to exert my latent power in another direction - I ... the job. There' a good deal of stuff in me that rather rejoices in being thus officially engaged coming home to find a dearth of it and [lamp wicks] & the [stoves] shut up sure: - 168 June, Wednesday 17. 1874. X My mark. In which I am not a person of sedentary habits - I am about and wheel about and do just so - My pursuits are chiefly examinational - My thoughts are in the green fields - in shady restful places - where the tender blue waits - A prolonged silence between myself and friends ensues - and I am powerless to bridge the silence - Home bulletin announces a hen sick - Her gyrations are painful - she takes this ... pretty hard and Dan is not here to lance her eyes - We might send for him - a thought just suggested to my mind! -169 June, Thursday 18. 1874 In which the little reminders come to us - We are in the work that comes with the last tender looks - and we feel the tappings as they gently, gently call - We know we are doing our last work together - as we lay the little flowers in and talk - I get to the meeting in time - and move about in a manner totally distressing - Mr. Stone says considerable - mostly in the direction of ... meetings - not that we tend in that direction! A thousand pardons - A new thing for this staid and venerable wielder of chalk and discipline to be interested in a line from a boy - The girl runs away with [one]! -170. June, Friday 19. 1874. In which the morning commences as only the graduates are presented to Mrs. [Lady] of P - and kept in custody - but no deaths have ensued - We hope for the best - I keep hold of the little ways and doings for [its] awful hard to see things stop - There's so little I can do for them now - my cross is the old and heavy one - that I had only loved them more and been always tender! - Ella and I take a ride off by the marble mill and the pretty dam - It makes my head feel better - Ella is a precious little gem -171. June, Saturday 20. 1874 In which it is all tender and sadly sweet. These last days I mean - and these last duties - All day long the girls drop in and I help them with this or that with a patience that knows full well that I am doing my last offices for them - We beging to know that we are going forth from summer days - never to wander back. Jennie keeps saying - "Where am I going" - and I answer back as of old - "Going to Crofts" - She can't help showing how glad she is - Pretty soon it won't be mother and I - it will be mother and Aggie - This too [grates] -172. June, Sunday 21. 1874. In which I walk home from church with "pa Stone". It was cheerful and I beamed brightly - Conversation dwelt on the Baccalaurate - suggested by Mr. [Moulton's] apt query - "Do you think it will last all day"? Nothing of the kind occurred to my friend [Woodruff] - or the Hadley's who ... their applause - So it has come about that Pa Stone and I meet on the broad platform of peace and good will - We had our last Sunday meeting in the east room - We could all say - "Yet a little while and ye shall see me no more"- but we could pray - and our hearts know that in the day when we all meet again our sorrow shall be turned into joy. 173. June, Monday 22. 1874. In which the righteous Judge comes - The motto on the blackboard is suggestive - "Let them pass" Dr. says knowingly - "I will if they know the pass-word" - The day begins and ends in a hot - and we all stew - There's scarcely any breeze in Normal hall except metaphorical ones - Dr. sort of makes the leaves stir when he sees the programme for commencement week - The girls go home worrying but the night comes on in a glory beyond words - Jennie and I go out for a walk - and we feel how nice it is - and how many nice ones we have taken together - and scarcely dare speak of it - that it is the last - 174. June, Tuesday 23. 1874 In which we see the star of promise - It is not an enviable peace - ours - The strain on us makes us feel victimized - and somehow we get ourselves up to such a pitch - that we wait almost breathlessly for the verdict - I could scarcely feel less so if I were court-martialed. In that dreadful room "below" the roof is lifted with the announcement "All have passed" Dr. has a word of cheer for me as he takes my hand to say good-bye - At Colonel Parker's it was almost Mrs. Cope's - [It] will ever be a South Side to me - and it comes like a breath of quiet joy - a restful comfort from a sunny home. How many a peep into the windows I have had in my walks175. June, Wednesday 24. 1874 In which all Normal does does not hurry. It seems so good - so new - to the girls to have this day of days - without a ... or a book - or that dreadful Mip B___, with her - "I want to call your attention to this particularly" - Ah - young ladies - attention is outgrown : What do I do: I have some of the time that odd idea - of not knowing just what to do - but a few dilapidated essays to repair - and flowers to solicit - remind me that it is not vacation - I do not pay my respects to either the G of P - or L of P - I am found at my old stand - making bouguets - I'm sorry Mip Allard came tonight - I'm sorry our talk was just as it was - sorry too we were all so hurried and nervous - sorry - a ... deal 176. June. Thursday 25. 1874 In which we step buoyantly upon the scales - Unto us has been granted a benevolent day - Benevolent and beaming - for the same idea in poetry see Rutland Globe or Herald - This way for the qui vive! - Which just expresses where I went to - Nothing of the day was so disastrous to all feelings of [moderation] so melancholy without Mr. Williams attempt at rhythm - I loved to gaze with Stella Eaton "into a crystal fountain whose depths she could not fathom-" and with Mary upon the young maiden "whose swelling bosom heaved convulsively" - but the manufactured verses [affected] me beyond all these - The farewells come flatly with the echoing enemies of Strauss and Mendelsohn - 177. June, Friday 26. 1874 In which we learn what it is to break up - This is best impressed on my youthful mind by a process of experience - I never passed through anything just like this. Our L... and P... wander about dolefully - Our house is chaos - all the little sacred nooks and cozy places smile sadly - life is one wintry waste - in dire commotion all! As the rooms are made empty one by one - the little lights that beamed in them go out and stories repeat themselves. "We live in feelings not in figures on a dial" - I shall always see the images with "Jennie" and "Pa" going out of sight - The girls come in one by one to say "good-bye" - I walk down part way with Ella & Q... - At last our train comes and mother and I are gone! 178 June, Saturday 27. 1874 In which there is little to augment our felicity. We are kindred indeed which is significant of dislocation in more points of view than one. There is very little to awaken romance or even complacency in a deserted house - It would melt one to see me sitting around on trunks - [chewing cocoa-nut] - Especially if he or she stood near the window or door - as they gazed - I from their thoughts would turn to that maiden whose swelling bosom heaved convulsively - Mine did and her hair cleaved tightly for it was hot. Mine did - Albany is not shaken at my approach - I come not with the roll of the stirring drum - not even a horn - Aunt Mary isn't glad to see me any more - 179 June, Sunday 28. 1874 In which my eyes are lifted up to the hills - There's been more thinking of the hills and of that to which the kings of the earth do bring their honor and their glory - Since I have come to myself - and I meet readily with dear Dr. Bridgeman to venture wholly - How grand it seems to be coming away thinking about it - to "do justly, love mercy and walk humbly with my God" - I could see Grandma a minute only a little minute - and then I came up home - I saw a great 180. June, Monday 29. 1874 In which our mode of life is primitive - suggestive of a "bed on the floor, a bit of rosin, a fire to thaw our thumbs" but not poor fellow - The paws we hold up have not been frozen - Mine do good service at washing windows - I also sweep some - I contemplate my work as the gods eat ambrosia - in a fit of divine abstraction - I aint much like Aunt [ ] in my house keeping - poor ... - my greatest accomplishment consists in being able to be here washing windows and sweeping and being of [somewhere] else at the same time - in figuring and thinking at opposite ends -181. June, Tuesday 31. 1874 In which we all work with a will - What our hands find to do is not commensurable - for Mr. John Davis - our new and much esteemed friend appears early to announce the arrival - appearing not duly - but at a period much earlier than duly - It took a great many of us - and we evidently have splashed in a [pond] for there is no small stir among the brethern - It is a dubious point - the piano question - There's no Lucretia to help - or Glory Inc ... - our only resource from a woman's stand-point ... [sick] of Love - There are some points not clear, some with this invaluable aid - but there are capable ... 182. July, Wednesday 1. 1874. In which chaos is no worse - One only needs to move to be reminded of the Creation - but there is not a good time to sit down and think about it - or reason under Mother's ... does not exhaust itself -183. July, - Thursday 2. - 1874. In which the boy comes home to stay.184. July, Friday 3. 1874. In which I get my books out - 185. July, Saturday 4, 1874. In which I "don't do it enough".186. July, Sunday 5. 1874. In which there is rest - An eleven o'clock breakfast gives us a realizing sense that church cannot be reached - neither is it - I lay by all day like an unsharpened saw and keep quiet - So do they all - We have no resemblance to saws in other respects - The unwritten and unspoken sermons hold in themselves a tenderness and a strength and a purifying the unuttered hymns are full of melody and my heart goes with the melody - into the house of song - the voice is "still and small"-187. July, Monday 6. 1874. In which existence is simply a delight - I feel almost as if our cottage stood in Newport - We feel so rich in it - up there on the hill it's nice - That doesn't tell it all - but how can I tell it! Isn't it a good thing to say that I am content? Dannie goes to the office and makes a bargain - This is the first step toward being the man he dreams he will become - It is an ... in all out lives - We see now for sure that we have no more little Dannie - The last holiday for the lad of ours we celebrate by strawberries and ice cream - Then we go to bed merrily - 188. July, Tuesday 7. 1874. In which the effects of last night's indulgence are apparent - But there is a sequel - Life's realities in the shape of cholera workers come upon the boy - The girls get up in the morning [devoid]... of sense and sensation - The [mother] laments the folly of ice cream and strawberries - However the trip to Albany is taken and the sun is merciless - I stay home and keep house and take care of the boy - The Albany folks return in due season bringing treasures which they spread out before us - One falls to me - Ad's picture -189. July, Wednesday 8. 1874 In which family news is of a mournful nature - It began last night and Aggie was a pretty sick little girl - but Annie following sent the night air with her groans - Dan having had his out the night before, slept on - Shadowy forms in long night robes glided through the halls and feel... down the stairs - A day of rest followed - At my pretty window, I reveled in the pictures, and sang on softly to myself - The boy comes home delighted with his place and we are all more glad than we can ... 190. July, Thursday 9. 1874 In which I hear from Harry Jones. Death is making its ravages and dear Mips Jones is gone. I recall with a feeling of reverence the beautiful way in which I was treated by her in my little visit to to Brockport seven years ago. I am ever so sorry that I did not get the money to her before she died - but I'll send it to Harry. My Geometry vexes me altogether - I thought I knew more about it - It doesn't take much learning to find out how little mortals know - Alas! My friends - Mrs. [Land] and daughters are [announced] - (Which has no connection with the "Alas - My friends")191. July, Friday 10. 1874 In which [it's] mostly thunder and lightening - The heavens conspired the first day in this house to salute us at aour coming - Then they saluted the arrival of Dan - next our getting ... sights - It must be the fearful rollings today are in honor of the curtains and cornices! We have scarce any peace for the fear of it - Halibut for dinner and a good deal of good cheer all through to-day - but no bulletins from the outside world. How little consolation there is in the fact that ten years ago I studied [Davis ...] - Books vii, viii, and ix . Tri-rectangular and spherical excesses ... upon me in childhood! 192. July, Saturday 11. 1874. In which I am set to wondering - "My weekly donation and inscription is forthcoming - It does daily - Anything whatever on the subject of rain, must be weekly - since genius has exhausted itself on this trite theme - Ma ... proclaims that we've had sixteen rain storms this month. This is no doubt [incidental from reading the cataract!] The comb is made responsible Mother and a man have it - this time [it's] springs-Tucker's patent please Judge Bromley is a band of hope - He writes of a fulfillment of Scripture - for an ass may fall into a pit - Some people might take hopes on this - but I've [sounded corporations - Twere rain to sound -193. July, Sunday 12. 1874 In which there are experiences - Lately it stirs me even in the deeps and darks to smile to Live - There are thoughts that have swept over me to today - and it seems as if I have been making up to them - I think my life will be surer and safer after this - It does me good to be busy with my living once in a while - There was a quiet steady rain to-day and the day wouldn't have seemed half so nice without it - My need and ache do not seem so far from the help and answer - 194. July, Monday 13. 1874. In which my doings are kept to myself. I am not commensurable. It may or may not follow that I will not have my ... intercepted. I am not fond of ... revelations - It may be as well to develop in this connection that Mrs. [Eggleston] is paid - and I haven't told our folks - I look out of my window and think of [Broadfields]. I am full of the summer pleasantness and a beautiful restful content - I have a feeling as if I had just been ... and what it is like - but opening tired eyes and seeing the "lace prepared" - for the first time: -195. July, Tuesday 14. 1874. In which there is a weariness in the land - Not so much in the land as in my looking at it with fleshly ailments - for I've caught cold. The process is entirely unknown to me - What I do know is that it doesn't take very smart people to catch them - nor to use them - so I can take no credit whatever to myself and mother as I unfold symptom after symptom - Takes it [moderately] and suggests everything - I study on and its a joy that is constant - and [unintermitting] - If I could only get ... into ... to stay by some process - I'd abide it to study with a cold -196. July, Wednesday 15. 1874. In which I'm in a long pause. How long have you been there - Is the cause self-evident - Does it have to do with a corporation? It seems to come to me in the way of a thought to ask - "Am I to sit in the middle of a pause - and wait for something to be done to that [C.N.S.] - for a period of time reaching out indefinitely into space - "How many uncomforting things I can think of about the whole thing - It makes me half hearted - Aggie spends her time examining lightening rods - and reading from the reports of Old Probabilities . [Fear] seizes upon her - for folks get stuck here -197. July, Thursday 16. 1874. In which there's a walk to take and me to take it - What of Harry Jones: He is shining clean and bright - Very far in the case I am unable to go - My facilities have not been the most condusive to extensive explorations of said Harry - and it was seven years ago - but Harry ... There's a place to walk here - a dear little slope to [rest] you - and lots of sweet clover - You can look at the spires - our ... Troy and all around - and when you're tired of spires you can look at the water - Then you can come home over the grass and think of ... - and the big trees near the bank - 198. July, Friday 17. 1874. In which I'm in the middle of the pasture. Having caught my cold and plunged ... in a fathomless abyss - I comfort myself - Such a sieze as I had with neuralgia - and the curing of it - Mrs. ... Mustard near the pit is an unfailing source of remedy - a healing art I don't put my head over any ... to-day or make any efforts to get out of things - I just sit in the lot - and wait - It's difficult to extract much patience from this girl I am telling you about - No appearance of mother's ... - Nothing heard - We're done ... enough - for something to come of them199. July, Saturday 18. 1874. In which Dan serves in a new capacity - Mother has been hankering for fresh fish - but unknown to her - the boy has been having a hankering to go for fish - leading him to dig bait and buy tackle and ... like [depredations] - It having been remarked to the young apostate on buying his ... before us - that anybody could have more'n that for half the money - answers "Ye couldn't buy the fun" - What is good logic and abundant proofs of it are instant - One somehow feels involuntarily that [tomorrow] is Sunday and hence the quiet contentedness that come over even restlessness like mine 200. July Sunday 19. 1874. In which things conduce - How still the day sits - It does not move or turn but it just sits and shines - Its tenderness savors only the near heart-things and is ... a silent side something of the meanings of things lay for me in the dish water - in putting the dishes on the table or away - the [cupboard] ... - in the chatty meals when we were all [there]. Dannie's exhilaration is a key-note-... - another's headache is better - Dear little Annie McDonald - It makes me wonder to see all the ... she gets into her meagre wheel around life -201. July, Monday 20. 1874. In which opposite states are attained - The good cheer seems somehow to have all left us - Even Dan's is nomadic and my heart sinks down where it was that disolate summer of 7.2 - My courage rises as my heart tells me softly that I can learn it with Him who has put under me everlasting arms - and the comfort of whose peace shall not be rumored - I bless that to morrow and the next day and the next I can wait calmly and trustfully - There's little else to tell - One big shadow or joy so engulfs the [memories] - but Miss C... called and we all chatted - which is a proof that whatever else she may be [drowned] she is not - 202. July, Tuesday 21. 1874. In which courage predominates - The kind that works and will not stop - that dodges pain - and will not worry - I found life's straight [hard] lines musical - and they did not drag slow lengths along - Family dialogues have centered on mother's hat to be made over - and Aggie's dress-making - Family conflabs all of us versus Dan - on the ... him - Having stringbeans for dinner pertains to the flesh - but we have not put away earthly things. I've drank cocoa and [browned] Graham flour - and lately I've taken to hot water. I ... them all! The moonlight makes me wish that I could sit in a little parlor by the window - with a laugh -203. July, Wednesday 22. 1874. In which there is a promotion of things which make for ... and I - A nameless sort of a day which is lived silently and abounds in the intangible. It has taken to itself an ache and a pain in the coming and going thoughts but greater than these - something that grief coould not dim - The walk from [street] after mother's bonnet gave me glimpses of miles and miles of green. The sunset light was on the tree tops across the river - Annie says - almost sorrowfully no letter tonight - Content am I - I want no letters like those of Monday and Tuesday - I'm glad for once not to get letters. 204. July, Thursday 23. 1874. In which [its] mostly work - There's a splash in the home pond and mother's going to be carried off - This has to do with the work suggested above - Visiting has charms for one this summer - I find what my heart wants in the little home - I dare not think once of what is coming next - With the early fall - Even my thought when it parks itself in the little places at C - so full of mother - comes back to me lonely and sorry - Hitherto has peace for me and thoughts - Mother is adding new grace and order to the day - doing all the preparations to leave us so comfortable - telling me where I can find this and that and all - 205. July. Friday 24. 1874. In which I am again in the capacity of - There's the long nice morning to get ready in and Mother can sit and comb her hair and do the little last things - have a nice cup of tea & walk grandly and on dignity to the train - Very unlike in all respects my flights to trains - I am now in a condition to test all the charms of solitude. All the hermit there is in me - can wake up to the occassion - The hour has come - The first act was inglorious - caused by lack of my usual foresight - locking myself out - and finding my way in by the old process at ... of finding my way out -206 July, Saturday 25. 1874 In which there's a cause back of it - It partakes of the tragic to me and my mind dwells upon it - Not that any acting was required - but an advanced state of passivity - I [served] - for I did stand and wait - There wasn't much left of six hundred and my bed-times a trois heures moins un quail - The day light part of it tells of litle steps to be taken and little things to do and see too - and the studying in between - The picture is bright with the pretty dinning room - always cool - and the peeps through open doors - out upon the lawn - What else is there to tell - but how I ache and toss over that [Bucher] scandal207. July, Sunday 26. 1874. In which there's a loneliness somewhere - Things ain't to-day as they used to be - but we don't find it out at a very early hour in the morning - This helps a quarter of a day - My cares are intensified by a stone which knocks the breath out of a Dominick hen - and the dictator proclaims chicken for supper - a few little steps to take - and considerable surface to turn [red] over the combination of [coal] and sunshine! Said surface is increasing - I have "groan in wait" - All my powers combine in the getting together of the secound ... - I am glad to sit down by the open door a few minutes and read Tennyson's Princess! - 208. July, Monday 27. 1874. In which she looketh well to the ways of her house hold and eathet not the bread of idleness! - Thoughts that might have soared to heaven - and seem given to the adored in - "Stories in Verse" - have been centered to-day on ambrosia - not divine! - On even such a much less divine center as cooking a dinner for Dan - but my dear ... you who have cooked [dinners] more summers than I have cooked [salutations] - my brother Dan is a critic - It is the hour of my exhaltation - The feeling akin to that which fried the heart of the the Duke of Wellington or Mitiades is mine - Dan asks "Fannie where did you learn to cook? 209. July. Tuesday 28. 1874. In which word comes from our travelers - The good word - safe - I enjoy these lovely afternoons so - following them there in these old places - where I have been and thinking on to myself - how glad I am of the rest for them both - Glad these dreary afternoons in a silent house and these steps which must be - are mine and not their's. My courage to study is lessening - with no one to talk to - I am attaining great skill as cook - Have I not a famous family critic - to quote from - Annie's in a growing season - I wickedly wish it might be indefinitely postponed! 210. July, Wednesday 29. 1874. I which I do roam in conjecture forlorn - Annie sends me into dismal latitudes - Her details of her several states and spasms are scarcely less dismal than her gloomy silence. I have both - I find neither ... The post brings me a letter from Mrs. Clute - This produces the effect of setting one to work to plan - Sometime the [evil] that overshadowed me in Schnectady may be entirely ... - How those old prayers of mine sweep over me to-day - The prayers that are like ships come back laden with spices and perfumes - 211. July, Thursday 30. 1874. In which I am of use - There are two reasons: - A little black dog comes after our [hens] - and the boys come after our peas. The first sends me out on a [driving] pace after the dog and the last makes me a vigilance committee. I station myself at the window not conforming to my usual custom - I begin courageously in Ancient Geography - It looks formidable - and I grope on tearfully thro' Book X Davies Legendre! - After three in the little ... minutes of waiting I ... in Irving's "Sketch Book" - Nights I dream of mother but not of home -212 July, Friday 31. 1874 In which I know where the day goes to - I had a sort of a wish framed in my head that the day would go a little quicker - It didn't hurry - it took its time - I believe I never shall forget about the little walk all alone around David Johnston's - [Where] the desolate, sorry, yet very tender thoughts predictive of far away Michigan- and no little mother - how dreadful it makes me feel- It was such a relief to find Nifs ... at our house when I got back - to hear something from the outside world was grateful - and a laugh brings me up to the time when Mother and Aggie were here -213. Aug. // Saturday 1. 1874. In which August drips in. Greek and I are getting in very good terms now - We make it go a little - Smith's History of Greece is also possible of being realized - and reproduced in one - but Chemistry and Ancient Geography are a flood to stem! I don't jump around at my work and sing - I creep when I'm up - and I sit down pretty often - I don't call it sick yet but we'll see how we feel tomorrow - The moment [Dannie] leaves me nights - I worry and I worry until he comes in - It makes me feel better ... to tell you about it - If I could only look on - always - and see my brother safe there would be a rest in it a far better rest than I know.214. Aug. Sunday 2. 1874. In which our souls today are far away - But not the next line for we think not of Russian Boys - but wherever the little mother is . Every little tender Sunday place is missing her. All the little steps to be taken make me feel almost happy when I'm taking them for her. It's nice to have Dannie stay in all day - The worst thing was Annie's johnny-cake - That was flat and monotonus and its tendencies were in the direction of alkalis. None of us took it to heart but to stomach - therefore our piece of mind is reserved - I stake my reputation as cook - in calling in an auxiliary.215 Aug. Monday 3. 1874. In which I muse - I am prepared to announce to a world that solitude has no charms - I have sat in utter and complete silence so long that my heart bounds to ... - I am ready to be ...! These lonesome divisions of time take away from my work - all acquired courage - and of all my ambitions one is left me - To cook something - The achieved success of last week eliminated once - I am being taught to come down - chiefly by a stove - The ... improved!216. Aug, Tuesday 4. 1874. In which I tell a story. I do not love to tell the story. I'll have a boiled Indian pudding to-day - brilliant idea! How I got it into the first [bag] - the world must imagine my experience is that it [doesn't] stay in the first [bag] - It sets sail - and empties itself in the briny deep - With all my cares there's no other way but to make a new [bag] and fish it up - This .. in the middle of a letter to Harry Jones! I am being called to a new felicity - neuralgia - the kind that shoots the head! - No wonder Dan is ready to scold a little even with my boiled Indian pudding before him!217 Aug. Wednesday 5. 1874. In which Dannnie is good to me - I like him ever so much [today] and he shows me his best side in our quiet talk at [noon] - Almost every summer of mine has had in it some intense longing - which has been put into words only in the ear of God. And every summer he has heard. This time [it's] all for Dannie - the pain and the longing - God is God - To doubt is still disloyalty - To ... still is sin! My neuralgia is assuming painful proportions. It disconcerts me all ways - and sets with my spine as a center - I am found pitying myself218 Aug. Thursday 6. 1874. In which I try a new dish. This cooking business is growing interesting - It will be so long as there is anything new to cook - and as long as Dan is here to eat - Dan suggests a corn-starch pudding. Such a dish possesses so many mysteries that I set apart the morning to its honor - She did it - there was nothing left except to take in quantities of loss in the ... of a face ache - and the dreariness of talking to oneself - The monotony was not even broken by the black day ... our little chicken. Even the day stagnating - How much longer can I stand it?219. Aug. Friday 7. 1874. In which instead of the thorn comes up the fir-tree, I can't imagine an object more worthy of pity than the girl who made another corn-starch pudding to-day and then cleared up things and sat down to wait for four o'clock - She goes down to the depot with her face all tied up - thinking how sorry she'll feel going back alone - for that the little mother will come is too good [news] for her - She hardly dares to go to the door when the train comes - but somebody taps her on the shoulder and [it's] mother. Even the ... grants a willingness to join the .... Everything is radiant - and I ... the day and all things with ...220. Aug. Saturday 8. 1874 In which I come now to my part of the journey - the best part - that which is left after it is over - The rides over the old roads that I took with them and now I'm having the good word from the dear old friends - the little talks and the things that can be told. This is real August weather - The sun shines through the gathered mist that that hangs on the hills - Mother brought home some live-forever from the dear, old graves - I hardly know how to act- with a better than I at the helm. I just sit by and think of it - and my courage comes back -221. Aug. Sunday 9. 1846. In which it might have been kept glad and heartsome - That it hasn't been makes one toss and toss - But why do I chronicle my tossings as if they were good and pleasant things to keep - as if in God's world these things remain with the years - as if the aches and sorries did not perish and the bright and social things only live on!- God tells us so much about blotting out - I sat [upstairs] a good deal and fussed around - reading old journals and the quiet made me over - Then I wrote long and [drearily] to [Sophy] - After that it was good to go down and visit with mother - 222. Aug. Monday 10. 1874. In which I announce a poor spell - Mother lays it to the apple-pie - and there is too much inward commotion for me to recite any outside commotion by discussing so vexatious a problem. The weather is making up for lost time - There's nothing to do but be hot - a big cloud raises havoc in the heavens and threatens water spouts and what not - but [its] nothing but a little wind! I write the last French exercise in a lofty state of mind - [It's] good to come to the end - Everything at home has taken on the most uncomforting aspect - I do so want mother a little happy - and I think and think and plan and plan - but the night takes it all up - away from me -223. Aug. Tuesday 11. 1874. In which mother and I walk over to David John's I see my chapter heads at the last of the day - The story reads backward - and to liquid states - and unparralled summer heatings up. I have a faint recollection of laying off of getting that dismal geography into a slowly evaporating brain - When there's nothing else to have - I have a toothache - It occurs to me that I wrote to Frank [Sanford]. Mother feels better since our walk - It has been good for us that it was taken - Good that back of all my plans there is a God - 224. Aug. Wednesday 12 1874 In which [its] hot. I don't know any cure for it but to just sit and be it. To fan is laborious and unsatisfcatory - I take a walk to the magnificently distant depot and my errand is one single one - those springs - I do not get cool again all day and my brain is very much aroused! Alas not to study - That gets on by pulling and hauling - Think I'll write but I don't - The few minutes to be given to this luxury pass while I am deciding who shall be the honored parties - Mother is sick too - We [won't] either of us play any more - Box 1287 is having a vacation - nothing gets in it any more - 225. Aug, Thursday 13. 1874. In which I read sixty-seven lines of Greek! - These growing memoirs are receiving no small amount of variety - My astonishing revelations are not all weather and distempers. - Tomorrow I may be able to tell you that I have finished Book III - which must end Greek stories for the present - Don't take it cooly - the digging is yet fact - Mary Dodd blesses me. It came in a good time - I go up to learn all the tortures of thoroughly aroused teeth - and do it better for Mary's words - applying Mr. Beecher's lecture sermon lately read - It must be God is saying "Lie down there and have the tooth ache for me"- 226. Aug, Friday 14. 1874. In which I must fall back upon distempers. Does anybody know what ails me? I may live to know that somebody has found out - My symptoms are various - and study is almost a ...! My nerves are ceaseless in their protests - and night finds me miserable enough - the way I tell it Dan keeps up the family spirits - Ennobling task! We are a pecular family - We need extenuating circumstances. A circus is coming - it will be here tomorrow - this bodes stiller times - I can have the toothache in peace - My diary which was a shining light flickers! - 227. Aug. Saturday 15. 1874. In which I groan some. My maladies spread and my teeth perform - In the worst of my gyrations Dan comes home to supper - His trumpet sings of fame for he bears tickets to the Great Eastern - I wouldn't be wicked to go and see the animals - of course not besides my teeth can jump better to the sound of cornet, harp, flute, sackbut, pealtry, dulcimer, sherwin piano and all kinds of music - So I do my conscience up very small and sweep gracefully in - I stay and see all the animals - Dan is on the qui vive - Aggie and I are lost - lost enough - 228. Aug. Sunday 16. 1874. In which [its] time Sunday came - I love the Sundays - look, long, wait for them. Most of all when I'm with mother - I keep in my heart lovingly the memory of our Castleton Sundays - They'll be ever dearer when the little mother is gone - What made me think of this. It must have been because she is so pale and tired and so little with us to-day - I can find a shadow in my thought that I have one only one more Sunday at home. I think of [Jeannie] and Helen - when I am upstairs - and I write loving messages savoring of the old days - I can think of the things that have been more tenderly to-day than ever before for there is nothing left in Castleton to dread - I so to begin again.229. Aug. Monday 17. 1874. In which I make great efforts to be a hero - I try various ways on different occasions - My most desperate attemps to-day were made with two objects: - To study some and to sit up straight and still and have the toothache! I have a geat desire to see someone who has achieved heroism by this route! I'd like also to see if two of their teeth ached - Mips [Mouk] came up about dusk - and we chatter away - As a sure consequence my history of Greece is suffering. The little mother is better - Her face brightens and she is her own dear little self once again. Our every day hero - 230. Aug. Tuesday 18. 1874. In which mother takes another trip for [springs]. We take turns but no one has yet come home and brought the [springs] behind them - Not one - Not one - We await the result of this trip anxiously. Aggie is regularly installed to preside over the destinies of our household - I take myself and my tootheache up stairs and try to study myself away to everlasting bliss - I haven't heard that she did. I shall remind Pres. [Augell] of Maggie Ryan - My knowledge is not increased and my [much] study does not conduce. The evening at Mifs [Mouk's] was chatty and sort of nice. 231. Aug. Wednesday 19 1874. In which its what do I hear? After a wilderness come upon a goodly heritage - all of which applies to letters. Dan brings me five. Forgive my rashness - I open the pink envelope and read that I must be in C- at once - and "take charge of Normal School" - Forgive my credulity. I was to take the part once of Antie Credulous - long ago - I hasten down to order one or not and walk as the head of a Normal school would be expected to walk and I dream as girls dream. Forgive my weakness. Mother comes home [springing] and we have sweet potatoes for our supper. Our "awful appetites" - show that the receipt woman has been here. 232. Aug, Thursday 20. 1874. In which the last night comes - This day is full of hurries - There's Albany to go to - and I am swept gracefully toward that port of entry with a new hat - The piano is all my own - I carry the fact home as a serene triumph - and invest in berets without regard to cost - That I am to "take charge of the Normal School" sets snugly in my consciousness and I invest accordingly - There are skies that fall down - and ships are sometimes wrecked in tropical seas - but the ... comes down and thingslook as if I should go to-morrow - I get in bed beside mother and the night passes as if I should always stay thus near her233. Aug. Friday 21. 1874. In which its some people and other people. My visiting will probably be done up under short notice - The last dinner at home is cheery and I start off for the cars full of courage. Mary bears everything and sits down in the middle of it and we proceed to visit after the most apprroved manner. My Glens Falls experience was nothing after this sort. There was no fault with the plan but the carrying of it out is the part that dismays - I did not forsee that Helen M. Mason was in [P] - and there was no premonition - My tooth takes it the hardest - It performs most of the night.234. Aug. Saturday 22. 1874. In which I am fully interested as to the kind of charge I am to take to the Normal School. My reception at Castelton partakes of warmth and ... - I am waited upon by the noblest dignitaries of the town and I myself compare myself to a placid benignity in the hotel parlor. Developments are not tardy - I saw how by means of an intuitive perception, entirely mental, that taking charge doesn't mean taking charge at all - What I think of it will not now be recorded - My thinkings are prolific - and many books might not contain all I shall think before I get through. In the meantime observe my benign placidity235. Aug. Sunday 23. 1874. In which He strengthens my heart - I have dreaded this Sabath - for I know how it would be without the little mother - God has not let me miss Him too - The calm stillness of regeneration and the joy I never knew of old have a place in this, the Lord's day and I know and feel that my trust is not in princes - but in the living God - I am ready to take a place not of my own choosing - to be intimidated and humiliated if it of His appointment. Blessed be letters - the little pieces of me that can get to another straight and sure. 236. Aug. Monday 24. 1874. In which I write mostly. I go to the task of helping to fill up the Normal School with a vanishing courage - It is dismal even in a heroic state of mind to go at the work as I am called upon to do it - Lillie Clark comes along and takes me off to a ride - carries me into ... and poetry and dreams - for the day and the sky are tender - and the hills all smile - I do not come back as I went. I am so like a child almost giving into the deeps of a joy - and so not like a child - in my efforts to rise above the heights of a sorrow237. Aug. Tuesday 25. 1874. In which they send Mr. Sherman to talk to me. It is the old story - that is told and told to girls and women as the places they aspire to are struck from them and they learn at every bend that they contend with men - A college boy - because he is a boy - is preferred without experience or years - though she may have been far more worthy is passed by - Ah! dont I know how it feels! A man as Mr. Sherman tells me "will give the school more of a name " and so it is before me and I need not be told that already the letter is on its way that recommends Mr. Hyde to the principalship of the Normal School - and I who have loved it so and worked for it so long am out of ... - The whole of me says as I toss and turn - "I wil not stay" 238. Aug. Wednesday 26. 1874. In which I read God's answer - It is forthcoming and it fills me with a calm that is new and strange and [welcome] - The drawing away of the people in Castleton means - does it not that I shall realize my well-loved purpose and see Michigan. It certainly means something and I've prayed that He who knoweth the end of all things from the beginning would answer me in the matter and tell me surely what it means. I know this God has a thought and a purpose "even in the fate of one like me" Hotel life is lovely and I enjoy it - I like Mr and Mrs [Sanford] ever so much - Letters and school work keep me every minute busy-239. Aug. Thursday 27. 1874 In which something comes straight from home. Who knows better than my mother what girls want who are away from home - A sight of anything folded or handled by mother's fingers has a hallowed influence. I am better for it - Annie McDonald is for once very welcome - I visit Mrs. [Harkins] and talk the hours away - Mr. Sherman appears to talk business which he proceeds to do in ... accents. I am becoming a celebrated screamer - It came about by being placed in a deaf ... Very few people in this locality can hear - Stay way or expect to shout240. Aug. Friday 28. 1874. In which there is high tide and low tide. Most of my pleasures are ... a positive design - I find myself the joyful recipient of a letter or two stating the certain coming of a student or two on the same mail - I also find myself the ... before recipient of other letters stating the certain staying away of a student or two. Thus I rise and fall - I cannot attain a very high degree of delight in comtemplating Normal School prospect - but I may be called to do so in a brilliant manner yet - [Jonas Wilder] is a comet just visible in my heavens - and R.G. Williams is vanished from my horizon: - I have lived to see this day!241. Aug. Saturday 29. 1874. In which I do not lack for discipline. It much more abounds - It has surely come out that this is a dubious summer - It does not bring me the usual good fortune that hitherto has attended my steps. Not at all - My discipline comes so fast and takes every concievable shape - that I stand still and question - The gift of foresight would prove invaluable since the recent trip to Glens Falls and South [Wallingford]. I dont get to the ... road before I know that Eastern holds [Jennie] in its arms and not I - But [Jennie] has a mother and if anything could be almost as good as the girl herself it is the mother. My discipline is somewhat lightened by many sweet apples - 242. Aug. Sunday 30. 1874. In which it is a day in country places - What can I tell about it:- There was a face missing that it would have been good to see but what there was lacked only this. The mother put a joy into the day - and the sun shone over the large grassy places - and there was plenty of chicken and cream. I could wander away in thought and come back quickly or I could chatter and chatter. In my room at night I could pray for Dannie and it has seemed so sure that he should b preserved from evil for my faith grows stronger as I pray.243. Aug. MOnday 31. 1874. In which I flop. My hotel life has merged into this life of the man without a country. I'm he! I'm in the space between the hotel and the seminary - and tonight I take refuge with Mrs. [Hawking] - the day is characterized by a novel process of reaching the train - I sincerely hope this is not typical of my getting to the cars on the celestial Railroad - After we reach an exciting scene transpires acted by Addie Taft - Laura and I talk over the new arangements with zest - assisted by Laura's mother. Such scenes as these of late have a strange tendency to unsettle me who boasts of a perfectly level summer. 244. Sept. Tuesday 1. 1874. In which tendencies are domestic. I aspire to-day to make good sheets and pillow-cases - good reforming [I've] my share of it. I locate on the upper piazza and the day is mine - It is full of the thoughts that almost always come with stitches - The coming and the going thoughts - roll outward and inward and when its twelve o'clock I sit down at the table with mother and the children - Some of my thinkings are restless - but those that stay are calm and full of courage. I feel so sure that the best shall be for me - and for mine. It comes about that one more night is spent at the hotel - and more letters are written - - So endeth!248. Sept. Wednesday 2. 1874. In which I sleep on down - away up in the fields - a house that it was pleasant to go to my first spring so long ago - a house - keeping saved up its traces of Helen and later of Jennie - Some mothers come and each one leaves a poor homesick girl - I move on slowly with my room fixings. - Everything I have to wait for - and nothing is done when I inspect it so I lay in more patience than people under ordinary trials are apt to come into possession of - But the bright side is that Delia stitches my sheets and pillow cases and curtains - and Mrs. Parsons comes to my rescue with quilts and pillows. I have kept my word - Nothing to fix up my room has been taken from the little mother -246. Sept. Thursday 3. 1874. In which few come to her solemn feasts - normal portals swing open and we would be glad to welcome a swarming myriad - We do not swarm - proceedings find themselves in all points more melancholy than promising - but I am surprised to see we hope - I find a fierce straining to be content knowing that when we see not - then is the call to patiently wait for it. A few several ... backward take upon themselves Normal honors and I count them with a gathered courage - but my heart it seems can never find itself sinking for the source of my trouble is in another latitude - My thoughts rush on home - fact.247. Sept. Friday 4. 1874. In which I am at the height of all dreariness This announces that things do not work - Its getting to be pretty well understood at last by the present individual that things dont arrange themselves with any view to consulting me - and I must suit myself to ... as they incessantly decline to suit themselves to me - Do you draw from all this the influence that is in my mind - that I would have the Normal School use in a grand upward move and start with families by tens and dozens - How am I going to get up my spirit - I should grow gray in short notice if I should not find a way to get out of this - Come - arouse - the generations are calling - and you are not a hero248. Sept. September 5. 1874. In which I can do nothing to awaken my slumberring ambition - If I should enlarge upon this to any extent - I would like a few other people - back readers - even the one constant reader would forsake me - This is not a pleasing contemplation - anthing but this. Keep - I impore one faithful reader - It must follow then that to enter into the causes and discuss to any extent the state of things described above - is not to be thought of - My ambition is in its little bed - Life seems worth prolonging - even with ambition gone - The things that I am to live among assume a certain pleasantness and today have promised to hurry249. Sept. Sunday 6. 1874. In which there comes a growing comfort - The Sabbath brings something that is not of earth and it will not permit things to look the same - I wish I could make myself feel something - waydown deep - as deep as I ever feel - What is going to come upon me to bring me out of this valley in which I find myself? My prayers are weak and my thoughts are full of earth - The power that could bring me to Him when I first came - must take me to Him now. All my thoughts of Him are swift but they come so seldom now - and I say O so sadly to myself "Is it not that I must be about my Father's business?"250. Sept. Monday 7. 1874. In which the new times are not like the old times in Normal Hall. But why must I keep writing such things: If there are ever bright times in Normal Hall again it never will come about by asking wearily for what cannot be: the old places are being taken by new faces and it is best so - but I look so often and so wistfully for just one of the old days - with the self-satisfied air - I was wont to don - I'm weak in my comprehension of the work before me - It begins way down at the bottom among first principles - I am guilty of a teacher's weakness - I am fond of teaching "smart folks" - Apply251. Sept. Tuesday 8. 1874. In which I go through another performance. I am finding myself out - It is gratifying to be given so fine and unusual an opportunity to display to an observing world your fortitude in time of great tendencies toward wrath - If I never make this fact clearly aparent - believe me it will not be for lack of glorious opportunities. I start out with a glow - I dare to have full faith that I shall meet the Hamburg Chicken and Pres. Angell - I dont. I have plenty of time to muse on the possibilities that earthly ... are not certain - I call myself several fit names - and put the child to bed after the honors are past - Hrm 252. Sept. Wednesday 9. 1874 In which I am shown that all is not indeed utter delusion. I finally believed it this morning. Besides my diary troubles me- and that of all things must not fail me or I have lost indeed - But it does show signs of dislocution . It is very sick - The only thing this day that pins my trembling thoughts on the stability of anything which has to do with me - was the apppearance on the scene of John Dooley who knew that his mother was dead! I take it upon me to keep her over until morning and discussions tend toward the West Rupert business. After supper we are found aloft - on high - way up - 253. Sept. Thursday 10. 1874. In which my room-mate arrives - Now that I have seen her I understand how it will all be - We shall be happy toghether - and I know by my few first glances. In this I am at rest - I find mysel full of what happpened in a minute - The arrival in my school of His excellency the Governor - and my enviable seat on needles - lest I for a moment do something unpardonable or my class appear nearly as stupid as they are - Col. Benton sets me all a going by one word but might it at the ... - The Board have ... & it is done - E.J. Hyde is principal - God is plainly calling me - as the general the officer to do a hard thing for him - to stay here and take a lower place to stand here in the dark and suffer254. Sept. Friday 11. 1874. In which I begin to lay out my work - It is pretty near time that I begin to take in a realizing sense of things - I am stupidly slow in letting things get ... and begin. The glory of the fall is coming on. It comes slowly - and I almost excuse myself this waiting and the easy way I have just now - when I see how slow are all of nature's processes - My tendencies are all toward ceaseless activity - and the next new thing is done - Miss Ten Broeck finds herself remarkably homesick - and ... to profuse letters - It seems now as if I was favored in the matter of companionship but maybe not - 255. Sept. Saturday 12. 1874. I which I dream of going home - I see a yellow poster down street - It assumes a sudden worth in the eyes of me - for it proclaims a cheap trip to the city near which I am found in my hilltown sweet thoughts - It suddenly occurs to me that I can afford it - so I buy a dress and despatch it with my accustomed ... and announce to my mother that I'll call for the dress next Thursday - We go on making wonderful improvements in our sitting room. We give the picture man countless hints and suggestions - and he makes promisies for which he will not soon be forgiven - He dooms us thus to sudden rises and and fallings of hopes and he lives a little for which we beg for his mercy256. Sept. Sunday 13. 1874. In which I am quiet a few minutes. How well for me it is! Anybody like me ought to be quiet a good deal - but my life spins on and spins me toward the stopping point while all the time I am wishing all so still to myself that I had a little home - and joy work could be inside of it for months - long enough for me to catch my breath! God has no doubt a reason for making my influence large - and my work incessant - I am a bungler at all my work lately. I am passing through an event in my life and I take the steps as in a maze for where does [it lead] -257. Sept. Monday 14. 1874. In which I try to get up a little enthusiasm. Try! Its not laid down anywhere for me to pick up - nor thrown at me to catch - Its gone where alas are lying all the brilliant things I ought to write in this diary and don't and can't - Miss T..B's chief aim in life just now is to sweep through time and get back to ... a Noble ambition! and mine are less - What good does it do to be ashamed of it - We are! Who can help us! I can't possess one of a quickening to make me absorbingly interested in the future of Mary Conley - and Annie Ostrander and my class to teach is so small and destitute of energy - and - well you know! -258. Sept. Tuesday 15. 1874. In which a plan is afloat - It looks to getting a girl here - and at the bottom of the plan stands the stalwart form of me - but not alone am I - there is another - a striped Hamburg chicken - who writes me solemnly and consults - I keep thinking of a house on the corner ofWhite and [Gumer] - and a face where the wrinkles are coming that I long and long to see - Do I go by the pretty white house and look and look? O - don't ask - do I stop doing it say - Mip Ten Broeck says funny things - little cunning things which trip off his tongue and fall not expecting to -259. Sept. Wednesday 16. 1874. In which I make preparations on a lorge scale. Mip L.B. finds it very funny - do I? - I sew a bottom in an antiquated bag - and insert a method of shutting it and holding it shut - It is packed by the hands of me and then the feet of ... down street while the ... of me desire what I'll carry to mother - How excited I get - A great day is coming for me and I am in a great jar of joy and don't think the bag is in too! Let me chronicle for future nights of ... and misery the record of this cheerful evening with to happy ... in room 14! - A girl going to mother - a mother coming to a girl!260. Sept. Thursday 17. 1874. In which I vow vengeance on alarm clocks - Alas - for the morrow - what do my eyes behold: A swift-footed maiden "with dreaming eyes" and a gallant ear - a man of noble deed - not alone are they - a boy doth journey with them - but not merrily - A Miss T.B. will in spite of my tears and protests gaze up in the situation with a tendency to merriment - Alas shall I ... to tell how there was a disgraceful return and a lunch eaten in secret! What a trial is this [to] one's faith - but did she, this girl, ever sit down instead? Ah! don't you believe it! - Somebody another hears the bell ring - She goes to the door261. Sept. Friday 18. 1874. In which I feel and know that the summer is not over. There's this piece of it - The little things that the cozy life at home suggests - the litttle duties that I went from so suddenly and so reluctantly: the places where I used to study - the outlook from the windows of my room. I'm back among these and its been kept for me to come to these once more - How grand I feel! - I do not forget that my hopes have risen only to fall that the Ann Arbor where I was to land this morning is an Ann Arbor of a dream - and instead of bring before Prof. [D....] and [H...] and [O...] - I am stationed before Mip Monk's ... children - and no thought of any examination - or dignities of the ... - It remains to tell how Mip Hasting ... us off up to the house - How [ever] did return262. Sept. Saturday 19. 1874. In which there was a great noise in our house. Gail had in her mind trunks. In mine I have in mind "the little dog" - Let us still speak further - All of Harriet [Mouk's] pleasures were designed to be [lies] - The world as created for her exists as a reality - she cannot enter into the subtleties of anything that involves a joke - Sufficient solemnity cannot be given to the words as we say them - in the dog story. Emma Mouk to her mind has ... upon the family an irretrievable - She has [sported]. We all play and are greatly assisted. We offord a pleasing picture to the man with the piano legs! - Don't be too much startled - I ought to have mentioned it more gently - but indeed will you be too much ... to hear that ... and ... have at last been brought up on - and the man so long- expected [dances]263. Sept. Sunday 20. 1874. In which I go from room to room mournfullly - I didn't want Sunday to come so quick this time - It begins to come over me that I must go back to-morrow - it also finds a place in my unconsciousness that what I'm going back to is very uncertain - It is not like the last Sunday with [Susie] before I went to Williamsport - I felt so sure and safe that day as my prayers fell in the ear of God - that I should not go alone - that it would be better for somebody that I go - Now I can't feel so safe and sure - After all the mistakes of the weeks since then - Must you ever hear my honest question, must you now ... to yourself that your hold on on the ... mighty to save is one whit lessened? Girlie, take this question into your next quiet hour -264. Sept. Monday 21. 1874. In which everbody dares laugh at me - I come back with the ... of sunlight darting in and among and around all things - I come back with the firm prupose of making all the people possible glad that I am to live among them! - I always like the thoughts that come to me in the cars - The time between the work we leave and the work we go to - isn't like other times - There's an impulse in the turns of the driving wheel - I see in the upper hall a girl with a shawl on - I look rapidly and am not mistaken - It is ...! - I don't want to hear any more about alarm clocks - Its a very uninteresting subject to myself - And yet people do talk about it - and there's something else about early Maine - and carpet bags - and other uninteresting things -265. September. Tuesday 22. 1874 In which a dreadful thing happens - How quickly one can pass from happy time to a sudden sadness - The news comes over us with a peculiar force - for we feel so much for Mr. Hyde and in this trouble he is speechless - he goes about while here with an inexpressively sad face - and no words - His father has been run over by the cars and lies very low at Mr. Langdon's - He will probably not recover - Is perfectly unconscious and will perhaps pass away in this same state without a word or look or hand pressure for the waiting one - his son. Our meals are very solemn - We are glad to see them over and push our chairs back - I'll venture on this sombre page a sacrilege - It will be this - my new calico - is a garment fit to adorn the form of me -266. Sept. Wednesday 23. 1874. In which we enter into the sadness - Four o'clock this afternoon will live forever in thememory of one stricken family - Out of that solemn speechless unconsciousness the soul of Mr. Hyde passed onto another life - and nothing came back - no word or token - and the hour was four - I keep thinking how he looked on Tuesday when he came away from the Seminary after keaving [Sophie] - How funny that I wondered as I looked from my window that Sophie did not say "good bye" to him as he drove off - I was so sure that she would - There will be school to-morrow - That seems strange too - Satie and I go out for a walk after supper and we enjoy it - How little could I enjoy it though were the blow that had come to some for me -267. Sept. Thursday 24. 1874. In which my hands are unequal for their budens - I believe I never felt this more fully than I have this very suggestive fall - I am reminded by Satie's severe sickness that I must prepare for new worries and new duties - I have no hope now of averting the disease - It has come and may keep her in bed and me out of bed for some time - Hope comes to my rescue - I draw on those supplies of it which my head examminer dwelled upon at so great length - Dr. Sanford duly appears and looks the tongue over lamenting that it has been necessary to call him - like as not - I take in all the [air] necessary and prepare myself to act in the capacity of - 268. Sept. Friday 25. 1874. In which I am found in the house of mourning - It was not a day for mourning - Can I ever forget how perfect it was - and how beautiful were all things as we went over the [road]? There were so many at the funeral - and it was a very solemn day for me throughout - It makes my heart grow still and my whole being pause to be in one room with a dead body in another. It is so different from anything else - and it makes me think of the coming of the ... guest - as nothing else can - even waking up in the midle of the night - when my thoughts always turn to that hour of my life when I shall pass away -269. Sept. Saturday 26. 1874. In which I better not make any estimates - I quickly intuit to not making any - I lay out a sufficient amount of work to do comfortaby and I am still further deserving of credit for I keep thinking how well I'll do it - which is dreadful to relate. I wouldn't laught if it weren't for Mrs T.B. She is in this matter to me as an inspiriter to-day! I need a prop or two - I always find myself hunting about for stays and props after sitting up nights with folks - I am achieving an enviable ... as a nurse in dysenteric diseases - I can talk of "movements" to the Dr. with great zeal - and listen to his questioning with quiet interest. - And Belle ... has come -interest270. Sept. Sept. 27. 1874. In which I search for the theoughts that lie too deep for tears - I feel like having Sunday after such a week - I wish I could have one of the old Sundays - Am I never to have them any more? - I am surprised and surprised at myself - Will I never again weep over my own sins - or pray for the souls of the straying? - Is my religion all centered on me - and will I let things remain thus - O that I might feel as in times of old! - That one - dear Schenectady Sunday would come back - The summer was good - Mr. Woodruff is surely inspiring - His subject was restoring the brothers and sisters in the church - The singing - partook less of discord than is common -271. Sept. Monday 28. 1874. In which I come down a peg or two - It takes a Monday to bring teachers down from any notches to which they may have attached themselves - We came down with drooping lips - Mip T.B. and I talk it over mournfully - When the work is well before the absorbing is complete - That's about the last we are seen or heard of during the circuit of the sun - Then we collect around the ... to the tune of our melodious bell - I believe this is indeed the first time that bell has been mentioned! My outward bound thoughts take wings to Mip E.J. Pierce - Abbie Adams appears upon the scene - and her call sends my Greek to a more melancholy journey than Mip Stafford's from ... to ... - 292. Sept. Tuesday 29. 1874. In which I search in vain for aught strange or startling - You can sort of imagine me making frantic efforts to do unheard of and greatly to be [desired] things - but you won't hear of my doing them. Not a breath of such glorious tenuinatives to my main fold labors - It is easy to feel myself tired - and not easy to find anything to show for it - We get settled down to the new life but slowly - we miss out mothers - and as time goes on they come not - neither go we to them - though we keep talking about it - Satie takes all the ... busy - which are not sacrificed to the school interests of Vermont - Nursing is not my favorite avocation. I am in a favor to having my patience toward health as rapidly as my classes toward graduation.273. Sept. Wednesday 30. 1874. In which Miss L.B.'s aunt has her mostly - Imagine her coming home to me after it and reporting as she does a "lovely time". - Making a direct application as I so promptly do _ I find by the most assiduous search that my lovely times are at once both before me and behind me! I look with expectant eyes for it - ahead and with wise eyes - for - back - and behind! To-day is not now a strange word - it means very real things for me - Having had so favorable a start - I shall soon be prepared to offer my services in the treatment of [dysenteric] fevers - My morning and evening reflections are in the region of Mr. Hyde's glowing grate - or on the stairs carrying plates and what goes with plates274. Oct. Thursday 1. 1874. In which I welcome October - I know so well the delicious dreamy ... that are in the stars for us of the gathered bounty - full and glowing in the last spirit richnesses it will lunch upon us - tender in its patient pity - as it is hopeful even with its precious leaves ... into the dust - It is the glad gala time for me - the season of my new birth - My transformation in the Kingdom of His Son - We are just now passing a through a cold snap but it doesnt mean anything - My flannels tarry - and for heat I am at the mercy of my friend's [Hyde's] grate - I am very grateful! Is not that the record of my pact? No sister Aggie at this place to-morrow night - not me -275. Oct. Friday 2. 1874. In which I welcome Friday night. I wish to you I hold out my arms as though I would embrace you! This is significant. Could some dear stingy old Vermont man just returning from paying his taxes, could he, O, could he hear my opening statement, there would be speedy legislative enactments. A teacher who never was glad of Friday nights, one approaching in characteristics is cast-iron would be at once engaged and a certain New York teacher sent home in disgrace! I have a lovely evening and there's more yet. Greek [seemed] almost a goodly [land], and French less heathenish. 276. Oct. Saturday 3. 1874. In which the King comes to his own. The Lord is not in the earth quake, not in the mighty wind. How beautiful upon the mountains are the footsteps of them that bring good tidings. How blessed the murmurs of that still, small voice! Everything is perfect! It seemed Gods message to us when Dr. Sanford came is take us up to the lake, and out among the hills and woods, this day of days. I can keep this day for ages, was I ever knowing to forget, my life rides. They form epochs! I shall not see the lake again this fall and it is in its [faded] away for me. 277. Oct. Sunday 4. 1874. In which I sigh, for some thing gone which should be nigh, and the [poem] goes on as my homesick girl. It follows it, "a loss in all familiar things, in flower that blooms and bird that sings". O dear, how is this girl going to get back her mother? Mr. [Later] was an exchange. What was written for Methodist ears, fell on our ears. It was a dreadful sermon about a plunge, a crash and somebody was heard no more, (several times repeated) about the pearly tear on the cheek of Jesus at the grave of [Lagarns], said the tear was kissed away by a breeze. The most startling announcement was that if a man couldn't have a piano and an organ here, he should have a harp in heaven. The notes of the choir trembled and made us do so too! Think of me hidden in a big shawl. 278. Oct. Monday 5. 1874. In which I forget the most important scene but Mip T.B. says she'll risk one. That I with eyes half open hurried down to a breakfast pitcher in hand and a lamp! this begins the animated scenes. One might be safe in inferring that I was next beheld in the plant corner grasping Liddell and Scott! Another guess would [...] on seeing me [near] to Satie, and then to school worrying in all available mornings, and carrying meals around. In school don't guess a sweet placid [mouth] and a benevolent beaming for the girl is a mystery unto herself. She might be always kind tender hearted, forgiving one another even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven her, but she is far from it. O, God help her!279. Oct. Tuesday 6. 1874. In which bad news comes and a new bad. My home letter tells me of the dear old lady in Albany whom mother has been to see. It tells me of the sick time and whispers, "If Grandma gets worse I will let you know". What the new bad was need not be recorded. Why live worries twice! Satie gains slowly, so slowly. I'm afraid the blue patient eyes will leave us and not come back. I wish I would be better and get right down close to her and kiss her like my own dear little girl. But every time I go to do it something makes me not do it when I get there. "Teach me Lord at length to love!"280. Oct. Wednesday 7. 1874. In which "la [bete]" only is here. [Lame] is a good ways from here, Didie! The words of the boy sends quick messages of pain through and through me, and I can think only of the dear mother heart that is perhaps coming near to the end of its love and its yearnings. Please pity the one of hers that is up here, thinking and thinking. Work is a delightful solace and it must be done though I can't talk and explain. I sit in a given silence which means only sorrow. The missionary meeting comforts me and fills me with longings to work for God. There is something unspeakably grand in the missionary work and my whole being rises once more to say, Here am I Lord. [Send] me. 281. Oct. Thursday 8. 1874. In which I see moving fingers, and hear the sounds of dead words. There are a great many years that are full of grandma. I can see wrinkled fingers moving busy needles to and fro, and beautiful, white stockings growing nearer and nearer completion, which shall be for me when they are done. I can hear a voice growing weaker and weaker say Frankie as there's nobody else in the world says it, and these words are in my ears and no others. God is so tender in this trouble, and the sadness that wraps me up is such a sweet sadness. Any glimpse of the last great peace fills me with a restful content, and the thoughts of death as far from dreaded thoughts today. 282. Oct. Friday 9. 1874. In which my evening is long and quiet to myself alone. No word comes from grandma so I rest myself thinking that no news is good news, and let the day bear me hopefully on. The evening is full of one of my lovely times, when I can bear to look out upon things as they are, and not lose heart and when I can live in the present and find little helps. There's a pleasantness about the night, when the frilly things can be kept out of the day. I am so glad Satie even begins to be better. I haven't been very good to her. There is something her eyes ask that I do not give her and it is hers by blessed right. The dear girls heart that has been mine so long, that has always kept [tuff] for me. 283. Oct. Saturday 10. 1874. In which we hear of Mip Ryan's [...] discipline. I take this Saturday with my usual bustling spirit and hurry it along. Have the good word from home to be glad over and it helps. Miss Underwood is [convinced], and after a protracted call passes on and is followed by our young hero. Miss [M.Y.Ryan] of old [known]. She gives me light on the subject of discipline, she governs by little slaps. It affords me no little comfort to know that hereafter I can always send for Maggie Ryan. Our Saturday dinner is almost always cheery. 284. Oct. Sunday 11. 1874. In which the day is delighted in. I am getting so I tell this every time, but its always new. Sitting down in the sunshine, or feeling its [touched] in my every fibre, seems as new to me today as if it had never been. As if I had never sat in a cosy sitting room with the work done up, and said to my darling mother, "Isn't Sunday nice?" A wee letter springs into existence, but today shall be long in the [land], if I don't forget that Roxbury is in N.Y. It is easy to be homesick, but I won't let me. The leaves grow pretty, and they laugh and play in the wind. Everything cosy even a cosy thought is a joy, and I find a few. 285. Oct. Monday 12. 1874. In which I muse on "Georgy reviews". Mip Ten [Broecken]. But on finding points nobody else ever heard of, and making them turn up funny. A sublime gift. It has been a [dimly] appointed plan that she come to shine here. When my [teacher] gazes upon his new circulars he will se it once throught Georgy, and on to Texas. Richard Ryan is a comet, I see him no more, and it is not a source of grief, for be it for me to hope for his [...] appearance. He is not a shining light. My courage is slowly coming back. the old work is taken up in the old ways, and the put away things, are again taken out. How funny all my dreams seem, I who was to be in Michigan. 286. Oct. Tuesdy 13. 1874. In which one might naturally expect some eloquince at this place, and time. There is too much of [time] around Betsy to get any thing like into eloquince from this not very amiable writer. Don't say much to her. A very pleasant beginning consists in a protected process of scalding two feet. Manner elaborate. A metammorphosis is working. You'll hear of it. A cross girl is to be fixed over into a sunny girl. Come and see! My [Bent's] are still a source of alarm to me. They are here but alas not here. "My twig is bent!" In the present system of [honors] for things you no doubt see my [benignant] features, [some] distance from the hanging basket, so be it. 287. Oct. Wednesday 14. 1874. In which we hear about Hyde's bells. They number eighteen. [We], Mip [E.T.B.] & her [compier], are about to add several more. One for Mrs. Burke to come forthe clothes, one more for me to [...] feet, one to change the calendar, one to water the hanging basket, one for Geoege reviews! An extended list is comtemplated. Excuse my brevity. The girl works and clings. O, how she clings to the hand let down list a cross word come, a [worthless] word, God help her. I think the struggle going on down here in the dark is a part of the battle for Christ. I can feel Him so much nearer since the conflict began. 288. Oct. Thursday 15. 1874. In which we hear from the professor at the breakfast table! I am approaching a melencholy subject. Most melancholy to people who now have to go around among distracted girls and call for reports at 10 P.M.! Miss L.B. marks Annie McDonald 2 in Arithmetic starting by way of supplement that she gave her a quarter at that. Great consternation reigns. Lamentations are not few, and the teachers are not having their tears pissed away by breezes. The teacher that goes around at 10 P.M. is not heard from. The day sparkles in all on October's glory! The girl thinks she'll sweep into Ft. Edward tomorrow night but maybe she won't. The Bints worry her. Why can't they stay?289. Oct. Friday 16. 1874. In which we enter faster and faster. Mip E.T.B. has learned to eat with her eyes on her Hydes. A [difficult] [fete], but when once acquired full of rare advantages. She by careful survey can ascertain about how fast her [cake] and such will have to go down. With all the car whistles ringing in mine ears and the sun a shining and the leaves flinging out gala day banners, I resolutely [turn] away mine eyes and don't go. I know now that I delight more in my conquest than I could possibly have done even in giving joy to sis! The dark lets down light tonight. I vibrate in my arches as if it were I who was going home insteaad of Aggie coming. The train carries a red light for me tonight. Hidden [curses] not made of [...] are radiant and I hold my sister in my arms. 290. Oct. Saturday 17. 1874. In which things work. Aggie gets her first taste of hotel life, and I a short taste of a life that is not bells. It is a kind hand that open pleasant highways for us, one that works when we cannot see and always makes 10 times one come out just ten! How can I tell it all. Of our ride on the lake road behind Mr. Hyde's fleet nag, and our efforts on a huge scale to make him go, (not Mr. H.). Of our finding out that for us Winnie had come. Of our long ride to Poultney, and the charming visit with Emily. Of the nice wood fire in the cosy sitting room still redolent of Institutes and essays! Of the plunge, the crash and we are heard no more. 291. Oct. Sunday 18. 1874. In which we take life [inside]. The day made a great attempt to be dark and dreary, but it couldn't. The rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew. They only crossed one little plan. They kept us from the Baptist church. The hotel was reached through windings not valleys of blessing. We were beaten and yet conquerors. No threatenings of gates or gabs moved us (gals!). The rest of the day was lit up with a little of wild duck and what goes with it, and some seminary. Anne McDonald was on our left and was entertained in my sister's most bounteous manner. Lack-aday. [To...] is to be our [alarm] clock tomorrow morning. Satie came down in the evening. 292. Oct. Monday 19. 1874. In which I chronicle on wonder. That for once I should hear the rising bell that at least once this winter. I should begin in Greek before breakfast. It came about through means, which worked. I go up into this Monday or down into it, whichever it may be, a great deal more ready for it after the rest and the visiting. Aggie goes home feeling all the better for coming. My work calls for so much from me when it asks me to speak greatly, always, and to raise my eyes [its] of a sure and blessed calm, always, out upon my sea. I am trying lately to let my life show what my heart longs. 293. Oct. Tuesday 20. 1874. In which something is worthy of notice concerning a girl whose expectations are known to be large. 294. Oct. Wednesday 21. 1874. In which there's danger of a smash up. This may refer to the girl that writes it. She's always in active anticipation of an eruption. It may refer to the possible going to pieces of the whole establishment! Lack-aday. The girls are surging and rising on billows. They raise lofty hands against going to bed at ten o'clock. School work drives on. There's always something to do next and classes must be taught. Work must be put on the board and lessons given out and Greek recited and a breath or two of time to do it in. I get into the teaching some days just as I like to get into it but the same old wound tries me lately. If it were not for my second course class I should like my work very much less. I have always been blessed in this class and I like it this year. 295. Oct. Thursday 22. 1874. In which you must hear of me as a moving spirit. I begin on a course of drilling. This has to do with rhetorical exercises about to be instituted. Our first rehearsal betokens success. This is a cause of some rejoicing to me, the venerable. The October days please me in their sweetness and in their suggestions. The dear fall is staying beautiful so long. There are minutes a few in which my thought struggles and finds room. "The thought goes, and something out of our own selves, some real thing has met the dawn or has found the mountain or entered beforehand into the blessed summer". 296. Oct. Friday 23. 1874. In which God is God my darling! Whatever else may come I think I am always sure of this, never surer than I am this holy, blessed day, that I give to Him. As my hand feels the pressure of His greater and stronger hand, I say to him solemnly and softly, "Dear Lord, it is ten years that my hand has lain in thine". O, ye years, full of that precious faith, great in what there was for me to grasp of God and perfect [consideration], beautiful with the [stars] that Christ set in years, dear years, faint, imperfect shadows of the years up there. Let me pray tonight. 297. Oct. Saturday 24. 1874. In which its hard to tell which I love best, the night or the day. It is the light that gives to each its beauty. It makes us know how much the dear Christ meant when he called himself. Light to follow Him is never to walk in darkness, never for once. To such it is promised they shall have the light of life. It may keep me honorable to remember that Satie has made me feel very sorry today. I went over to her room and found her crying and took her over to mine and made her feel better. We are not yet just where I want us to be. We shall grow to be heart to heart little by little, and I must be tenderer and [turn] her to me, very near very near and close. 298. Oct. Sunday 25. 1874. In which I live to chronicle three perfect days! Perfect in light, as perfect as light ever is, or can be. October prepares to leave us with rich days as this, followed by rich nights as this. I have my room all to myself today, for Mip T.B is with her mother. I am glad that I can say that I am not alone for the Father is with me. The work that I have entered upon that of keeping myself gentle seems easier in the quiet thought of my quiet hours. I wonder why it seem so hard other times. If this year can only show that I have grown & in being Christlike and [succeeded] sometimes in [...] my spirit. I shall greatly praise him. 299. Oct. Monday 26. 1874. In which thoughts travel homeward faster and faster, something makes me want to be home today. Sis is twenty-two. I have to do all my part of the celebrating alone. I wish so much for her and a great deal of it. I can't tell her I want more than anything else that she should have to [hide] her life with Christ in God. That she should come to life's years solemnly. The days are still lovely and full of thoughts that rise out of the [tossings], and are higher and greater. We know so little down here of what we might rise to. "We get faint glimpses when we have been a little faithful and a great deal helped of Him". This night is memorable for the soiree and we hear from Mr. Dennison. The rest of it was polite. 300. Oct. Tuesday 27. 1874. In which I muse on Castleton's people. I always find it necessary to come to a solemn sitting after a coming together like last night. I call to mind for about the tenth or eleventh time that some people are not inclined to waste any of their attentions on this lady, that the Adams do not call on me but on Mip L.B. I think a great many little things about one thing and another that make me feel tired and sorry. There are times when it seems hard to stay here, but I believe I do a little good, that some things are a little better because I am here. "When my heart is warm I know as the blind know, that I am in the sunshine that I cannot see". 301. Oct. Wednesday 28. 1874. In which the calendar isn't timed fast enough. We both watch it with zeal which never grows less but only one day rolls off at once, and sometimes we get wicked and wish the days would get along quicker. We forget that they are faster, far faster than our heroism or self-denials. I work vigorously at school and then at French and Greek. French is quite a drain on my [...], it takes so much time and we play over it more than there is any sense in. I take so much comfort with some of the girls in the house and Laura is good to me. I like Julia Miller better and better the more I see of her. 302. Oct. Thursday 29. 1874. In which I enjoy a rarity. One. It comes to pass that a man dawns upon Normal Hall in the capacity of a visitor. I count it an event of my life. I receive it with a fluttering worthy of the occasion! The History Class show off particularly, Mary Conley who greatly congratulates herself. I spend the evening in NOrmal Hall preparing for tomorrow and what there was left of the evening amounted to very little in the estimation of my favorite writer, the author. Almost every night I am called upon to say Farewell, a long farewell to all my plans. 303. Oct. Friday 30. 1874. In which we live in exciting times! Friday is getting to be a feast day, metaphorically considered. Everything wakes up in Normal Hall and I fly around and much abound. Then when it stops I feel about given out. This is a rare, uncommon state. Don't do it. I get a large bundle from home and it makes me feel clear up. Presently I appear in my clean blue and white print. If I feel ever so down and jogged out it always does me over to dress up. This is as it should be. I manage to get out a Greek lesson and feel some good over it. Memorabilia is harder than I ever dreamed.304. Oct. Saturday 31. 1874. In which its very well to lay out plenty of work to do on Saturday! We shall always do it. It is so satisfactory. If one wishes to feel most comfortable let that person instead to do a great many things on Saturday and then go to West Rutland in the morning and to Fair Haven in the afternoon! Nothing will succeed more perfectly. There are signs in the air and inside our shoes. The omen is frost. We were vigorously entertained by Miss Brown who charmed us in a most striking manner with the full discription of Mr. Griswold's expected proposal to Miss Wilber and Miss M's probable reply. Imagine me taking that home train and la [bete] getting off the second station! Take in the heights and depths of it! I am found in a house of which I have dreamed my fancies rest among the plans of their own creation!305. Nov. Sunday 1. 1874. In which phases are varied. I open my eyes upon splendor which I was doubtless born to but have never enjoyed! I take it all even going up on the cupola and looking through an open glass, or taking in the length and breadth of the magnificent parlors, as if I had never known the one little dreadful room in the house with Mrs. Bell. Satie was invited to dinner with us. The church service is so like old Sundays and it's a dear privilege to be near the dear Lord in the silent memorials. My first communion with little Satie. Evening and I am at my corner by the red spread. The marble house has vanished! Miss T.B. enlarges upon the utility of the water tank down stairs as a means of shortening our monotonous existence. She says mournfully, "The gay will laugh when thou art gone", and I continue, "And each one as before will chase his favorite phantom". This was short-sighted in me. Miss T.B. at once [expands], yes, their favorite phantom Miss Bromley. They will gather around the trunk & knock & knock & say Miss Bromley may I go to the [Parks] [Office]! May Miss Stafford go with me? 306. Nov. Monday 2. 1874. In which the leaves go and the comforts begin to take their place. This like the titles of many books has no connection whatever with what I am going to say. This is indicative of great gain's. It always is! Mip T.B. tells a funny story about Katie Fallon, it occurred when Katie was on a visit to the room adjoining ours. While there after [...] ghost stories, Katie proclaims, "O, I am all of a shiver". Miss T.B. adds as a memorable supplement, "May Miss Stafford be all of a shiver too." The day ran away with us but we did lots of things we meant to do, which is at least a spark to be added to our zeal! Miss [Withington] shows as yet no signs of a [drouth]. She is still accessible by fords. I pronounce French audibly. I am going to be obliged to stop here but this is as far as the list goes, only this and nothing more. A lovely birthday comes from my darling "In memory of the time we used to sing it in the home of blessed memory." 307. Nov. Tuesday 3. 1874. In which the girl wonders how so many happy things could come at once. Think of it ye barren days without voice or language. Think of my three letters and what they say to me as my heart reads and reads! Think of the beautiful motto that I love so that shall bless my eyes, always and for ages. There was a charming part of an evening for me at Dr. Sandord's with Mr. and Mrs. Hall of Pittsford. I can tell myself how nice it was and she will understand! Mip T.B. says interestedly "Come Miss Bromley aren't you going to take that little frolic in the Normal tonight. Go over in the Normal and have some fun". And with haste I dip out leaving her in the midst of a kerosene bath. 308. Nov. Wednesday 4. 1874. In which mine is the deep joy, the unspoken fervor, the sacred fury of the fight. This is one of the days when Fannie likes to talk to herself, and to God. What she says in the still moments which she must talk, let us hope will make her waht she finds it so hard to be, "tender and pitiful, ever the same". Sue's first letter from Chebanse blesses me, and I welcome it with all my birthday cheer. A surprise gives the signal for the rapid flight of my senses, it involves the shelling up of sundry parties in the clothes-pins even to Remember [Murphy] against when we have locked up, these many nights, for whose benefit we have grown so inconsistent! We go skirmishing round for a place to put the lovely toilet, [...] I, to put in words in response in being told that one of the quaint little pieces is for kinder Mary Conley immediately goes distracted to think [of] Mip B's using [handles] & [needing] that [dish]. Satie sent in some flowers & a little note before breakfast by [E...]. 309. Nov. Thursday 5. 1874. In which a beautiful surprise comes by mail. There is one who has a loving thought for me certainly, so says my darling little ring of four pearls. Miss T.B and Miss Brown love it to the lower hall and called me down that I might open to them my gifts not of gold frankincense & myrrh but gold and pearls. I wore it back up stairs with a step pretty light, some of the girls in the second course afterwards related that they saw it the moment Miss B. came in. Yes, says wise Satie Rising. Miss B. cast her pearls before. Miss T.B. is beginnig a series of distinguishing feats. The first in the course opened by our knocking vigorously at her own door. She was greatly abashed on being discovered. The great scene of the evening proved to be our letter, postmarked & delivered to Miss Miller. 310. Nov. Friday 6. 1874. In which we go smelling around. Mip T.B. aroused me by saying as we seat ourselves around the red spread "How stale tonight. Things are [beaming stagnant], for lack of something exciting like the arrival of toilet sets or little rings by marl!" Odoriferous breezes are wafted to us from the lower regions and we all seize our pitchers and went down in search of warm water. Candy and an invitation to it. All along of this we stand on waiting posture to have the hours cheered by some performances in light gymnastics. They grow exciting when our worthy gymnast vibrates between the two floors! You must have heard of the big hole there. You'll hear of her yet. I mustn't forget to tell how Miss Julia spoke her little piece and she did not mention "put your head & c.." There's more to say. 311. Nov. Saturday 7. 1874. In which Mip T.B. continues to distinguish herself. No serious results of last nights fall are as yet apparent. The day being withal so perfect in all its parts, suggests a ride might invigorate. It will be Mip T.B. who will ask, say this girl. At last she asks, and Mr. Hyde's exciting "certainly" comes pouring up the register. That was all there was of it. In despair we wait for the vision of a horse and it gets to be decidedly, ye "non cheval". Then it comes about in the course of things that it becomes [neccesary] for me to look upon a new baby. The baby's face will be a [haunt] for an indefinite period, as it prepared to cry at the vision of me! My companion is slightly amused at baby and I! 312. Nov. Sunday 8. 1874. In which it is hard telling what I am up to! or done to, which would describe it better. On the event of taking my first mouthful I am heard asking to be excused and next seen looking into the green pail! It is now decreed by those stirring scenes that I keep quiet and blessed can't begin to describe it. The pain going leaves me hushed and tranquil! The holy ministries fill me with thoughts tender and far away. Such honors. I feel some of the tendencies of the heart that bled and broke. I feel more like receiving the Kingdom of God as a little child. Comfort one another with His words!313. Nov. Monday 9. 1874. In which my cold assumes the character of an imagination. Indescribable sensations give my otherwise quiet life a new charm. Breathing is performed chiefly by my mouth and ears, and the rest of the entertainment takes place in my back. Its too bad that all this suffering can have no higher sounding name than a cold. It ought to call forth more sympathy. I commence a new method of frolic, by sitting the first course at their written examination. This means new [terrors] to me! I have queer kinds of fun. Mip T.B.'s second distinguishing feat was too much for her. She is sick enough to go off early to bed. I then enjoy the [feliciters] of a name both and it makes me feel O, so much better. 314. Nov. Tuesday 10. 1874. In which I don't like it much! I don't like so much spice in my life. As I feel now I'd like a little "even tenor". An existence flavored with a successful cold and a written examination partakes no longer of any thing to desire. Others have work beside me. It will be a long time ere I shall forget the little sad voice which said over and over so pitifully last night "I want mamma". When I got into bed she took my hand and held it O, so tight and went to sleep thinking that it was mothers! Beautiful delusion! The evening of this day, November 10, made Mip Ten Broeck a little more free from pain, and a little hungry. It made us both desire an independent pleasure and gave us the felicity of skirmishing round for a plate, a fork, some vinegar, some pepper, some salt. A few of the oysters are spared for the morning repast. 315. Nov. Wednesday 11. 1874. In which I am called upon to announce the close of the first quarter. I am clasped in the cold arms of Duty. This is why I am not on my way to Michigan. You find me a favorite phantom [chased], and not a graceful Sophomore. I am learning how slow to expect all things to move for one girl! Mip T.B.'s smile again illuminates our abode. She no longer needs pillows for her feet or looking glasses tied on to a chair. We miss Miss Fallon. Nobody can take her place wherever she drift in life, my good wishes follow her. May peace be around and Mip Stafford ever go with her! I am happy to announce a settlement with H.H. Shaw, and a few minutes of composure following. 316. Nov. Thursday 12. 1874. In which I am not at a loss for little worries. I suppose there's as many worries in one day as another, if one has on the right mind to hunt them up. I meet a few rought angles, and some things not to suit me! Alas, Who don't? Mr. Preston needn't have risen as an armed man because I told him how the matter of charging interest looked to me and James Adams, needn't have shown me what he knows about cutting matters short. These things move me! I count my good nature dear into myself. Inside the bower it's different, though I return to it with an empty purse! Good cheer smiles upon me and Mip T.B. in her funniest mood! I play be good, and to smooth me I sew. My evening almost always means that. 317. Nov. Friday 13. 1874. In which we begin to talk up Alumnae gatherings! It begins by a prolonged consultation of the two learned ones. It is resumed in the afternoon in the Normal Hall by the calling into honor a prolific swarm of standing committees. My part of the project will give me room for vast [measures]. Madame Worcester is to report my present dispositon is to say excusey-moi. This important occurence having been disposed of by me there remains for me the lingering echoes of " vous etes tres cunning", the painful mutterings of Miss Miller's tooth and the consequent dejection, the growing alarm as to what we are going to do when our aspiring ivy reaches the top of the string, the arrrival in our midst of Miss Fallon, the growing attachment to Mr. Hyde's rocking chair! I write along tender letter to Satie to draw her [woo] her to me again. 318. Nov. Saturday 14. 1874. In which no day was ever more worthy of a chronicle. It has been replete in chapters of incidents and chapters of accidents! We now possess some knowledge about our worthy cheval that we did not enjoy before. He is a dark lane! We distinguished ourselves by arriving at a worsing promptly with every train. We reversed ourselves and the buggy only once and not quite that, or, I shouldn't be here to tell of it. We put all of the day together and call it a fete. We eat dinner at Laura's and we sing going home in the moonlight. All this is strangely like some of the old days when I was a part of the old Seminary before. We sit down to the waiting cheer in the Bower, and shake hands metaphorically, calling it a good time. Satie meets me at the door, her face perfectly lit up [...] [hold her to] [...] [close & earnest]. 319. Nov. Sunday 15. 1874. In which we take on new airs. Apropos of this, was the fact that we are escorted to lunch in the most extraordinary manner and shown in to our seats in a way "quite new". "Yes, it is quite new". Mr. Woodruff improves. Who can doubt it or does? I wish the church would raise his salary and let him do the singing too. The rest of the day hasn't much to say. I wish it had and would speak loud enough for me to hear. It's an increasing trial to keep these pages, lately. Our talk tonight my Satie girl is the first real good one to me. I come back from it with almost the anointing of a prayer meeting. I wish I might eat Sunday dinners somewhere else. 320. Nov. Monday 16. 1874. In which new things conspire! My French and Greek drag wearily along crowding themselves into days already full. The next new thing to distract me is the unexpected honor of assisting to decorate our most worthy Town Hall. Somebody who ought to didn't. Whereupon we marched ourselves to the "forward march". It results in a [beam] for Mip Ten Broeck but none for me! I have had a long campaign of permitting other girls to enjoy such luxuries, and ask pitiously "Where is mine?". My [festive] turns out a misfortune, much labor to a bad purpose. Mine is too fat, and causes our worthy Smith to make mental comments. We are called by Mary Conley to lunch in a distance of the house. Then Laura beckons my [steriously] and [lures] us to a tempting quaff of ice-water. 321. Nov. Tuesday 17. 1874. In which we have fallen upon strange times. Not that it should rain. This is wise, and well. But that Mr. [Domson] should read Shakespeare, that we should be blessed with free tickets, a large delegation goeth not from our time-honored institution! A close observer would notice that I frown as to this, but frown because the divine Shakespeare should fall into such hands! I've not watched Fannie close today and I feel as if it would never be helped. Have I not stood in the desolation that comes after such a day so that I know full well it's sunless depths! Am I never going to be helped or must I [needs] be shown and shown and shown that without Him I can do nothing! and that such goeth not out but by fasting and prayer!322. Nov. Wednesday 18. 1874. In which "Madame De [Ruyt...] will appear once more. She will not only appear but sing!" So says our worthy head, by request! It now devolves upon me to chronicle that to Miss T.B. fell the mournful duty of sending the girls on ahead! Their after account of this was that they "went on the day before". A few can appreciate this! The concert lacked not in distinguishing traits, neither our rendering of it on our return! A form stands in the centre of our room. It holds a cracker, it [murmurs]. Mip Ten Broeck will now appear. She will not only appear but eat it! I forgot to be [fond] and make a note on the lively dinner graced by the Misses Hyde. We open our most blue eyes to hear our worthy head of the table addressed as "Eddie" and talked to [fine] and easy! 323. Nov. Thursday 19. 1874. In which I am still distracted. Tonight meant party. It is to be feared the wholr day meant nothing less. Between times we cracked! This meant crack away. It was alarming to behold how much one paper bag would hold! I gave the finishing touch to our table by covering it with a pillow slip! I wake up too late to find that I am once more conspired against. I am given over to hardness of heart and Mr. Castle. Have I your tenderest pity? I am an orphan and away from home! When I get back to our invited guests I find concealed agitation. It is soon explained by my surreptitious glances in the direction of the bureau. I gaze upon mats, a great many, nor on mats alone, a picture case! I am in a most receiving state of mind. I invite them all again!324. Nov. Friday 20. 1874. In which for a wee while I am the "girl I knew of old" and I do the old things. I seem back, away back tonight and once more I am holding my Satie in my arms, and whispering to her of God and heaven. The girl that I was when I stood pleading her to Christ's [stood] to be [recounted] to God, that girl I am almost once more, as I stand and hold her hands, and thank God that He has done the blessed work, and made her say, softly and solemnly "Jesus is so near tonight". The work of the Kingdom seems such a blessed work tonight. My heart warms and expands at the thought of the hundred-fold in this life that it brings, and of "in the world to come, life everlasting!". It is so sweet to pray once more with Satie, and to know as I know tonight that we are not alone for the Father is with us. 325. Nov. Saturday 21. 1874. In which I meet the most ardent expectations of my friends! Nobody expected me to do full justice to motto cards today but I am certain I deserve most well selected praise. I make unexpected progress. Satie leaves with the eyes of the family upon her and I come upstairs and feel a great empty place! It comes about that once more we eat oysters. This in itself is not wrong, but it violates a point of order to go strewing vinegar cruets around the hall and making people come not in horror to see. Mip Brown in the act of distinguishing herself falls down stairs and sprains her ankle. This is a crowning catastrophe. My turn awaits me. Fall I may, and fall I must!326. Nov. Sunday 22. 1874. In which the day is full of II Corinthians 5. It seems as if every verse of that chapter has shone and sparkled for me today. It is so above and beyond the things I move among. Take courage, heart. This is the shadow that the substance! The door of the tent has looked toward the quiet meadow and across the meadow has been light. I am so sure that the Lord will bear me through. Some of the sweets of Sunday night are missing. The voices that sing are all growing a thing to miss. Laura is sprained, Satie and Mary Conley away, Minnie sick, Julia's last Sunday, and she comes in for a Sunday talk. Has the girl told herself yet whether the little home shall see her, or does she pulsate to and fro, just yet awhile!327. Nov. Monday 23. 1874. In which the girl passes through an experience. This does not surprise you. Her states and stages of experience are as manifold as are Mary Conley's visits for a subject! The present experience turns over hard chapters involving as it does more self denial than she likes. I have it in my heart now to believe that she will come out of it all right. That she will in a surer sense take up the cross! Not much of anything helped. The weather was dubious. Everything whistled and rattled and drifted. Two letters went on their way. It said to the little mother, "Mustn't" and to my precious Satie "Can't". How gladly will I sit through these coming days so full of what I shall miss if only I can know once for sure that I am ruling my spirit, that I am stronger to deny myself. 328. Nov. Tuesday 24. 1874. In which there are pangs in car whistles. There's a girl here that is wanting to go home. Some days she don't hear the cars, scarcely at all. Today every car ring goes through her. She felt as bad as she could before the H.B. letter came. I don't believe she is sorry down in her heart for this hard day. The pain it brings is so sweet and the savior is so precious. It was so much easier to kiss Mip Withington and to be patient to the girls in their little worries. The home letter [bans] the child to come. [Darwine], bless the loving boy heart, sends dear words to me. And still the cars whistle by, and send me shouts of [songs] which are almost pain. 329. Nov. Wednesday 25. 1874. In which this looks pretty hard! I know that the dreaded moment has come. I know just how it feels. There are no little things to be learned about it that I do not understand. The joy that I can do it makes my face bright as I kiss the girls off and watch the trains go. How sort of nice life is, even such times! I find so many little last things to do. Then there's Satie's Alter to read a great many times and a cracker supper in my rocking chair. It is dark when Winnie comes, but the moonlight will bless us out of its bigness and Mrs. Lloyd makes me forget everything but her sweetness and her loving thought. 3300. Nov. Thursday 26. 1874. In which there are paths of peace. Quiet ways into which I have strayed. I hear His voice and I know Him, it is not a stranger that I follow. Think of me in the putty sitting room by the big wood-stove, which makes a big noise whenever I turn the little draft. Think of the bright rag carpet, the seven stages in the life of woman and man, and the girl there playing with examination. Don't think of the little empty place by mother's table, and the little words about a girl that is away from [the day]! [Lived] to the realization of a [genious] English plum-pudding. I realize now how little space there was left for it. It's a luxury to find a stray minute to George McDonald. And I thank the dear father all the way through. He [crowneth] the [fear] with His [...].331. Nov. Friday 27. 1874. In which I have a strange experience with a strange young man. I am straying on to a "quite new" theme for the deliberation of my mature years. He was worthy of it all. Should I exhaust myself he is still worthy of it. He hails from Andover Theological Seminary with all his blushing honors thick upon him! He considers me a person discerning a few well-timed suggestions. The [Misses] [Allord] are present and mobile. At the tea the learned sir being asked if he would partake of a certain article replies savagely "No I'm full". All remarks made forcible by a sweet smile. I must not forget how holy was the little bedtime hour. There was a [veiled] [finest] in the star-light-dim. It was Christ, the Lord!332. Nov. Saturday 28. 1874. In which the Father knoweth. I count it happy for me that there should be in store for me the quiet pleasant dinner visit and after it a ride. That out of the calculation should be kept all strange young men. Mr. Allard meets me with a staggering question in theology. He thinks I'm the chap his daughters took tea with last night. The dinner to which I was called made it necessary for a fool to be brought to the slaughter. Since I came to Vermont many a chicken has left Vermont. Our ride and then evening, the long evening full of lessons to be learned for this world I go back to and full of the light that shineth in darkness. 333. Nov. Sunday 29. 1874. In which I find myself feeling sorry. It feels now as if I should always be sorry, as if this dear afternoon when I came back so happy with Winnie would always be filled with the sorriest sorry, when I think of it, always after. It's about the little picture that I sent for. My room looks up at me with a bright face. All the little things smile so, but I don't stay only to warm me and to think and then I dawn upon my friend the doctor. This is a new made of existence, this flopping, but I can't do anything or be any where but I come across some comforts, some nice things kept bright for me. 334. Nov. Monday 30. 1874. In which I get sorrier, but I keep thinking about the little picture, till the scene is completed and then I go in to teach a few benches, which distracts all the struggling sunshine there was in me, or in my clothes. The author of some of my sorrows [answers] but darling appears not at all. This increases my powers of being agreeable to such an extent that my society is eagerly sought. "You'll hear of her yet'. She's better to Mip T.B. than I'd think she'd be. A postal card cheers me not from the great responder. There are tw darling letters from home, and they say not to scold mother, but she has gone and brought home for the girl a new silk. They think down there its time that she had one. 335. Dec. Tuesday 1. 1874. In which there's a better. The world is a better place to live in and sunshine comes, on the evening train. There are the old laughs again in our room and I try to be good and not think of laying up little hard things. Surely I haven't time for this in my short life. I have only time to be kind, tender-hearted and forgiving, even as God for Christ-sake has forgiven me. I am glad to see sunshine back, it comes like a prayed for blessing and makes me know there are hours of love laid up for me. The girls all seem very jolly after their home trip and they have lots to tell. Isn't my story, the still story best of all? 336. Dec. Wednesday 2. 1874. In which I make the world a little brighter for some people. I am thoroughly out of my Monday night mood and go to work with a will to see what there is for me to do. Take some time to [...] that I have downs as well as ups. This is a source of regret too, allow me to say, to those who have to be with me. I stand the girl up straight and I say, "Are you comfortable to have about?" This is what she must tell me, and then I shall know how much of a Christian she is. I tell you what, you may believe it or not, but I'm good today. I have embraced Mip Withington. Could there be proof, beyond this? I try to radiate geography tribulations and make the highway's of grammar and arithmetic glorious! Hard job!337. Dec. Thursday 3. 1874. In which I faint and pursue. You will judge at me by the tone of this that the key note strikes some lower than yesterdays. You may say this and not be mistaken. When you hear from me possible suggestions of fainting and pursuing you'll guess first that my back aches and you'll be right. You'll think of me twisting about and writhing early in the afternoon wondering how I am ever to drag myself through the five unsuitable second course classes. You'll know that I couldn't go to bed after supper, but the evening lay through hedges and ditches. No wonder I faint. I am glad to hear you pursue. 338. Dec. Friday 4. 1874. In which I record an arrival. The first of it was a trunk in the hall. Pretty soon voices from Mr. Hdye's room and the rattle of plates. (A new way of spelling his name!) We guess from our locality that the new teacher has arrived but nothing definite rewards our activity at guessing, and the Professor is very silent. The one busines of life now has to do with a Normal Reunion. Nothing else can demand or expect attention. We must for awhile postpone preparing for heaven. I work on mottos mostly and send thoughts out after a poem. They come back finding no rest for the [sobs] of their [feels]. It is not known where the poem is to come from. 339. Dec. Saturday 5. 1874. In which its about so. A spots not in any way picturesque marks the haven't of a would be poet. It is not a shady work where fancies might give birth to fancies, for an empire that might propagate a "flow". I have hallowed it and the first part of my immortal verses is brought into this terrible world. Then I go visiting. I find there's another great world all about my little one. It quite surprises me. I thought the Seminary and the park was all there was of it. There's things outside and people. Homes full of sunny beginnings and radiant with baby faces. And, I told you just now I went visiting. It was visiting. Does Lora guess how much she has done for me. And her words make me proud. "I have been reading Patience Strong's Outings and it sounds as if Miss Bromley wrote it!" 340. Dec. Sunday 6. 1874. In which we met Jesus by the way. I didn't get to church. I did not forsake the assembling of myself together by an intentional deviation. Far from it. You need not develop, nor state further, nor bring out several points, unless you greatly desire it which you don't. I have a salutary washing. As Mr. Tator would say, "There was a plunger a [wash]". When Sunshine comes we have a talk. It is about "the King and our Elder Brother" not a long but a dear and holy talk. I go out of it down into the supper room as I fancy the dsciples way have come down from the mount. My heart is humble and full of tender pity, and in it there is malice toward none and charity to all. It was the look in his dear eye that humbled. 341. Dec. Monday 7. 1874. In which I become my favorite author. I am found no more in my accustomed haunts, and there is given silence around the red spread, where of old the voice of France and Frances was heard in our land, and lispings of what was once the tongue of Athens and Sparta! Strange doings are afloat. I mostly engage myself in rhyming and unlike Mr. Poet [Laureate]. I do not find myself a perfect master of rhythm. So I command the aids of spade and shovel and dig. This grows wearing. All [unusual] [words] of spirit my friends I have no doubt will gladly excuse, attributing it of course to my poetry. Seminary breakfasts have entered upon a buckwheat campaign. 342. Dec. Tuesday 8. 1874. In which [Venus] transits. This is a great day to the favored beings who live in Asia and Australia. Very. In eight years more it transits again and its next performance will then be witnessed in the year 2004. I cannot impart a vast amount of information to my one reader, on this lofty topic, but I'll appoint eight years from now as the time, and then I'll "bring out several points!" This side of the world was very still today. Its transits were unobserved. I might have been found moving about among Normals, or filling the blackboard, or leaking "from peak, to peak the salting crags among" in search of live thunder. (It doesn't often thunder in rhyme.)343. Dec. Wednesday 9. 1874. In which times grow exciting. The village of C. rises to the merits of things. Two or three teams have been seen in the street! You never saw a place so alive! This evening most every body goes to a party at Mrs. Jackman's. This is like a tidal wave over the town! The debate calls forth the eager ones at the Sem. One of whom we have before heard, makes a party in Normal Hull and goes to it, to the sound of the trumpet that sings of fame. I have a little frolic in the Normal very often lately. Spirits from the vasty deep do not come by calling. So it comes to pass that the poem grows slowly, and the wherewith to make it is in the vasty deep and won't come. 344. Dec. Thursday 10. 1874. In which we go to an oyster party and meet no oysters. It isn't my fault. I made known the message as it came from the anxious Dr. to my severest critic Mip E.L.B., and the interpretation thereof consisted of meat and potatoes! I humbly ask her to consider that just as much as the baby was nicer than she expected. Just so much must she place to the side that lacks oysters. I owe up that visiting isn't the nicest thing in the world to me. I am ready to pledge myself not to go again until I get up or down into the spirit of it. I'm just distracted sitting prim and trying to be nice. I [reconvinced] this [state] for those who write poetry! It's well to practise a little. 345. Dec. Friday 11. 1874. In which I pause among life's solemn hours. The last dear anniversary day of the year. I keep everything out of it that the day itself did not ask. And I enter into the sea, calm. It came over my restlessness, solemnly, and the blood of Jesus came over my sins! The day tells me that I have been planted in the likeness of His death. It gives me sweet and tender promise of a coming resurrection and in that resurrection I am to be planted in His likeness! "It doth not yet appear what we shall be but we know that when He appeareth we shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is". 346. Dec. Saturday 12. 1874. In which I am not at my brightest! Indications around the eyes are threatening. That's the place to look! The black streaks are a warning. Mip E.T.B. takes up her residence in the Seminary school-room having begun on an existence [to] [trim]! I begin on an existence to flop and find rhyming and flopping antagonistic! After Herculanean efforts I give up poetry, and go at mother's motto. It was wise. The school-room trimmer comes up stairs supperless and I haste to the rescue with a pitcher fresh from the precincts of Langdon's. Responses take the following form. Vous �tes tr�s bonne. Je vous remercie, remercie, remercie!347. Dec. Sunday 13. 1874. In which the beauty and glory are hidden. We all get up late and feel like nothing in particular. My room calls loudly for a broom and Satie breaks the Sabbath and flourishes the broom in "immortal vigor". I don't go to church at all and the rest go most of the evening, up to the last prayer. Each church in town gets a few, but not at the earliest moment. I managed to get washed once more and wrote a little and read a little, and slept a little. At supper the girls laughed and the Sunday [thus] strayed around somewhere out of our reach. Something hid its [banner] from us. 348. Dec. Monday 14. 1874. In which some people are called to work under difficulties. This has been the story for some time, and I am some people. With everybody's mind wandering through space, and ideas floating in mystic realms, I am set up to call these spirits from the vasty deep, and proceed to work as if everything wasn't about to happen! I stand it! (In more senses than one!) The evening spoke of closing exercises in the seminary, and many people up there to see! "They done very well". My roommate comes up stairs with life at low ebb. She is quite ready to put herself away for the time being, and does. I write poems. 349. Dec. Tuesday 15. 1874. In which some people are given a chance to distinguish themselves. This time it isn't me. I flutter away behind the scenes, and hurry the thing along! The Normals are seen and heard, (some of them are heard) and then things are hurried together, and once more the Seminary is still. I come up stairs with my life ebbing about as low as it ever has, and eveybody is too tired to think about me, but the dear Christ. I put myself in His dear care and He gives me rest. Mip T.B. tells me in such a solemn way that she "isn't coming to this room to live when she comes back". She tells it in such a way that it hurts some. 350. Dec. Wednesday 16. 1874. In which I come to a stand-still. Very............. I don my big apron and go to work as chirp as any one could possibly order, but I don't stay donned and chirp! I write geography on the board until pretty soon you don't see me. Up in Winnie's room I lie down and I stay. It is now that I begin a little to know Mip Hastings. She comes in and her talk brightens me. It is like what hasn't been in the old Sem. since that June day in the corner room. There's always something for us, even in the days and hours when we find ourselves asking for light. God takes care that we do not dash our feet against the stairs!351. Dec. Thursday 17. 1874. In which times grow more and more toward a wake up. I go around with about as much energy as George Stone. I have got when I can't go on much farther at present and I've a mountain and an Atlantic to cross before I see my mother! Don't go to fretting about it Miss B. I can't cheer you much, wish I could. Your little hands were never made to write poems! I have distracted Mip Hastings, who volunteers to serve in the capacity of amanuensis! We are glad to leave the pieces and be comforted by the drama. It was a perfect success and Laura can rise out of sight in her [scarrings] over the Captain. How glad I am to see Dannie, and the dear package fresh from mother's blessed hands!352. Dec. Friday 18. 1874. In which I read a [pome]. Yes yes, You will at once infer that to me this was the prominent [feature] of the day. How very interesting we are to ourselves! I have been kept awake over this poem. This is a delight in which there was a single participant. [Me]. There'll never be any more. Our alumnae dinner was like the feasts of Zion, few came, but those that appeared ate! I was radiant at the reception, helped along by a black silk. In brief expressive pauses I had little visits with Dr. French, whom it was a treat to see. Again after a great day, the Seminary grew still and solemn in its stillness, and then Jennie and I enjoyed each other until morning. Who could sleep feeling as we did? 353. Dec. Saturday 19. 1874. In which I embrace my mother. This is a cheerful close to a long chapter of life which I have been taking mixed. I see the trunks go one by one and the sleigh go off with the girls, and every thing and everybody is happy, happy. As the 11.25 train moved off, Mr. Hyde turned to a friend & remarked that that car-load belonged to him! I pick up whats to go and stow away what's to stay, and while I'm doing it I sing away to myself, or chat away in a most lively manner to Miss Hastings. There's a train for me at last & Satie and Dannie and I [sing] our flight southward. The little home looks up at me and smiles, and I have entered safely into its rest. 354. Dec. Sunday 20. 1874. In which no bells ring. The iron tongue in the town at the Sem. is still for there's no one to molest her ancient solitary reign. The Church bells of this my present city could not awake a girl who has not slept for a week, and so it came to pass that our eyes opened out upon this world of ours between eleven and twelve, and we came to a realizing sense of things at a period somewhat later. Just so before us lay the whole day, time to do everything in and nobody to make us hurry. Dr. Webber preached in the Refomred Church and we enjoyed the service very much indeed. He took that ever dear text, "I have glorified thee on the earth, I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do". The night was too beautiful for words. 355. Dec. Monday 21. 1874. In which the ways are ways of pleasantness. There's a new order of things. We fall in with it naturally enough, strange as it is. The breakfast is appointed for an hour when we can conveniently attend to it, and the back parlor makes itself particularly cosy for us. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps also had our interest in view, for she wrote the "Silent Partner". I read it to Satie and the little pretty sentences which I like fell in with the day, like the "light of the maple leaves". The Board of Hope entertained us in Harmony Hall in a royal manner. Their echoes roll!356. Dec. Tuesday 22. 1874. In which I go back in the years. We have come to a quiet day. It is full of what has been, and of this we can talk solemnly and tenderly together. It began in the young people's prayer meeting. Though we did not know a single person in the room, we fell not strangers. How could we when the dearest Guest was Christ the Lord? We take out the little girl letters and read them. Very sweet and tender they seem, and very sad too, in the little appeals. "Please pray for me". How glad we are that the "light about the Head is shining on her as she goes". Satie can talk tonight, and she tells me about the trouble that has come into her life, and the love that made her able to bear it. 357. Dec. Wednesday 23. 1874. In which we find and enter into the Christmas joys. If anybody wants to see what from there is in having Christmas let that body present himself in the Albany stores! That is what we did. We were a part of the jolly crowd for we had presents to buy, and a great many things to be shown before we could make the all important decisions. We come home and find mother glad to see us and find oysters to [...] hungry girls! We betake [ourselves] to the speedy enjoyment of each other, when we are waited upon by a caller in the person of Mip Monk. We leave from her all the important [advantages] of at once learning to dance!358. Dec. Thursday 24. 1874. In which we all feel good. The last little quiet talk and read is over, and Satie must go. I try to keep her, but she goes. Aggie goes as far as Troy with her to see her safely on the other train, and at home we get ready to find full enjoyment in ourselves. The distribution of Christmas gifts takes place in the evening, amidst general enthusiasm. We are all pleased, and we are very much in love with all of us. I bought a little book for me in Albany which is going to help me in the upward path. "The Imitation of Christ", by Thomasa Kempsis. 359. Dec. Friday 25. 1874. In which we are called upon to be merry. It isn't very easy to be anything we are expected to be. Most of us are not fashioned after that sort. To sit down a whole day and make an attempt to be "merrie" is about as cheerful a mode of existence as teaching Tedie Drake. We don't go to work any such way. We are glad enough of all the little pleasant things that come, make the best of every drop of cheer that trickles down and there's a good deal after all. Some of it mother [wows] in and some of it Aggie scolds in, and I chat mine in, or work it up in [torn] motto cards. We have a cosy chicken dinner and the day is hereby honored. 360. Dec. Saturday 26. 1874. In which I brood. I talk about things a little and then I keep still and ponder. I recommend the latter. So does mother. In the evening the Episcopal Sunday School designed to make our pleasures more. An important [feature] was my [hat]. It was introduced to the rector's wife. Hers was not like it! Aggie wishes I'd get another one ready to wear. Mother says, "yes, but your hair always looks so." I will gratify their most unexpected demands before Mrs. Cook gets through with me. The evening mail brings a letter from Satie. Very sweet and full of her best love. 361. In which I come to a great calm. It isn't quite as good as the Sundays in the white house with mother all to myself, but its nearer to those darling days than I've been since they were no more. There's a sacredness about everything, even the little things we touch and handle. 362. Dec. Monday 28. 1874. In which I do just as I have a mind to! I have better success in this when I practise chiefly on the one girl. Circumstances and other people are not so easily managed to my mind! Mother doesn't recommend the European plan in all families. We eat one at a time and each one eats a great many times. It keeps the general supervisor stewing in more senses than one! I don't do anything long at a time, so to properly decide what I would probably be doing at a stated minute could involve much integral calculus. Mother sets her foot down that Aggie must trim my hat. So I sit down like poor Mr. Briggs. If I had an Aunt Glegg and an Aunt Pillet they would be summoned and asked what is to be done with Fannie's hair. 363. Dec. Tuesday 29. 1874. In which I have hurries to stay. I feel like as if I didn't want to go back. The things I fled from do not awaken in me a desire to depart and be with them. This is indeed valiant! How brave you are getting to be Fannie! I am trying to impress on mother the advantage of taking Mip Withington in this winter, but mother won't be convinced! I've been trying to tell her that she won't need to prime the cistern. All this labor can be avoided with Flora here. Besides she could suds the clothes in a new and novel way. Mother little knows all her advantages. I go to a Social Sing and it makes me feel good all over. Real good soul-stirring hymns you know. What did I care though the wind blew in my face all the way home!364. Dec. Wednesday 30. 1874. In which my thought rests itself in a present Help. This suggests time to think. This long breathing space does me good. The thoughts that come to me out of the stillness are full of Jesus. I have felt all day like saying "My Lord and my God". For the outer parts, there have been things to hinder as well as things to help. Aggie whews around like a March wind getting in readiness for the [Reunion] doings at Albany. I have finished my course as regards Reunion doings and am content to stay at home and have the pain across me in peace. Mother stands ready to take all the little stitches or little [jawings] just whichever comes and by and by the girls get off. Mother tugs up coal and rakes fires, is scarcely ever seen without a pail of ashes. This is her poetry of life. Also fixes over old socks. 365. Dec. Thursday 31. 1874. In which the last beam glitters on the rail. We go farther back than the page and remember that the chapter closes. The year now dying, has been in some ways a significant one to me. I think I have learned more than ever before the weakness of myself. I think I have learned to ask more than ever before to be gentle, and lowly in spirit. I have gone through sorry valleys to learn. I grow tenderer as the year goes from us. I think indeed we all grow closer to each other. This year has kept us all to one another, and we bless it with all the blessing of our hearts. There may be a desolate place next New Year's Eve, only God can tell. To Him we connect the past and from Him shall come the help for the days to come. "As thy days so shall thy strength be."Cash Account - December. Fare to Ann Arbor By Saratoga 17.18 By Troy 15.19 Invitation of Christ Thomasa Kempis. Lee and Shepard. A.L. Stewart Broadway 4th Avenue 9 and 10th Sts.Abutilon striatum Yellow cup-like leaf-some like maple sedum ternatum, white dark [s...] bones small three of a [node].
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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Date: 1877
Text: F.M. Bromley Dec. 30, 1876 "Aggie""How great truth is and how little empires are" - "Retribution may come from any voice: the hardest, cruelist, most imbruted urchin at the street corner can inflict it. Surely help and pity are rarer things, - more needful for the righteous to bestow." Interpreting all things [largely] like a mind ... possessed with high belief". The worst drop of bitterness ... []ver be moving on to ... ... from without. the lowest depth of...
Show moreF.M. Bromley Dec. 30, 1876 "Aggie""How great truth is and how little empires are" - "Retribution may come from any voice: the hardest, cruelist, most imbruted urchin at the street corner can inflict it. Surely help and pity are rarer things, - more needful for the righteous to bestow." Interpreting all things [largely] like a mind ... possessed with high belief". The worst drop of bitterness ... []ver be moving on to ... ... from without. the lowest depth of resignation is not to be found in martyrdom. It is only to be found where we have covered our heads in silence and felt - I am not worthy to be a martyr, the truth shall prosper but not by me""The mills of the gods grind slowly - but they grind exceeding small"_ "And then the sunshine of thy Father's home"_ [My] new one - "born to the purple" 1. January 1, 1877. We have come to it again - this first of things - We stop a moment to look about _ long enough to see how sure our footing is - and what of cheer or courage we have for those who are within reach - and then we hurry on - I've found out how the courage of me - is the courage of the souls that live near it _ How that good-cheer is nothing short of an atmosphere _ and even of a little patience the world has need! We are here at the top of our long hill - yet mother calls it "the pinnacle: The worries that we began last year with are most of them here to start out with us again - We dont get out of and beyond them very fast _ The currents of Folk have scarcely changed _ Grandma is a little stiller - in her chair behind the stove - [G]. a little surer that the storms are in the lower strata - We shall get above them by and by - I have reason to be more sure of a few things than I was a year ago. - "I tell you that One [knocked] while it was dark""I believe nothing lifts us so far forward as pain." 2. Tuesday, January 2, 1877. The utter complete spell of silence is broken - and somebody has sent me a written communication - Huldah is noted for breaking silences _ Its her voice grim and insuspicious that comes summarily into dark mornings - Her alarm is that it is six and something and I am too nearly gone to contest the point _ usually _ Her letter crows some and cackles a lot _ They've been dressing up down there and playing they were people and I almost feel like going back to the V.C. The spirits that wrap you up and delight to fill your soul with uncomfortablenesses have possessed the girl with the "[oppydass]" to-day - none of us have known the way to break the spell - Dan comes up to supper whistling the shadow Dance - There's a certain twinkle in the boy's eye - I think he's got a cricket in his pocket - The rest are doubtful - He has fooled them too many times before - every few minutes he breaks out whistling - every few minutes we laugh - "Dan give it to her" Then he whistles - by & by he says - "Ag, who do you know in Cincinnati?" - This ... [two lines of writing in left margin]"I am the Door, by me ye shall go in and out" _ 3. Wednesday, January 3, 1877. This is an unexpected pleasure surely. I'm on a hunt after missing cards to fill out History sets - and I'm a finding them! "Who wants my History sets." _ did you say? _ A woman who flourished in the uninhabitable regions of Northern Vermont - Julia Miller knows her - Also Ella Mills knocks at my gates for "pamphlets" please. I find 38 pages - write up the rest - and [tool] them all off _ Its a nipping afternoon - my sister is dispatched for tea and sugar - and scolds - My letter from ... makes me feel rich - well-to-do in the world - I won't say that there were any bluish tendencies for her to counteract but anyway I view ... eight pages in the light of a "[]" - "nice itty voyage - nice itty voyage" - sing one "... day" This loses in translation I want my boy to bring a letter from Laura Skinner - bless her - Isn't is a coming?"That is what we wait for - the adoption" _ 4. Thursday, January 4, 1877. It was highstrung weather - a wild old J[e]hn day_ "You don't catch Mary out such a day as this" Mother's way of putting it. It might have been the mother _ it might have been her lord and master - whichever [way] it was - we on the pinnacle didn't say "Aunt Mary"- to-day _ We did say - "How do do, []atie" - and "How do do, George"- Quite an invigorating circumstance. It came into this uneventful current of ours _ the fire in the Base burner No. 12 - starts up - very much quickened - and the curtains come up - There's easy chairs to it _ and ripples of talk. By a preconceived plan they [leave] me _ dealing themselves out in the greatest moderation. As early as three I am out again in the dining room - talking it over with Aggie and [muzzy] _ We say _ "[Dont] it seem funny to think of Annie Croft's being married. _ "Annie Marsh" _ Well that aint our...- Fishes aren't the only things that "[turn] over and over - and round and round." [Evening] - Emma ... and a clatter clatter _ She says _ "how come ..." I [wish] I could - [In left margin] A further installation from []atie - ..."clear fidget is the worst thing you can give up to -" 5. Friday, January 5, 1877. Mother said it was the nicest day we had had for four weeks. So did the milkman. We thought Aunt Mary would be up _ We laid out the day on that plan. Aggie was elaborate on her French twist _ Mother stirred up pancake batter _ (Aunt Mary's liege lord don't allow her to stir any in her own principality) I put a tie on - and a belt _ Grandma sat in her corner and wisely indulged in the remark that as for her part she didn't believe we would see Mary up here again this winter. Now this was not consoling but we live in a world where the thing that is the disagreeable one and the uncomforting - sometimes proves to be the one that happens _ The pretty new basque that goes with my cassimere dress is done - Mother's day was half button holes. It wasn't very inspiriting to say the least. I made a transparency - Then I hung it up - I didn't write diary nor study Latin _ I visited _ [Our] Folk didn't move us down street nor get Aggie a school in Albany _ but then we have to plan campaigns _ before we cross ... to the ... ...As we see hard [lives] and great anguishes here and behold them with a reverence. 6. Saturday, January 6, 1877. When the baked potatoes were in their first glory mother called us up _ You will say _ "how nice" _ but goodnatured as you may be you will say it without half knowing - how nice! I piped up _ "I'm a going to Albany with you Aggie" _ Aggie said "She cant can she ma?" "Of course not" _ That settled that _ Frances attempts a feeble perserverance in de [Orative] "not an atom of sense" in the last well - any number of lines _ She brings up _ and "ties Flora" _ "Aggie's gone"_ She looks out for her long before its time for her to come! Dannie says as he [starts] to shoot off - "O I nearly forgot"_ and hands me - why it was one of the loveliest things out of the []ths. Laura's letter _ Another of the cherished surprises out of life's []cket - whose full secrets we cannot know until we get to the top _ What a new face everything wears for to-day - After all its the hopelessness ... home matters that is the dragging down _ To be among things just as the are - is to know how powerless you are to help them - I [wave] a hopeless [torch] - and -"If we could get out of this world into the nearest edge of the heavenly places would the angels shut their doors I wonder? 7. Sunday, January 7, 1877. "How she ever managed to have the things happen when she was doing such monstrous days' works to smite them all down" _ "..." wonders scarcely less than I _ who have rashly entered upon a diary for '77 - "Monstrous" Well _ I comprehend - This business is like rent _ never paid up There is every assurance that a thaw is begun _ We get a little rain _ then a little snow _ then we take them mixed _ Dan remarks that the wind is in the northwest _ Mother speaks up _ she was "a good mind to move to Albany" Aggie's drawings are fiercely that way _ It begins to look as if something would be done about it _ as we gather up all the little "why" threads _ In the meantime there are "spaces between" _ I read Patience Stong's Outings _ picking at it here and there _ in the pauses of talk _ Aggie is wonderfully "chipper" A mighty helping Cricket's determined little [sent] raves madly on _"Yea - even [long]eth"_ 8. Monday, January 8, 1877. It can blow here - blow "great guns" on any and the slightest provocation! The world was sloppy in the morning _ a goodness gracious sort of things on the whole _ In the afternoon - nothing unusual only a shift of the wind and some freezing _ but the night came raining and pitching in - and your hair could easy stand on end! And there we'd a party on our hands _ The day was sort of [drefful] _ a rasping away on some of the soul strings _ I am sorry Aunt Mary came now _ The place of green cont[]t the "[]ch grass" in to-day was the time I was writing to Susie _ Our rocking chair insisted this evening on some general exercises of its own _ I've already promised it out several evenings ahead _ it has such enlivening abilities. There was shouting to it - (our party-) _ a staying up late, and spirit!_Thoughts of the sweetest, saddest thing 9. Tuesday, January 9, 1877. You go to bed feeling that the world is rocking in ... fashion - You feel perfectly sure that it will be rocking in the morning _ You sleep on past everything _ When you get up you find a long ... of sunshine has gone and a ... lovely little lull over the world. You don't know whether you have an idea of marching, ... P[] _ or not _ On the whole your ideas are mixed up That sick headache all night won't let you be strong to-day to dare - You'd rather have the pretty blue comforter over you one day more _ "Tell her I'll go" ... worry" Mother [makes] some of my dress [barrels] more conversations _ and brushes a couple of dresses _ and when its after supper and nobody there but us - we fold up the things and dear me what immense bundles. It will ... sublime management to get them to the ... parlor on the [first] []th ! We must be "chipper" Fannie It will be summer when we come again _ We go to come back richer _ "isnt it ?" "There is no away" 10. Wednesday, January 10, 1877. You are waiting for your story you say and the years are bringing it _ Have the chapters so far been so full of dark surprises that you stand on the home side of the threshold and fear to cross? _ What have you not gone out to that was beautiful or a joy to have? And [muzzy] and I went down to Albany in the cars _ which you see was lovely for me _ Then we clambered up a fierce array of steps _ and ... bundles ... for aches and ... - and stings at finger ... - That man that stands in the door at the depot to marshal us out will never see these pages but I honor him - He had regard ... my look of beseeching - & let mother go to the very car door with me - Her last words were something about seeing Dr. Web _ and letting her know - and then I moved on to felicities or infelicities I'm in the dark as to which _ sitting up straight as if I had lived a beyond the sorrows of my time and had nothing to dread! No. [I] smiles up at me - Polly and the girls come at me. - and - well there's an example in Trig, with two solutions - six answers ... ... (Line of text in left margin) I spend silent ... with [Laura] Bless her11. Thursday, January 11, 1877. I think it was self renunciation of a lofty type for me to ask Huldah deliberately last night to spring the trap that should make my eyes bounce open at 6-30 this dreadful morning - and then leaden-hearted and leaden-footed to crawl up - and right about- for whatever there was of it! In the first place a match had to be struck which meant twas dark out doors What if you do know that by & by the world will light up - and there'll be help in the hills _ It is nevertheless a strangely real & bitter fact that you are standing with your feet cold - and your eyes swelled almost shut - buttoning a cotton flannel waist - that pinches you - it was a very small alleviation when you found there were "[saratogas]" for breakfast _ Then you were no. 6 in Trig and you lifted up your voice and said "Not prepared" ... did ... ... ... ... to ... how ... the white snow looked with its ... and ...! How you and Laura did ... ... that old example is the ... of - It makes me double all up to think of it!12 Friday, January 12, 1877. Maria, our chamber-maid of yore is lost to us. The new one the girls say is able to be endured! One cheerful thing - Arletta brought some cookies from home _ 324 _ She lays it down to us thus _ "No one must ask for a cookie unless she is faint Then she positively refuses to let us get faint _ The moment the bell rings for meals she [whews] us all off to take in provision _ The designing girl! I haven't seen a red ant yet! Our girls put .. a great deal of "I know all about it" _ to me and say its the man " what man!" You see I'm not up in college news _ "The bug man" _ This is all I can elicit _ but I venture to add here that he's some wild kind of pied piper - who exists as a terror to all the Formica* race! At half past seven Letty sent us all out & told us to knock _ We did. Then she said - You must take hold of hands and [go] [around] the table lock-step - & if you see a bundle with your name on it, grab! *Formica is a genus of ants ubiquitous in the temperate region of the northern hemisphere."To be weak is to be miserable" 13. Saturday, January 13, 1877. ... approve of this - The new blue and white in your room ([grabbed] last night) is a pure sensation The [givers] are the girls who room across in a Sophomore class meeting - You leave it with your usual uplifting of spirit _ You thank heaven for [pluck] and don't feel bad but a few minutes. You're in Laura's room when the twelve strokes sound _ []ing up the mysteries of Book II - chapter 34 _ trying to make sense! Mrs. Livermore* gives a talk in chapel on "Superfluous Women". Blessed are we among girls to have heard it! _ It is like her to stand and push apart the briers and bushes - and show us glimpses of the glorious upland winding ... _ The way that is the only royal way - ... be ... by those who shall be kings and priests unto God _ when the time comes _ We need to have such as she push back the thick grown shrubbery now and then. She begins - We who are about to die salute you! (right margin) Laura's birthday ... *Mary Ashton Rice Livermore (1820-1905) founder member of the American Woman Suffrage Association and president of the organization between 1875-1878"It is reserved for ... God and the angels to be lookers on" (Bacon)* 14. Sunday, January 14, 1877. To-day comes too soon after yesterday for you _ You wanted the dear Sunday stillness to take up yesterday's legacy in and ponder the things in your heart _ What you did get you could have waited for _ [and] put into some Sunday morning when the President was explorative _ and talked on conscience _ We dont have things our way _ Prof. Backus talked to us out of the deep places there are in him. There was heart and soul and feeling in his sermon and the hearts God had touched [felt] their way to the cross with him _ A severe talk on the married state - all there - Laura too - comes to the [wo]ful summing up - "Its a [wu]zzly world" Laura thinks the right [ones] get joined - not often to be sure _ but now & then - Huldah sets her foot down _ "None whatever" We are [sure] the projection of the great circle of hopelessness crosses our celestial equator - both in and as we turn reverently to Matthew in Greek - There's no hopelessness there - no dragging down sensations "Come to me" it says - [Well] we are tired children & He knows! *But men must know, that in this theater of man's life it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on. Francis Bacon (1561 - 1626). 15. Monday, January 15, 1877. It did have streaks of disaster in it _ You were handled a little rough to be sure _ but then _ how do you expect you are going to sing "Increase my courage, Lord" if there isnt ever anything a happening _ to make courage and lots of it _ the thing to have _ You were torn up by the roots when you got out of bed _ and you lay around loose on top - for all good you were to any subjects necessary to be contemplated _ Its my stopping to be so wise for a little _ I suppose there's a cold at the bottom of it _ but how or where _ this is unsnarlable Its Laura that packs up 82 and brings it down stairs for my present comfort I howl all the night through (this may properly belong in to mourners recital) howl as if the evil genius of the stormy night which is in its fierceness upon us - had gotten hold of me - 16. Tuesday, January 16, 1877. We arent going to have any mournfulness about this business You've got it in hand[] and we see you wriggling it through - Trot right along _ You march up to Prof. Braislin* and stand there gladiator fashion _ What you're to impress her with is that you embraced a [jug] last night and not Trig _ aches and not cosines _ She doesn't act as if you were confessing incendiarism to her - and you sit down meekly as is your wont. You perservere through a half a chapter thoughtweighted Thucydides _ with Laura _ and then her good angel comes suddenly down _ It enlivens the world by keeping you up from tea _ causing you to sit at a famous little supper in 82 _ and letting the blessedness there is hovering in loose places in this world _ make an open place before you You go to bed at seven or so and ache the dreadful[] all night - but then _ (left margin - and Aggie's precious little ... [is dead] _) *Priscilla H. Braislin, Vassar College mathematics professor, 1865-188717. Wednesday, January 17, 1877. Notes from Dr. Wag[]'s talks _ "Too far east is west, Too far west is east" The Greek is the author of everything beautiful in the world _ now as in the days of Pericles. (Don't believe it). Rome gave the cupola_ the upper Rhine, the dome, The spire is dominant in Eng. "Hic, haec, hoc" in the textbook; but [gum]ption is a rare thing. Egyptian obelisk is a sunbeam in ... _ Greek Doric temple is a master-piece of human art - solidified beauty, ... out come and not a put-on _ ornament constructed _ Talent is the agent of science - art the product of genius - The Greek created, the Roman constructed - Greek temple has its decorations in its moldings, its [fea]tures _ moldings sections of curves - Gr. Segments of circles _ Roman What can be done with a tool - talent by brain & hand - genius. Arched architecture Roman - Lintel - Greek palaces of glass & iron exact types of modern society - Benedictine - the schoolmasters of the world 20. Saturday, January 20, 1877. You thought you would treat yourself to a day on the bed _ as if there were something to be got out of it_ You could just be there you know _ or you could take yourself into "Annals of a quiet neighborhood"* _ How lucky you were to get it last night. The girls all came in at twenty minutes to 12 _ and you properly hoisted up and propped, read to them []arlyle's Hero Poet.+ After dinner Huldah came in and brought her sewing _ As for things to rejoice over _ the jug of hot water was one It stood for _ and emphasized larger givings _ Then your shoulders couldnt be cold any more _ for why? Polly's comforter _ Yes, yes, things have worked round _ given time enough _ you judge that now the massive pile that confronts you will crumble _ You are tired to the very centre of you - of [toting] the acropolis around! ... in such a sense - how uplifting! *1867 novel by George MacDonald + May be from Thomas Carlyle's Heroes and Hero-Worship, 184021. Sunday, January 21, 1877. The President preached to us on the unity of the church _ Text _ "One Lord, one faith, one baptism - one God and Father of all"_ It was a better sermon for the intellect than for the heart. The dear, great-hearted tender-hearted man. Why is it he don't take hold of us further down and stir the deep places? One word from Prof. Backus* _ with a ... in his eye _ and the feeling in his voice _ and we are all melted down. The sun is shining on us and though we are a good ways from spring and in the midst of a biting air _ the very brightness will make us think of days long and bright - when promises of blessedness shall be again fulfilled! When I said _ "You were [real] good, Laura, to come and stay with me so long" _ she told me very soberly that it was not good of her to be good to herself" It may have seemed an hour a little dear to her who has so many here that ... bright[] in her shadow _ To me indeed it was a great deal_ more than an hour a little dear. The [opening], [sweet] life with the hard question _ Did you [ever] have a year when everything that you had [discarded] came all at once? *Truman Jay Backus, Vassar College professor of Rhetoric and Literature, 1867-1893Flowers _ (from "12",)April 12.22. Monday, January 22, 1877. Well _ another worry has slid down and out of sight _ The history work did arrive at Chipman's Point whither it was marshaled forth _ and the upshot - outcome - of it is three dollars and ten cents. This is an event! The 36th chapter is hard. Yet _ a bliss for every plunge down the shaft we come up with a shining grain! This pays ...! We are all down at the end of the table together _ I didn't tell you, did I? Life at meals is less a nemesis [a] theory _ ... even are something - even in a world we soon go out of! Coasting is still the rage _ 'Why what do you slide on?' the innocent say _ the people who don't "compreney-vous"! "On what? why on what nature has provided to be sure" You perhaps don't know _ that this last came from Laura's Polly _ Moonlight - moonlight and nothing to call me out in it![upside down at top of page] A letter from ... Lake - 23. Tuesday, January 23, 1877. Let me see _ The home letter had to be attended to as I thought, on the spot. I went at it at the 6th period - but didn't pull it through. It lays over: The transports of a half an hour out doors on Paddy Hillard's sled I could not forego _ The half hour, the sled, the transports were held out to me - I took them - and grew happy _ thr[]e! There was a world of enjoyment _ lying open to us in that masterpiece of Pericles! Not open in any sense without Liddell and Scott and a good deal of C[] and Hadley _ but there to be worked for - just as most everything else is _ if its worth having _ We were in magnificent ... for it _ and the night came up our sky _ never with a sweeter blue - or lovelier gray borders - or pink touches and suggestions _ ... all these .... lately I ... ... the blue - I can't get the Trig example - I ... sat and stared at it two periods and about made up my mind that it is Frances versus example!24. Wednesday, January 24, 1877. To be sure you didn't have your Trig example _ but as Laura says _ "That's nothing"_ You proceed along the halls up to class - wishing you had it _ though you are awfully dumb on the subject. Some example for Friday says the sharp-eyed professor in drab. You may get it! There are ... in the other ends of the world, pieces of stories _ prayers for light upon the path _ Rhoda has ... me again _ and her perplexities knock at my gates and say "May we come in?" _ No - little ... - I cannot straighten you out _ I haven't hold of the end of the thread you see - that's in better hands than mine! Another little supper in Laura's room with her _ You peep into "Sights and Insights" while Laura lays the cloth and brings out the cunning little china cups _ she buzzes about and you call it "being out to tea" _ and forget that you are a sophomore with aspirations _ and trigs _ a minute to forget in.The religion of Christ is the religion of the Divine Love. 25. Thursday, January 25, 1877. For steady help from outside give me a day of sunshine _ It is impossible to feel that you are fighting single handed and alone _ as long as there is sunlight that will not forsake you - Well _ we have begun and ended the day of prayer _ There's a good sound in the name. Why all our days are not called this _ is no fault of God's - Prof. Upson of Albany - a short man with a keen eye - and a beard growing gray _ Those awful words _ they [run] about with me - they stamp the day with an oldtime fearfulness - "And those Capernians who are exalted to heaven shall be brought down to hell" _ "Culture without Christ" _ How quiet we are living knowing believing these awful things - How still we keep_ The exhilaration of my hand sled ride is still fresh upon me _ A touch of the pleasantness that lives out doors of things - There are lots of things you wanted to do _ that are left over _ left over for when - We will see - meantime we are glad _ glad for life just as it is this minute!_26. Friday, January 26, 1877. As a parlor we are in disgrace_ Miss Hiscock saw a light from the outside at an hour altogether unseasonable! Letty not disrobed answered her knock_ Polly was just holding up a lamp-lighter to light it from the gas in the parlor_ Letty says- "She didn't light it _ I don't know why I didn't ask Miss Hiscock in _ I don't know why" _ Miss H. was determined on a ... - and gae it. Laura - periods 1 and 2 busy with Trig _ It grows uncompromisingly dreadful ... the ... of her and she says _ "Himmel" "What is Himmel?" "Himmel," says Miss Laura - is Heavens _ a very bad swear whatever There's anotice a new one in masculine handwriting - posted in the water-closet _ to the effect that persons using the water-closet shal hold the knob up half a minute. Letty comes in, sits down and counts up - half-a minute twice a day - a minute a day _ half an hour a month _ 4 1/2 hours in a year _ pretty hard in ... really ... Huldah we get the proposition that each of us do it all up at once - a proposition well worth thinking about _ Laura bids me farewell for an indefinite period. anticipatory of water tanks _ and a Freshman essay - Miss Hay[] has a cold - dreadful of to kind ... has a hall-meeting ......there!Until He says - "Come up higher, let us sit at the foot of the board" 27. Saturday, January 27, 1877. Undermining forces are at work again _ and you are not in any sense enjoying the satisfaction of our up-grade You've heard about such days before - You and Trig journey to room D _ and hold communion with each other _ Two [weeks] ... of such _ Our reading circle has got rid of considerable of its much needed enthusiasm in the march of time. We took Swift's "Tale of a Tub" very hard _ and now that we are making off - and going into Carlyle for a brief space - it takes the ... of a most dilapidated [wardrobe] to get us together - and even then we insist on supplementing the author with a few asides _ These things ought not [so] to be. It comes to me by a circuitous route that Laura is no longer dangerous - it is ready to be copied! I finish "Annals of a Quiet Neighborhood" This week though it ends with a full ... has had its hard places - but which one would I have had left out, if I could. It has been given ... the quiet little story to help me on in mine! 28. Sunday, January 28, 1877. It was good to you - so good to feel that whatever there might be before or behind - to-day you were in the pause _ It was a day to be remembered out doors _ Snow and sunlight make lovely combinations _ and such sunlight! Can it be we are yet two months from April? The President gave us plenty to think of in his sermon "Without faith it is impossible to please God!" I ran in after dinner a few minutes to see Miss Reynolds in 13. She has a great many sick days _ but what I started to tell you was this: - "If I could go home, she said, "and stay a year or two years I could get entirely over this sickness _ get perfectly well. but I can't! I mustn't _ I must work or get ready for work" Here's another to add to my calendar of - shall I say saints? I was in 82 _ considerable _ It happened through the []worthy[] getting it done - Miss Lord's letter ... Laura says _ "My heart goes out to Fanny Bromley_"29. Monday, January 29, 1877. A Monday morning without the Monday morning dreadfulness _ not so much fun in getting up as there will be when the sun comes early - and sends loving goodmornings - but _ well brought up _ and good to promise . So we ... and walk up to breakfast pliably! I threatened to put Laura Skinner in my "memore" so I'll have to _ I hoped to see that she got a little sleep - not having taken any lately - so I put her to bed - did it well too _ Presently she appeared at the door with her cloak and hat on _ It was a hopeless case _ and I could be in dismay _ There was nothing else to do _ I went determinedly at Trig review _ 80 pages _ I felt around for Spartan blood _ [Well_] results aren't firm - I got together some grit - and it answered every purpose! - Night - a quiet soul resting sky - the sun going down in no flashes of glory - no ... of kings - but in soft shades - and [hints] of peace - Parlor ... don't talk much to each other - we are all having a hard ... over something for to-morrow -30. Tuesday, January 30, 1877. "There are passages in my history" remarks [Earl] at dinner "when I feel like taking you Fanny Bromley by the heels and throwing you over into the lake" We will not say what called this forth _ but you were mild in your reply. You meekly suggested a ... be tied around your neck and you be allowed to drown This might have come from your preeminence in fizzling this morning! It pays so to fizzle when you've studied Trig and nothing else for three days _ nights included! You take [refuge] in the shadow of a few thoughts greater than the thing that cast you down! Laura _ and then there comes up a great big "bless her" - from the soul to me! _ Pericles grows enchanting - with her to read it with _ We stick on the 89th _ Laura says she's a sleepy cat so she takes to the bed and tells me about the "row" - in Phil [n]ight _ gets through - say - half of it _ Another lovely little "..." up in her room _ "I am you bet" 31 Wednesday, January 31, 1877. The way January leaves us is through the deeps _ There's some sun and some fog _ I guess twas ten minutes before dinner when the girls came in and sat down in my room for a "between time" _ All but Huldah - she never has any between times. Laura proposed a burial of herself in Trig _ Probably accomplished as nothing has been heard of her _ I did too _ Twas kind of comfortable - the hot bath and getting into my brown dress for tea _ Earl is wrought up on a "philogical[sic] research" to wit - the difference between subjective and objective - She comes to the door "to ..." (Greek ...) in a felt skirt & striped stockings - wants to know if the slop-pail the most prominent object visible is subjective or objective _ Our logic is not [mighty] at life P[] - about:32 32. Thursday, February 1, 1877. Well - how's things? If you've got anything comfortable to boost us up with _ how very wrong of you to withhold it optimism! I have ..." _ Farmer Bassett's Romance* with Trig digs tagging on behind and calling out of the deep. Before that story was a pure delight _ Out door exercise accomplished to-day by means of the cart _ trundled up and down the gym-path _ Its a sloppy day _ It took you the whole previous afternoon to make out your wash list and to see the Dr. The latter object unattainable! How do you feel by this time? We live in a world of illusion. There's one reality about it at present that never fails to impress you - Prof. Braislin's martial spirit in going at things - We quake but we live! * Story in Saxe Holm's Stories by Helen Maria Hunt Jackson, 187433. 33. Friday, February 2, 1877 The snow-storm you want doesn't come yet _ There's a smoky look in the sky like the April mornings _ If anybody wants to look and particularly don't want to see sloppiness and gri[]y snow - she will have to look off _ to the tops of the hills - You feel as if you must look to-day _ as if the way lay out _ and yonder: It has not been an overwhelming day _ It has been freedom in one sense - leaving out for one day that pain that has not left you for weeks _ That has made all you did so hard _ You almost know for a little [breath] what the better day will be! Prof. Hinkel does not find himself very fond of you _ He picks _ but there you don't mind long _ Laura and I read the whole of chap 89 and talk in between. We feel properly ... Alphas hall meeting was ... some - Polly and I enter into it with spirit - By the way - when operettas are good you have quite a fancy for them -34. Saturday, February 3, 1877. You don't propose to look upon this Saturday in any light of pure utility_ This is not a cheerful standpoint. The Sophomores are wise - For President Miss Teel* 25 _ Miss Blake* 9. Quite as it should be you remark. You have not yet outgrown the cares & responsibilities of Trig. There's a week more of it _ You sit by your big window with the blinds all thrown open _ and Huldah comes in _ and with your eye [imagined] at the end of an axis _ the infinity end _ you begin _ What matters Trigonmetry to the strong? The aptness of this loses in getting to Huldah in the rocking chair. You again don your wrapper for a dreaded interview with Dr. Web which was purely mental wrestling - no Dr. no interview! Senior essays _ Do you suppose that E. D. could drop her E. [Deduces] _ Dont think it! "The ...of those who live with quiet people" * Jessie B. Teel, Sallie T. BlaKe"I go this way, but once!" 35. Sunday, February 4, 1877. Titus II - 4.* Severely practical _ An exposition of the dangers of mirthfulness _ in short a sermon from the President on "giggling" "The animal that is a perpetual [grinerer] is not a man" Other passages with tendencies similar _ Proverbial gigglers in ... to church _ mostly _ "its a lovely day Fannie _ wish you could go out" _ Have not attained unto any such paradaisical borders _ yet nights I dream of walking. It is as if the one blessing that the day desires must not be wholly lost to me. "Edith is going to read some of Edward Everett Hale's Christmas Stories - dont you want to come up?" _ Inclination needed proofs _ supplied by the maiden who wanted to know _ "a very young Freshman" _ Four verses of Greek mixed up with a good deal of people that [roam] in and out!_ I have finished Ida's letter _ *That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, King James Bible, Titus 2:4 "Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise - God help me" ! * 36. Monday, February 5, 1877. There are spots of bare ground in sight - a thaw has started - No ride - no cart - or to be logical - no cart - no ride! Moreover it was an entreating apres-midi! A review of Herodotus is about to be entered upon. I like this way of [t]aking it _ viz_ me on the bed _ pillowed _ Laura with dic. ... and most of it _ mind _ [given] me exact meanings - and explain the optatives with or without " ... the purely receptive _ Then we had crackers and beef tea and jam up in her room! Evening _ Corridor meeting and then absorption _ I'm taken to studying in my room nights _ with the door shut. Laura came down and read Herodotus to me until Freshman prayer-meeting. Myself in an uncomfortableness to-day _ If I only could feel better - * attributed to Martin Luther, 1521"I will not leave you comfortless" * 37. Tuesday, February 6, 1877. You surely haven't lacked for sunlight _ It has been about you every where _ " A beautiful vast window is yours _ where the morning" can come in : There's nothing very inspiriting in the home letter _ but my heart don't go down _ It can stay up when its helped _ God cares even for our sparrowy troubles _ Laura called my attention the first thing this morning to the tense of the Greek verb in the verse "I will come to you" * It is present in the original "I come to you". It was sent to me - this _ I needed before the day was over _ to know it _ not that anything hurt that had not been here to hurt, but it did me good to have the troubles ... together and let me cry a little while. It was good to have Laura's shoulder to cry on - The dear child. It seems as if I could endure hardness as a good soldier - for a long time now. * John 14:18, KJV"We thank thee for the hymns that we can sing together" 38. Wednesday, February 7, 1877. "The swelling thereof" You needn't think about it quite so much only I spose you can't quite help it _ when you feel so pussed up _ inside _ ... pussy-willow _ its a grief that will make itself known. Trig examination for to-morrow _ Huldah knowingly _ "what do you spose she'll ask" I give it up _ The student's association send in petitions _ "Give us _ O give us Friday" _ The shortest speech we ever heard the President make was on this occasion _ " I have received a request from the student's association which is granted _ There are so many tired girls lately . ... ... tired out cries _ How good it seems _ to think of a little let up! Went to "twenty minute" meeting with Laura and Lizzie Cohn _ Had supper on a dear little light stand in L[] Wheeler's room - Laura ministering into me right my ally39. Thursday, February 8, 1877. [Drawing of two female figures - one says "O! I'm going to take Miss Bromley to ride!" the other says "What does all this mean Miss Abbott?"] * [Lettie] is one of the unquenchable lights in our constellation _ It is easy to deduce this from the above _ Her feather in the engraving presented sticks up none too straight _ There is force in this! - "Trig" is over and gone - another thing! The examination did not bear as strong a resemblance to the "Assyrian that came down"+ as we had darkly pictured _ There was a slight disparity between the number of minutes and the number of questions, however - which added to the uncomfortable spots in its last moments! How we've laughed to-day _ But we only sit still to-night and grow very tender To think that this was coming !_ * Mary Merriman Abbott, class of 1878 + From "The Destruction of Sennacherib" a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1815 in his Hebrew Melodies, based on an event described in 2 Kings 18-1940, Friday, February 9, 1877. I was sitting at the table out in the parlor trying to write a little note to Laura - it seemed as if I must write it as if I never could tell her. but Polly had met her in the hall and presently she came in. "What is this - Frances - what does it mean?" _ I took her into room"d" _ in the very sight of our darling Greek books _ and in the sacredness that has come there _ since she came so much _ The girls said "Let's put by everything and just have a good time till Fannie goes _" So Parlor 12 ceases to be a work-day world _ and all its borders become holiday land. The ark is brought up and it opens its yawning gulf but we aint going to pack yet - After the girls get loaded down with [dresses] to make for the "heathen" and ... succeeds in finding "Saxe Holm's Stories _ and Laura comes down to sit with us and crotchets a pair of little black slippers - we know we are in the L[] Orchard! 41. Saturday, February 10, 1877. We began by taking into considering the necessities of the ark: _ Laura says _ "I am going to pack it aint I?" _ "much as the girls in [No.]12 will let you" _ say I _ with some degree of certainty in my own mind. In about how much that will be - But all any of us need is a little coaxing - Away we go into the depths of drawers and boxes until room d howls _ This will not answer _ we'll do the rest on Monday! - I enter into a conference long and necessary with Prof. B_ in that office of his ... up in the "fourth north"! "It isn't all over for me _ Vassar isnt _ and I may get better" _ This is the best I can do - I cannot see a slip ahead - I can only stand and wait _ to see - Meanwhile the next thing is to go down to the 1st South and read Saxe Holm* with the girls! _ I find room "d" lit up with flowers _ from parlor 12 bless them! - and after tea came in to find a lovely Calla and some English violets from Laura. these things go to my heart [two lines of writing along right margin] ... ... in the morning_ * Saxe Holm's Stories by Helen Hunt Jackson, 187442 Sunday, February 11, 1877. The first thing was the breath of the flowers! _ Then the dawning sense that this was the last day _ that the little Greek books lying in the window meant nothing any more - I got up with my trouble and went out where the girls were - Everything has been very sweet all day _ the girls have taken care that nothing should be left out _ that could help me bear _ My comfort has been thought of and thought of _ until I am strangely confused at being so cared for _ Polly sat with me through chapel - Miss Long was good to let her _ I almost forgive her for the last [squelch] she gave me in view of this! _ I took the little Greek Testament up to Laura's room but we didn't open it to-day _ We talked about things we never got near enough to each other to say before - To see the day die over the top of Sunset Hill - and know that it is the last time for week & weeks. To know ... just how this feels - [Left margin] I asked Laura leave her Greek books in the window ... ... ... -43. Monday, February 12, 1877. It was Laura that brought the little white box down and packed the flowers _ That - I was to carry in my hand : It looked as if the camp chair had got to be helped home in the same way: _The sight of the little Greek books in the window just as we left them last Thursday is more than I can bear - When I am ... I can't look at that window: The last things to get into the trunk, folks to see. Miss Hiscock to leave my dismission card with _ How good I've these things to do _ Almost the last thing Laura takes me for a minute in her room and puts around my neck narrow black ... from which hangs a pretty cross _ Its all over ... It's only a little while and I see them waving to me from the platform _ My train moving slowly out _ One of the very hard times Fannie - the very hard _ It's He [too] that knows it! "O Lord! only to be made like thee in thy great love!" Home where they are also who care _ who care most - Aggie was at the cars44. Tuesday, February 13, 1877. There were two dear little notes in among the flowers _ Laura's hovered over two English violets that she had left kisses on Letty's had in it that sweet poem of Saxe Holm's "It cannot be but He must know About the thing I long for so" _ * My flowers all look sweet and fresh this morning. The calla looks as if it had it in it to live forever _ Last night it was hard and ... _ and we all felt the dread and fear. This morning in the newness it seems a little better _ Mother says "Well I won't give this up yet _ I'll believe there is hope until Dr. Vanderveer says there isn't. It sounds coming from another like a call to courage _ for is it not her heart that has ached the sorest? _ Well _ "We know who has come into the world and borne the pain that was in it" __ * first two lines of "Draxy's Hymn" in the story Draxy Miller's Dowry in Saxe Holm's Stories by Helen Hunt Jackson, 1874 45. Wednesday, February 14, 1877. Last night I woke up in the night and heard mother praying. It went to my heart and it left there all night the [sorr]est kind of an ache _ How can I go and know that she wants me like this. If I were anywhere - anywhere in this wide earth and she wanted me I would come - but how can I - if it is that river that I cross But it is God that she's talking to Her course is safe, with Him - When I get up - I take all my flowers out of the vases - and give them a lovely bath _ and the freshest water _ Then they smile for me all day. Aggie has her work to comfort her - I begin to understand something of what a great thing it is to have work to do. It is nice to have a little time to rest in before I go to see the doctor _ I drop back in the life here at the cottage - just as when I left it only with a worry larger grown _ I had hoped in vain that it would be smaller46. Thursday, February 15, 1877. Before taking me down mother thought it would be well to precede me with some arrangements _ so she has gone down and we have to do without her to-day. This last does not mean anything very enlivening - but we "pinched along" which just expresses it ! "faint yet pursuing" to have this said of you because you washed a handful of dishes! _ Think of coming to this! _ Grandma sits in her corner behind the stove and asks questions! _ I suppose she, too, is worried and wants to bear a part of our trouble! _ Mother comes back to say that Dr. Van is out of the city and I cannot see him until Monday! - It seems an age _ before Monday _ and we are all so anxious! _47. Friday, February 16, 1877. ... _ I keep very-very still_ These are not days for diary keeping _ I would not like to write what I am living - It all looks so solemn to me _ not like anything I can tell _ When I think of these days _ I shall remember it all _ It is not such days as these that we forget! _ Grandma's chair is under the little mantel by the stove _ Here her years creep by _ as softly as the snow falls in the drifted places _ Behind her is the little sofa _ where I lie all day _ Mother's slippers pat-pat on the kitchen floor. It is not the work she is thinking of _ but blessed a thing it is that there are dinners and suppers to get _ bread to be kneaded _ ... to bake _ work of any kind is such a respite! "Talk of something that's greater than living _ of a love that is higher than mine!"48. Saturday, February 17, 1877. I told you the calla had it in it to live _ and it has. Come and see it this morning _ The pinks and the English violets - these too are with me yet _ The roses and the ... had to go _ flowers have such a dear, quiet way of helping us _ Our talk drifts all one way _ We cannot say little surface things and be glad _ We are given sweet gleams of winter sunshine _ Well people go by happy in the freshness _ the crispness of the clear frosty air! Saturday night _ in the harbor _ I _ my boat rocks gently _ as the night comes up _ There are cities full of busy people buying and selling - but I seem out of it all _ with something of the feeling of one who is forever to be out of it- : "Under His wings thou art come to trust"49. Sunday, February 18, 1877. "Our help cometh from the Lord who made heaven and earth - He will not suffer thy foot to be moved - He that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep _ The Lord is thy keeper - The Lord shall be thy shield on thy right hand" * Take these Bible words _ they are such blessed ones! _ bring them here into my life of to-day _ here into the pain that is slowly working into peace _ A hard place to bring them _ The hardest, hardest place O _ ... _ that I have ever known - but it comes like a shining _ somebody is "keeping" me! _ To feel this just once as I feel it to-day _ I do rejoice to be accounted worthy to suffer!" My last Sunday in the brown cottage - for now - I cannay tell when I shall come back _ * Psalm 121:2-5, KJV50. Monday, February 19, 1877. All day long when I can get myself about it I am found picking up the things that are to go to Albany with me and laying them one side - placing the rest back in my trunk - as they are to lay while I am gone I feel as if I was following somebody over a thorny path between tall hedge-rows - and yet I know that "it is not a stranger that I follow" - What I am doing to-day - in making ready seems almost sacramental to me - I cannot think. I am bewildered and perplexed! _ The other work at home goes on just the same - It has gone on so thru the glad days and through the sorely-grieving ones _ almost three years _ just like this _ I like to see it so _ To have it to think of when I am not here _ "they are doing so and so to-night" _ I'd like to spend the days that are close by here with mother _ but the other way is best _ we think!51. Tuesday, February 20, 1877. If we were in a picture we would not be taking the train with joy and happy people with "to-morrow shall be as this day and more abundant" in their focus and ways _ It would be among figures moving silently with awe and wonder in their hearts It is not so out of pictures People ... ... sad ... and we never know _ I shall remember to my dying day the way that ... looked _ the ... where I sat and waited for Dr. Van _ and where it was all said and from which we ... out at last _ the little mother and I - What a pitiful little face Nellie held up to me as we sat in Aunt Mary's talking _ She seemed to understand - I watched muzzy's gray shawl and black dress and little [bonnet] with the [veil on] _ out of sight _ I think after that I had the heartache _ That night it seemed as if there could be nothing grander than to have like the Lord Jesus the power to heal one such [as me] as mine _ * Isaiah 56:12 Come ye, [say they], I will fetch wine, and we will fill ourselves with strong drink; and to morrow shall be as this day, [and] much more abundant King James Bible52. Wednesday, February 21, 1877. Aunt Mary lets me lie until the whole breadfast is ready to be taken up _ then she comes in very softly and asks me how I feel and would I like to get up _ Aunt Mary is such a dear soul to come to with a trouble! I feel as if all connection between the busy world and me - were broken - It is purely a case of "lain by" _ We are not made to relish such things - and yet - when we come to take the questions down into the very hearts of us _ who would forego - the opportunity to "endure hardness as good soldiers?" _ I sit by the window and rock some _ lie on the couch and take cut up naps _ some - talk to Aunt Mary some _ not a taxing existance _ A little after dark Dr. Van comes - He is encouraged sufficiently to say that he will undertake my care - 53. Thursday, February 22, 1877. As I said before, my existence is not taxing at present _ nobody expects anything of me - apparently - except to be up to eat breakfast while the steak is hot _ Poor little mother! I can see her every minute _ I know just how she is worrying up there in the little dining room! If God will only let me stay while she wants me! Aunt Mary and I talk a little [in] broken places about ... night long ago _ Of a great pain and a great peace _ "O - God to clasp those fingers close - And yet to feel so lonely _ To see a light upon the brow Which is the daylight only _ Be pitiful dear God" _ * * From the poem The Cry of the Human by Elizabeth Barrett Browning54, Friday, February 23, 1877. I do not like "Hannah Thurston" by Bayard Taylor * - I had a dim suspicion that I would - but nothing would tempt me to read it again _ I thought I should read a verse or two of the Greek of Matthew every day _ but I miss a pair of brown eyes that do not read it with me any more - Something is the matter with it - with the face of things - every where but in the heart of things - It is always glad - th[] How sorry Aunt Mary feels - and how hard she tries - to do everything for me just right _ Helen Bly manifests her sympathy in tail-waggings _ any-way Helen _ don't care how _ ... .... I ... it! Mrs. Sullivan too - has ... of it for me but I can't understand her as well as I can [Nell] - We don't find out some things except from the darkest corners *Hannah Thurston: a story of American life by Bayard Taylor, 186355. Saturday, February 24, 1877. Two things will happen to-day _ I said this to Fannie and ... as soon as the comprehension of time and sense came back _ said it again while I was dressing! _ The doctor will decide whether there's anything left of me to doctor _ and whether he's the one who will make an attempt _ - [at] working in that little Another thing - mother will be down - and will see about my place to get well in! Here or somewhere. _ We took our breakfast as quietly as the folks in France did on the morning of St. Bartholomew's massacre! - This is the way we do _ in a world where we walk from one dark room into the next! All we can do is to listen to the voice that calls from where the light is _ "Be of good cheer _ I have been there and I have overcome!" _ The first thing that did happen was Mary Dodd: _ We [did] ... a minute or two with pater familias and the [knee] -acting attendance There we gave it up! Mother waits [over] all night so as to hear what Dr.Van says _ It is no dark message that he brings - He thinks I can be helped: _ Dear little mother - how [your] heart goes up! _ Mr. Hughes says "no" I cannot stay here - with Aunt Mary56. Sunday, February 25, 1877. It is a very much twisted up morning _ to my mind - Pater-familias and the "son to him" _ held a grim, smoking carnival- (grim to me) which lasted until church time. (There does come a relief for most any woe in this world, if you wait long enough) _ I had my Greek Testament _ and I could sail splendidly away from most every weariness to where "nothing shall hurt or destroy" * _ Yes - Yes! - It is a good time when the dishes are all put away and Aunt Mary sits down to comb out her hair _ and I sit and rock by the window We talk a little about the going away to-morrow _ and say how sorry we are _ that there is no other way _ we say how glad we are for what the doctor said last night _ for the coming of the [new] sweet hope of a better time _ Well _ (Two lines along right margin) Mother completed her arrangements and went home on the horsecar[] ... ... ... bless her! * Isaiah 11:9 They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain57. Monday, February 26, 1877. Well - this is the way it has all come out! _ I am landed at 42 South Ferry St.! My pretty carpet of t[]ted browns came this afternoon and the other things _ They didn't take me over until the room was all ready and the fire built! While Margaret's front romm duly bargained for was being put into a state of winsomeness and grace - I sat by Aunt Mary's window rocking - and telling her that I wanted to stay with her - Bless her dear heart. She would keep me if she could! One like her to love you is a great thing even in a world we soon go out of! _ She comforts me by telling me how often she'll [run] over _ and tries to ... that its the best thing by logic and argument! I am borne in due time to my continuing city on Ed's big truck which happened as a purely accidental circumstance! A hack would have been better - but then! I consecrate the first evening to writing to Huldah _ and no. 1258. Tuesday, February 27, 1877. A very cruel way of waking me up mornings has been adopted _ The setting down hard of a coal-scuttle _ and the dumping of a rattling grate _ these to come into the middle of some"sweet Eden shore" dream! _ Well ! the world as it will be from the "first floor front" _ this - the morning after the first night _ looks some as if it could inspire _ and help a little _ Just think of it _ the days may come when I can walk up and down - the street - where now I can only sit and watch the people who have been blessed of heaven with power to walk! - The snow lies on either side of the street piled up in great ridges _ we have not yet sailed out of the winter of things! _ Gracie trots in and out _ We've not [proceeded] very far yet - in a mutual understanding ! _ but we paddle towards it ! _ Aunt Mary drops in at morning and at night59. Wednesday, February 28, 1877. This is a new way of living _ Its got its uses - no doubt - I think it a very good plan to try all kinds. Starting out it looks as if I should be kept warm - this is well - as if I should get something to eat _ which is also desirable _ as if I should get talked to a lot _ which is not an attractive foreground! _ It isnt a place where there's any living done - a kind of drag for daily bread - which is thrown around on plates when obtained _ with out a comprehension the slightest that there is even a thing as high art _ even in serving _ Any number of [pre]... of persons who have died (most of them in this rom I believe) look down upon me "from the world - Outside theres a piece of sky for me to see as large as one of [Maurices] targets. the old Dutch church with the large street lamp in front - lighted early - sparrows in abundance too and people going back and forth _60. Thursday, March 1, 1877. He marched in _ blowing but not much! _ Plenty of sunshine _ and no noise about it! - Mr. Hughes _ a man venerable and growly _ comes forward with advance dispatches of clean clothes _ also a letter! Don't I wish he'd go so I can have the sweet little talk with Laura? _ It is a lovely letter and my heart is lifted! - Come in from supper. All dark _ man standing there _ I scratch a match and labor with the large globe to be fitted into four brass pegs _ not easily done _ Lo _ my good doctor _ he it is _ He takes a few surveys of my [crust] and interior and says - "Take courage" _ Do I? I fairly soar _ Touch the vaulted blue and tarry awhile!61. Friday, March 2, 1877. Reflections. Sparrows are quite a help _ Are not two of them sold for a farthing? And yet _ that is a wonderful "and yet"* . It occurs to me that Laura and Parlor 12 will not find in my communications that variety which they could wish! _ Look at my diary for instance! This is a dry and thirsty land!** We have [entered] Fannie and me upon a new kind of life _ How a chance to taste the world out of many dishes! It is very slow journeying back to health _ We still lift up our eyes unto hills - "the hills"!*** It takes me a good part of the day to write a letter! * Matthew 10:29 ** Psalm 63:1 *** Psalm 121:163. Sunday, March 4, 1877. Vowed diary should'nt be given up _ Tis to be kept in dribbles _ Chapters no longer _ but heads of chapters! _ Well _ try it madam! _ Aggie and I on a long snooze _ called back to things of time and sense by a [rush] of coal on a new fire _ Presently we get up _ Spells of rain take up - Also "clear off" spells _ The 3d Dutch does not lack worshippers _ We watch ['em] ! 1:30 _ Aggie is off _ Leaves Frances some "down" _ A good deal too much down _ This taking her out of [clover] and sitting her down on bare ground she takes hard ! _ Vassar versus S. Ferry 42 - Evening brighter Aunt Mary _ and a still house - Finished Earl's letter _ a note too to Martin Hayes ... ... -62. Saturday, March 3, 1877. Excuse this tipping over of things _ The child is in a tipsy-turvy world! _ It kind of blew _ an Albany turn to things _ indicative of the whew about business way Albany people get into _ My sister blew in some-wheres in the flood tides of the morning _ this was a helping on occasion! Shall I mention another? The chat with Parlor 12 _ Aggie has business to attend to _ not unusual _ some things to take back doubtless that she bought before _ A pure guess _ but it is probably so _ a fortune teller to see "for fun" _ In the meantime I dispose of myself in a nap _ to be followed by a talking time with Parlor 12 _ Evening _ Aunt Mary came over _ and Aggie was there and me _ all to ourselves ...! _Monday, March 5, 1877. The "cares of this world" are increased _ The new responsibilities consist of pillow shams to be kept straight _ I find I have a great talent for sleeping _ If I keep on, my diary will grow so absorbingly interesting that I shall not only dote on it in future years but leave it to posterity! What a thrill would come over me to turn to this page _ disposed of as follows_ IX. Woke up sleepy _ X. Laid down XII. Still asleep _ II. As quiet as an infant still _ IV. Opens her eyes _ five minutes part IV _ Goes to sleep again _ VI. Rallies _ VII. Retires _ hopes she'll have a good night's sleep! _ Probably does ! Aunt Mary comes over after tea _ Is too sick to stay. Dear soul _ she is too good to me! _Tuesday, March 6, 1877. My bath of last evening was not in vain _ It washed off some innate drowsiness _ There's nothing surer _ Indeed I have kept up a purely civilized air to-day _ Have varied my existence by setting my energies at work on a puzzle _ energies still at it! _ 3. P.M. A knock! The writer reclining _ Knocker enters Ah! Dr. Van This is a thing greatly to be rejoiced in, this managing to get here before dark - I hope I am properly thankful. He acts bolstered up on props not likely to let him fall - This sets me to hoping too: _ Two letters _ Arletta's one _ brim full, running over with the things that I want to be doing _ that it is so hard not to be doing! - Satie's _ Well - hers tells about some thrills she's had _ Has a picture of her in it - No thrills apparent - Evening - Aunt Mary and Mrs. George H[]y.66. Wednesday, March 7, 1877. I set myself up _ to say that as for this dozing business - it won't do! _ So much in earnest am I in this matter that if there's no other way to keep the upper lids up and the down lids down, machinery shall be resorted to _ A postal from Lettie suggesting that I write Parlor 12 _ a daily installment! Think not! _ Pussy willows as sure as you live! _ and there as plain as can be is the writing of my Laura girl _ The darlings _ there's a love-thought for me in every one of the soft white bosoms _ Isn't it good such things can live - can be sent? _ Uncle Eph's daughter exists in [title] only _ Why do you suppose it is I can't write? I just sit over the paper hours at a time biting the end of my pen holder _ The story is in my head _ but it won't write! _67. Thursday, March 8, 1877. And there's my blessed mother come to see me _ She can't wait till she gets her things off before she says _ "I've got good news for you" _ This is such a darling way she has _ She would come all the long tiresome way from the top of the long hill to Fannie and me just for this _ to make me even a little bit glad! Bless her heart _ Mr. Johnson has ... ... with the "presiding genius of Room J" _ and the p.g. says he hopes I'll get well soon and come back _ for when I complete the course he intends to give me a position in his department. How do you suppose Fannie and me feel by this time? O _ it is so splendid _ I pray harder than ever for health! _ And the dear Lord who has sent the good news - will he not send the health? do you want to hear any more about this day - No - you don't _ It is full already _ I didn't want Muzzy to put on her hat and go _Miss Frances Bromley, 42, South Fetty St. Albany N. Y.68. Friday, March 9, 1877. A sending down "of showers, of showers to water the earth"* It might have been the rain - and then again it mightn't _ any way I was dumpish and nothing came to pass to lift me out! Aunt Mary came over or rather dropped in with her yeast-pail _ but she only looked in on us _ and then got up to go _ The postman darted by heartlessly _ and still the rain splashed against the windows! Life isn't long enough for us to have much to do with such books as Roe's "Cloud on the Heart"** _ I was driven to it to-day _ As bad as it is, it is an improvement on "Barriers Burned Away"*** _ He makes his characters talk, and such insipid talks! No Dr. Van here this day _ no ma'am! _ * Psalm 73:6 ** The Cloud on the Heart by Azel Stenens Roe, 1869 *** Barriers Burned Away by Edward Payson Roe, 187269. Saturday, March 10, 1877- To-day the sun blesses us _ Its a good day _ To be sure the river is "a raising" and our ankles may be in puddles in the "first floor front" any minute _ but that's nothing_ A putting in attempt to start "Dr Eph's Daughter" "Dr Eph's Daughter does not get started - I wasn't born to write stories _ evidently! I had my mouth all fixed for a letter mine A. ... _ "Not a drum was heard" _ Did it again at 3 _ the man in gray trimmed with brass buttons said "Bromley" He was the medium between me and Parlor 12 _ which speaks up again! _ "When I get my letter read I am going to dress up" _ you said _ A minute after and in walk Aunt Esther, Aunt Mary and Hester _ If I'd only done it you said! _ Began a return mail to Parlor 12 _ I get quite elated over my chat with Lettie, Polly, Hulday and Ella _ ... elated70. Sunday, March 11, 1877. Good morning, Fannie _ A "good" morning it really is _ leading out into a precious day _ No one to talk to us or bother us much _ and all the sunshine we wanted! Fannie and me! _ We heard the church bells _ sang a little softly to ourselves _ read Mrs. Browning's Sonnets and Poetic Studies _ and rocked ourselves _ It was all still and sweet and solemn _ The [trust] that God sends He sent to me while I was praying _ the sorrow and sin and trouble of the world _ came over me a little as it did to Jesus _ I prayed too for life _ if He who knew the best _ always the best _ could see fit to give it The verse that came as the answer filled my heart with peace - "Whether we live or die we are the Lord's." * * Romans 14:871. Monday, March 12, 1877- No high-water yet _ A bracing item!_ Dr. Van _ before noon - wants to see mother - whereupon I fret a little Watch for letter-man - might just as well not. Give him up _ Just begin to feel consoled a little when Gracie comes in _ with "Here's a letter Fannie" _ from Laura as sure as you live! Also a first installment of Greek prose _ Evening - my boy and girl - Boy with a boil! _ Girl in a state of transport _ "Maggie Mitchell" in Becky Mix* _ to-night Aunt Mary _ a minute "I wonder what the doctor wants of your mother"! * comedy written by Clifton W. Tayleur72. Tuesday, March 13, 1877. We think always in the childhood of our life and far as in the other years that almost the hardest thing to bear - the thing we wonder how we can bear _ is the time when we are told _ "You can never be well again" _ And yet it came to me to-day in the midst of other things _ and the day was like other days _ and we talked and were cheery _ and it dropped out of our talk _ to be thought of in the still bedtime to-night when we should be alone with God This is what the Dr. wanted to tell mother _ and now we know _ the dear, little mother _ dear Aunt Mary and I _ The worst and the possible! "The very present help"* _ It is the Lord _ let him do as seemeth him good _ Dear little mother - well - we have had a nice talk_ We wouldn't have got it all said if you hadn't gone on the 4_45 so I let you go _ smiling at you as you [pass] the window * Psalm 46:173. Wednesday, March 14, 1877. I suppose I can tell how I sat here and sat here - and nobody came and nothing happened _ Began on this exciting life as early as seven-thirty ! How favored I am that I am so well fitted up with things to stir up so as to make things happen _ Thanks to mother for managing it Life at 42 South Ferry "first floor front" isn't altogether a "howling" wilderness while I have scrap-books to make - I make [em]! Aunt Mary and Nellie drop in - just before eight _ Come to see how Fannie and me feel to-day _ Also to talk about going to "..." to-morrow _ night and storm and darkness _74. Thursday, March 15, 1877. All available space is called into use in my present crusade _ to be a deposit or rather a place of deposit for scrap-book "d[]" _ This is why mother is glad to have the affair accomplished while I am in a state of banishment _ I manage to keep an awful looking room without prospective improvement even when pasting begins! Well this is all we've got to tell Fannie and me _ Conversations with the p.g. (presiding genius) also (perpetual gabber) have in them no high flavor. They exist to me as a sort of last feather to break the camel's back _ in which case I am the camel! (but not Lill) 75. Friday, March 16, 1877. Come and rest Fannie Come up into long days leading through vine lands and out into the open country _ You need not have any worries in your heart for this is the court of the King The spring touches me coming closer _ we shall enter presently upon newness of life _ In the morning you say "I will work at scrap-book awhile" _ at noon you say " I will take a little sleep on the sofa _ and by and by the night falls - across the pillars of the old Dutch church - then it wraps up all things - and you have nothing to say _ but _ "when it gets a little later I will go to bed"! We get into queer places _ in the course of the long journey - only "do ... go ... with us _ O, Father ! (Side margin) Aggie came down but, has ... back _76. Saturday, March 17, 1877. We think we're pretty glad to get out _ fanny and me! Not that it has'nt its miseries _ we all know through what tribulation locomotion is possible! but the being out _ the forgetting _ the being a part of something like other people _ that's it! When that young chap brought a satchel & left it here _ I was quite dazed! _ What ... was it meant _ was'nt here nor there _ It did come over me to say after a few whiffs _ "Maybe its Satie" _ Aunt Mary had just got up to go _ "Maybe it is" _ she remarked! Our "maybes" ... it for presently she was on hand also my sister _ also "Em Abbot" 42 was stirred to its profoundest depths! _ Maggie Mitchell in the Pearl of Savoy! _ We quite like it Fanny & me! A bright spot after a month at 42. Where do you spose we are all going to sleep? _ (Two lines along side margin) The day of the ... of Aunt Mary's ........77. Sunday, March 18, 1877. If we had cherished any high hopes ever so fond _ of lying to rest out this morning _ they were dispelled like cherries on trees when small boys live near _ It seemed as if I hadn't slept at all _ when Margaret came whizzing in - setting the coal scuttle down on the oil cloth _ with a great bang _ and letting out the very uncomfortable information that we were to be up to eat _ before Mr. I. was called. I looked up and three heads lay in the big bed in a row! How were they more inclined than I to eat before Mr. I. was around! _ Aggie and her friend got off and Satie and I were left to find whatever we could in the day There was nothing very helpful or bracing up about me _ I was not an inducement to anybody - (... ... ...) We rolled along in a kind of ... talk - and went to bed early _79. Tuesday, March 20, 1877. This having some one here is a new thing for me - It may be a good thing if I don't go into the rashness of talking too much _ Satie after many directions as to where it is and what she shall do when she gets there _ goes up to spend the morning at the ... - It comes about that mother drops in upon me - and we have a visit highly fine. Somehow things [look] brighter _ more like being endured when she has dropped in upon me for an afternoon _ The things that I don't do afflict me even in this do nothing state that I'm passing through Its very well for me that I do have gnawings and uneasinesses when I keep people who are good to me waiting for answers to their letters = though why my dribblings are desirable is ... I know _78. Monday, March 19, 1877. It was middlin early that I was awake - I turned over and asked Satie if she "sposed" that we'd got to get up and eat this morning before Mr. Ingraham did: - We lay sometime - and found out that this cruelty was not to be practiced on us! - Satie goes out in the height of the morning to look around a little and to see what our end of Albany is like She comes back to ... to "mother" and read "The Circuit Rider" _ I try to make myself think that I am molding and fashioning a communication to somebody _ but I ain't _ There's nary [write] in me! _ Mrs. I _ gives us her inspiring presence _ explains the peculiar state of her on the arrival of our guests on Sat. by enforcing it upon us that she was "agitated"! She casts to right to left ... ... in my ... ... in ... not Saturday! I am not meek80. Wednesday, March 21, 1877. It was full of the kind of little things that come like annointings into these days - Laura's letter _ and it came just as we were sitting down to supper _ How could I help growing tender in my every thought outward upon things _ After it I sat down to a comfort talk with Julie _ On the sofa it was - with the night coming up outside _ We can hear the bells calling while we hold each other by the hand - in our quiet speech there in the dark - It has in doings and such like been a day much like the rest _ a little pasting _ a little reading _ broken by sundry nibbles at the oranges _ My light stand makes a suggestive picture there by the stove _ I'm supposed to be writing letters _ but I don't _ I'm not utterly and thoroughly useless for there are the scrap-books you know _81. Thursday, March 22, 1877. To-day our talk is always ... - You know how it is _ thoughts march up and posess us _ and our talk drifts with them _ It is a long, long time since I have thought of ... _ like this _ Aunt Mary comes in with a kind of a whew about her and thinks she must hurry _ but _ do you suppose I let her? - Margaret gives my life a great many variations _ and almost every time she ... in Grace trots behind. I hardly object to this though _ It is quite an alleviating circumstance _ I have quite a [commisary] department _ which I [boss] _ thanks to Satie and Aunt Mary _ Mrs. Sullivan once or twice has brought me oranges - I wonder if I've thought to mention it _ I would not like to forget _ Dr. Van has come again & gone _ I crawl about sort of wearily and dream of the days of ... ... _ and bounding step _ 82. Friday, March 23, 1877. I bring forces to bear _ upon that light-stand there by the fire _ It is really interesting to see ... off of the ruins of Carthage _ Its so easy not to do the things you'd ought to ! _ The episodes are yet the same - There are the same things to watch: _ the sparrows picking up their dinners & God caring - the coming of the pleasant German who rings the bell _ across _ Gracey in her little tiffs with her sister _ the very mysterious man who "likes fat" _ Well - my letter is put in the [green] letter-box in the corner _ how I am ready for a talk - my Satie - girl - Shall we look forward to-night- or back a little? _83. Saturday, March 24, 1877. What a day it was for March! Taking us up in its arms - at ... - as tenderly and carresingly to-day as if it were not sometimes harsh with us - and fierce! When Aunt Mary comes over with her best bonnet on - I say - "Yes _ I am all ready _ I'll have my hat on in a minute" _ she laughs and says "much good it will do you to have you hat on in a minute" just like that! _ Why couldn't the power of walking have descended on me then and there! ... you needn't be in such a hurry Fannie - it will come slowly. Think what a return it will be come how it may! _ You can well afford to pass through anything It came up to this! _ But Aunt Mary isn't saying all this to you _ she's way out of sight by this time _ showing Satie the [lions] of the city and such things! awful good of her! In the meantime I and the light stand are drawn up near the window so writing can be done!84. Sunday, March 25, 1877. I am glad you are just such a Sunday as you are - Give me pieces please out of your best - your very best _ I suppose its not yet _ that we really know what the best is when it comes _ if it is a joy _ a love-message _ a thought of comfort we are sure _ so sure we are being given the best - but if an added pain - what then? Sometimes the very best is a day that "like a desert country lieth silent-bare - No - I suppose its not yet that we really know. Dear Aunt Mary comes over to take Satie up to hear Dr. Bridgman! _ I am proud of her in her dress up clothes _ she begins to have such a dear old lady look_ Satie says the service was very sweet _ So was ... at home on the sofa _ not quite as well to-day _ perhaps _ but lifted up a little _ helped by one who too is sick these days _ yet [sending] ... ... ... _ for others _ like [Fannie & me]85. Monday, March 26, 1877. How it comes in columns _ "Budding morn and dewy eve" and splashed on _ and there's enough left to splash the next one! _ this rain has its mind made up _ But we won't quarrel with it. Last night in the night things were pretty bad at 42 _ Laurie and me got up and left the things of time and sense behind us in a temporary swoon _ How ever we were recalled and were taken beautiful care of _ the rest of the night. To-day we move not about much _ but we're here _ all of us _ and on the up-grade! Aunt Mary comes over with some of her ... broth - and is awful sorry: _ While Satie is up to ... buying up muslin _ in the rain - Margaret sits in the "first floor front" and ... ... [through] all her old love stories []thing for me! _ also in the [rain]!-86. Tuesday, March 27, 1877. Not a very comforting day to start out on _ The blue above has a hard time getting out into sight _ Gives it up! _ Satie gives it as her opionion that she'd better go - "If I wait - it may rain to-morrow" _ Yes - it may - I have no arguments to fetch forward to prove that to-morrow will not be as to-day - or more so! - So with bundle embarking and ... as a sustaining prop coming up to reinfore she is off _ and Fannie & me standing in the door watch her - almost out of sight. Then we come back and lie down and miss something! - Satie has made for all time a place in the affections of the p.g. by presenting her with a sachet! _ "I never had no such thing before" _ what must her childhood have been - d[] of sachets and perfumery?87. Wednesday, March 28, 1877. This rain business is hanging on! There's not a bright patch of sky in the whole heavens _ nor likely to be The sky like a sad child sobs and sobs _ then tears fall again! Begin as my old life again - and the first campaign was planned against Parlor 12 _ It is a cheery talk we have - looking not out upon the driving rain - and the early grey nightfall - but in where the fire is and the lighted places _ It is very still _ too still I am afraid _ It is impossible sometimes to keep all the specters out _ when I am left to my own calms - hour after hour! _ I wonder why _ is it sealed and set against me that I shall have no power of telling the stories that I so ache to tell - ache - with every thought of mother.88. Thursday, March 29, 1877. This mostly ____ Albany, Thursday, Dearly Beloved and Longed-for _ A am here in Albany laid up - here on the sixth week of it! Why don't you talk to me a little? Send me something - a word - a signal, anything - anything but this utter silence I cannot bear. Are you sick, too, and cannot talk much? Is there no way for our ships to speak each other? Is there no longer any fashion of speech between us that shall change my longing for you into rest? Yes - I am here - but better. You can wait for the rest I did not come to you - and I did not tell you any why - For the sake of all that there has been between us do not say even to youself _ "If she had only done differently" _ I cannot bear even the thought of this in you. I have not [by] and the pale of your trust - your perfect trust - in this - love - and you are so strong to do it for me. Pretty soon we will talk again, __________ Your girl! Well Aunt Mary and Margaret have got back from "..."! Here we sit talking. Enter Aunt Mary's patriarch! - A momentary issue - Exitent ...! ... worry up, home - Muzzy, Fannie cares! 89. Friday, March 30, 1877. Yesterday I kept properly dressed up _ and waited all day for the doctor _ My room excellent in its way _ all unsightly objects _ carefully poked under the sofa _ or wash stand _ In fact every-thing according to my house keeping conscience _ in good shape _ the outside of my platter - clean! But no doctor came _ Two such days right along together _ too much for me _ To-day I got my scrap-book out which means on the face of it an execrable looking room and in the worst moment of its career in walked Dr. Van. Well! Afternoon _ I do a rash thing _ walk over to my Aunt Mary's to dine! _ It is worth while _ and I do not [pant] _ even now! We have a fine chatty time to ourselves until long after six after which supper _ after which I am escorted home by the patriarch _ He enters _ Scene - Mrs. Ingraham in earnest _ also Mr. H _____ I think a whole story out after I get to bed.90. Saturday, March 31, 1877. I knew somebody was coming down from home to-day _ which was the signal at once to my amounting to nothing before hand _ and taking a good while to amount to anything at the other end of it! _ I'm "superfluous women" these days _ sure enough! - I thought it would be Aggie this time but 'twas mother - Aggie's sick - poor little chicken. Well _ I [camphored] mother and [corseted] her and Dr. Vanned her _ and gave her the usual list of my ills _ and whether it brightened up the world for her or not I know not _ I'm wofully [sic] afraid it didn't! Dear heart _ it has been having all it could bear so long! _ A beautiful surprise _ a box of flowers from Mr. Spicer, brought over by ... Rice! _ I'm so glad they came before mother went home so she could see them _ These could brighten her _ another ring _ a lovely [Easter] Calla from Satie _"Give us for Thee long pining" _ 91. Sunday, April 1, 1877. (Acts II-24) There was so much "beauty of lilies" about the whole day _ the dear Easter day _ It did not well up strong and full in deeps of sunshine _ It lived in little touches _ it suggested - I thought the day was meant for me and I got ready for it _ My eyes got where they could look up to the [blessed] help hills better _ and my heart _ it saw the Lord _ How rich I am with this day to keep the flowers _ the organ music _ the chants _ Dr. Bridgman's sermon: _ All mine in perpetual possession! The dear communion season - the broken body _ His - the shed blood _ To do it once more in remembrance _ sweet remembrance of Him! Then I came home and sat beside my Easter flowers _ Those days when Enoch walked with God* - how supremely []estful and glad they must have been. We _ with faint breaths of such living are so happy _ If we only did but remember always that this is not our rest _ *Genesis 592. Monday, April2, 1877. Something happened the first thing _ a voice from Room C _ It gave me so much to think of that it sort of drove Thaddy [Trueman] off the track - Poor Thaddy _ I'm afraid you will feel like untying the string around your neck before Thaddy gets through being "Bobby O'Toole" You do not go at him as if you knew how _ Pardon the suggestion in me ...! A long still afternoon - You, left to your thoughts and your pasting and your tears _ a great deal of pasting _ some very serious, deep-down thoughts _ a few tears _ It ended in being sure that not even a bird falleth without your Father* _ My patience can scarcely be called heroic when it aches and is restless like this! And having done all to stand! _ No Aunt Mary _ no camphor! [left margin] And Mr. Hughes ...plans _ unsufficiently propped! Down they go! *Matthew 10:29 KJV Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.96 - Friday, April 6, 1877. - Read Harper's for December and January some to-day. Glad I had ... to read - There's always at least one comforting circumstance in a day. Two graveyard inscriptions ... me - On the tombstone of a man and wife in one of the N.E. burial-grounds is written "Their warfare is accomplished" _ (Jer.6-12)* _ On the gate is written "Here lie the dead and here the living lie". One long blank day _ four walls and a sofa! But rest is sweet _ and underneath _ you know, are the everlasting arms! How could I bear to see the sun of such days come - if I didn't know the "arms" were there. The April touches are around us _ rare and sweet the promises of after fullness _ and harvest time! _ The day _ you crept into a house, Fannie _ long ago _ God is indeed merciful _ To some of life's [sickest] - and [best] he says even to me - "Take" Isaiah 40:2 Speak comfort to Jerusalem and cry out to her, that her warfare is accomplished ... Jeremiah 6:12 And their houses shall be turned over to others, fields and wives together: For I will stretch out My hand against the inhabitants of the land, says the Lord. 97. Saturday, April 7, 1877. I began about the first thing- bending over to pick up my first stocking _ to sort of settle it with myself how I was going to behave to-day in the event of getting no letter from Lake Erie! _ A rather unexhilarating question! It came out that before I and the eggs faced each other that Margaret came in with two postals! _ Rather queer thinks I to myself _ Does she too ... in postals! _ One thing is settles_ She will be here Wednesday _ Now my thoughts hamper scamper in another route _ via _ Delaran! _ Well - its much more comfortable to settle back in something _ So we do _ Fannie and me! Its must be nearly four when Aggie comes _ and such a sleepy girl she is _ up all night to a party! However these little circumstances do not largely affect me keeping on chatting _ even after we get to bed - Even after she keeps saying _ "I'm going to sleep now" _98. Sunday, April 8, 1877. This is an eminently bright world _ Good _ my child _ I approve of your beginning that way! _ No intertuptions please! _ Also an April with some accomodation about her _ It really is no credit to be hopeful and light-hearted on such a day as this - with all the world to help! _ I commenced a letter to Earl - felt like it _ wherefore and therefore _ I can finish it in a few minutes _ all there's left to say! Everybody that passes thinks what a good day it is! They look in at the "first floor front" and it means something happy to them _ even if they saw a sick girl at the sindow a girl that hasn't walked since the Aoril of a year ago. Aunt Mary chokes up when she tries to talk _ Charlie leaves house to-night leaves to stay _99. Monday, April 9, 1877. Couldn't make scrap-book _ no - cause I'm out of paper _ couldn't write much _ no feeling like it in me _ so _ I lay becalmed! _ Saw the world mostly from 42's back stoop _ This to get shone on _ When you come to look at it _ in a time of greater inward illumination _ you discover that it was really the best the world offered you to-day! And you took it _ we hope thankfully _ When people come to wearing wrappers all day - and taking outside life from an inside "first floor front" _ there's a great tendency to moralize. You may have discovered this _ Do you know what I want? I want to see the sky again from Annie Phelps' front door! _100. Tuesday, April 10, 1877. I wonder if there's any such thing as keeping on with this weather - For my part it is a perfect eye-rest and heart-rest _ If there's anything that seems as if it came straight from the hand of God _ it is a day of sunshine! For He maketh the sun to rise on the evil and on the good!* Be ye, therefore, the children of your father in heaven!" _ How lovely those two - fit together! And mother came - and with her Aggie's sack and hat - and all this printing paper! It was nice of muzzy to think to bring it _ nice of her to say - "Go to the Delavan with Laura - afford it _ dinner and all"_! I had to go to bed awful sorry though and fret _ too. I kept the dear little woman so long she missed her train and had to come way back _ ...Brady's tea_store and Battershall's meat_market! She found Hecter & Mary Delamater at Aunt Mary's & brought them over here - but she's a poor, tired little mother & I am so sorry ___ *Matthew 5:45101. Wednesday, April 11, 1877. Yes I am back again_ and way up_ feel as if the one bright day in my banishment had begun _ to live on ... . A whole day away from 42. That alone would be worth having _ We'll take ours, world and people, at the Delavan if you please! _ Quite as good as saying - "Two seats on Mount Olympus _ if you please _ two seats for the day" _ Quite as good! I wrote April 11 _ in the little red morraco note-book _ on the bill of fare _ Both of us wrote it in the "... of gold" _ Both of us said "it will be nice to keep" It would hardly have been complete though without the great-gentle sunsmiles _ the being taken into the warm, fresh heart of spring! Well _ we talked _ There was lots that we couldn't begin to get in! _ Its two months since she dropped in on me to say things! and here we are just ready to jump on the train and be off but the little last words get said and Fanny and me are back to 42. reading a letter from Polly ___102. Thursday, April 12, 1877. And here they are _ brave hepaticas in their pink and purple! the sweet wood-breaths all about them _ I take them in reverently and bring freshness back to their mute faces _ with the cool water which they ... for _ Bless you my darlings _ ... is not the first bright place in 42 lit up by Vassar's touches. Polly's letter that I told you about is full of the Mother Goose party _ 42 is glad to get hold of every word _ Its a fairy story to come to Fannie and me _ in this place! I hurried a postal off up to mother to tell her how nice yesterday was! I feel so good to-day _ yesterday lasts _ Earle's postal tells me they're so, so, so so glad I'm better _ Bless 'em all _ They've helped! A hard day for Laura _ Twas to-day a year ago that the great trouble came to her! The great peace to her father.103. Friday, April 13, 1877. Heidelberg by G.P.R. James _ that is _ pieces of it _ It takes me into pleasant places in the dear, old Rhineland _ : this, too, in a spring of things _ a day alive and gladsome! Pretty soon we shall open to Gil Blas!* The scrap-book business is on my hands _ and through its fields and hedge-rows walks the day _ A long day _ with little []some spots _ All day the wagons clatter over the stones _ quick steps sound on the pavement _ it is a world where people work _ and stir up things _ but I'm not there - I have no part in the busy places _ And yet I am at the bidding of the Highest There's no mistake _ the last command is the present _ "Stand there in the dark and suffer for me" _ * Gil Blas, a novel by Alain-Rene Lesage104. Saturday, April 14, 1877. My tunes are played without variations these days _ and if I want a new tune _ I must sing it myself! _ So ... the orders _ and I, a private soldier, in the lists have nothing to do with ought but the word of command! Something to alter the face of the day _ I said something to come into it that isn't like the rest _ Then Aggie came _ but not to alter the face of the day _ not to bring the something _ for her shoes hurt her feet _ and when this happens what are the woes of others to our woes? Besides she had a ticket for the Almighty Dollar! Well - something will come some other day _ "Let patience", I entreat thee, "have her perfect work!"* James 1:4 But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.105. Sunday, April 15, 1877. You don't suppose I am glad any, do you! On this gladdest of mornings too _ Think of it _ me - who walked a whole square without pain! It comes over me this morning _ the tender significance of that answer Jesus sent to John _ "The deaf hear, the lame walk, the poor have the gospel preached to them!"*_ While Mr. Hughes was at chuch Aunt Mary came over and sat with me _ We had plenty to enjoy out of the day _ We couldn't get out much where the world lay _ but there was no need when the world could come to us _ all in its best clothes too! Then Mattie Rice came over which was also a piece of other people's good times brought a little nearer _ She informs me that Miss C. Harrison of Vassar College has discovered a comet in the constellation Pegasus! So says Miss Mattie so says the ... Press _ I give the evening to Polly in that & some other subjects! _ Matthew 11:5 and Luke 7:22106. Monday, April 16, 1877. I feel quite perched up _ and my heart _ it fairly sings _ To be sure there is no reason why it should not sing on through night and storm and darkness _ just as well _ Perhaps it did _ One thing we know _ you could never have had the joy of this moment in its completeness without all the pain that ... for you in the year! To walk again _ without the pain _ O-Lord of the night _ You have given me my prayer! _ Laura's letter was in an envelope that might wrap up a young hippopotamus! "Business and love"_ she said! P.O. order comes back _ "To be filled out in ink_" So says our Mr. Dean! _ Afternoon Our postman here again! _ This time its Ella's doings _ a letter excellent in porportions _ gossipy too _ which keeps 42 from being altogether lonesome!107. Tuesday, April 17, 1877. "Girlie may I put my arms around you and talk a minute - just a minute - may I tell you that I do not forget how hard these April days are to you _ these sad, sad days _ the anniversaries of your sorrow? _ All the harder and I know so well, because you are so brave and patient & still, the shadow does not lift from your heart even while you come with help to me _ You, too, have a part in that [song] you send to my trouble _ my darkness _ and so you say "air" [song] - Yes - you, too, need this keeping quietly to God _ this heart to heart fellowship with the Peace Eternal _ I am glad we both know dear something how priceless the gift is when God comes to us in "a supreme & awful sorrow " _ The God who has helped you to bear a whole year comfort you my darling: There are heights as well as depths to pain" It took me a long time to say even a little to Laura to-day _ Such things work O - so slow since I came to 42. Very still the day has been _ too still for me! Bright though _ and Fannie & me able to go out and look for bright places! _ Went up to see Dr. Van - [Gone out of town]!108. Wednesday, April 18, 1877. And here is Polly Abbot in Chiarooscuro! Think of that - mum! I was right in the midst of one of the short stories in Harper's monthly when this happened _ It might have been "allegretto" _ Can't be sure _ anyway I was feeling gentle and amiable _ and you can guess I was awful glad when the Merrywoman got here! Then I heard a cane _ and twas Mr. Hughes come over to ask me ... to supper _ steak, you see, and nobody to eat it _ [this] is the way he put it! The old gentleman felt good _ he had just seen Dr. French - who was homeward bound! Just think! all this to happen in one day! A [forgetting] in the life of a girl at 42!109. Thursday, April 19, 1877. A long poky day _ Conspiring elements in the heavens above us _ [mud] and a cold in my head below! Whatever desires might have crept into my soul to get outdoor air and outdoor blessedness had to be smothered _ as I was repeatedly told that it was "damp"! With all my welcoming a day when it was possible to be heroic _ there came, too, the consciousness that a day can drag even to a heroic spirit - even heroes can be glad when it is time to take refuge under comforters! Yes'm _ My how it rained _ I tried to talk to Susie _ It wasn't an inspiring moment ! I take Gracie on my lap and have a nice little play with her _ Twas about as nice as anything that came or went with the day! A rainy world _ My! how it keeps on! and Susie's letter not done!110. Friday, April 20, 1877. "Nine weeks of this" so ... the record up there in the calm and rest where angels stand and I down here in the restlessness take these nine weeks "of hard waiting and try to lift up toward that calm and rest a brave and happy face" _ this with a piece of mignonette and three pages more will be sent to 1158 East Jersey St. Elizabeth when done! It don't get scratched down very fast _ not very _ I don't feel like communing with saints this way! _ Aunt Mary's plan and mine _ like many another ... of our brains fell to naught _ so up to Cohoes [toils] a postal saying Aunt Mary won't be there to-day. this my dear friends can only show them our good intentions since arriving at the V and G. not before 6:30 they will already be well-... that she is not forthcoming ! Never mind! This rain has the zeal of a war-horse! 111. Saturday, April 21, 1877. It must have been ten o'clock before I got that letter done _ My satisfaction was lofty when I got it folded and in and off! _ Still it kept in raining _ I found it difficult to be either useful or agreeable here on the tag-end of the protracted storm! _ especially when it began to look as if Aggie wasn't coming! _ "I shall be real disappointed" said Aunt Mary _ Twasnt only two o'clock then and half-past two ... lady appeared! Later still and the clouds parted _ There was summer and sunshine somewhere _ and we got glimpses. [more] is coming to-morrow! _ Huldah's [turn] this week - and her letter has upsettings in it! _ Talking already of next year and [rooms]! _ Shall I be reckoned out or in _ do you spose! _ Tisn't time for me to think of next year yet _112. Sunday, April 22, 1877. If there's any help and comfort to be derived from a Tuscan straw trimmed with black velvet and cream with a Nile green rose _ and a cranberry blossom _ then help and comfort are in my hand! _ Yes, in! Mind now! its a real consoling thing to know that you are in a world yet where such things are necessary _ I've lived sans hats _ sans such things so long _ I am wild to think I can crawl up out of my fogs _ into a country where little common things please _ and people dare to lay plans for to-morrow! Twas lots of fun to be at Aunt Mary's and have Aggie there _ Quite reviving! _ to have lulls and pauses in talk _ Couldn't have that at home! _ Way down here at the last breath of the day a little gospel of St. Matthew! 113. Monday, April 23, 1877. "The energetic brotherhood of mankind have taken it into their determined little heads that I am in need of blueing soap, salve, liniment, ice, ..., straw & suspenders! that I have umbrellas to mend, pipes to be soldered, dog-taxes to pay ashes to be carried hence _ that I want to take boarders and a S.S. class _ The irrepressible soap, salve, straw &c men knock at my window and dangle their several commodities up & down in the air - recounting their virtues with all the gibberish of Parthians, Medes, Elamites, Mesopotamians & the dwellers in Cappadocia * I have no success whatever in convincing the plumbers that I have only one pipe, a windpipe & that I am not in pressing need of their services _ and to the ashman I cry in vain that my dust and ashes are not ready to be borne away" It is not to be recorded that this day had so much as one inspiring moment _ except out doors _ There it was a fete day. My letter to the Bond E. ... sort of dragged! _ Walked down to 221 ... and made a call. Acts 2:9, King James Bible114. Tuesday, April 24, 1877. Not a great many "ins and outs" _ We take the world [from] a corner Fanny and me! _ Nothing from PO _ in any form _ nothing whatever! _ Next to "how are you feeling to-day" _ comes the other question which sticks _ "Has your check come?" _ No _ world _ no _ nothing's come! Well _ its easy to see that as for special favors _ the day has been sparing _ but the great universal blessings which are for us all _ the sunshine for instance and the eternal rest of the sky _ I helped myself out of the abundance _ and life was sweet! _ Among these great and universal things I feel like placing Aunt Mary's cup of tea! _ I tramped around to an extent unheard of for a dilapidated girl _ and so _ my feet ache - ... too - but I am too thankful too glad _ to feel any ache to-night!__115. Wednesday, April 25, 1877. Whereupon a great aching fell upon all my bones and I was not much seen about! I was glad the world had such a brightness about it even if I wasn't out in it _ there was the atmosphere of it _ and that I couldn't very well get out of _ I wish mother would stick her head in on me a minute _ I haven't seen her have I, since the 10th? This diary business worries me Am forever behind! I ... at it some! Bring into being a letter to Aunt Mary's man which after proper attention and management gets on its rejoicing way! You'd think to see us it was a protocol to the Sublime Porte! Aunt Mary's been here all the afternoon and her head's ached! When I'd get off on some [string] about Prof. Backus or mother's prospective boarders or Dan's views she'd look up when I stopped a minute with - "They are going to wear hoops again this summer" or something quite as far off from the subject in hand. [upside-down between lines 7 and 8] Vassar catalogue _ also "[]" for Founder's Day116. Thursday, april, 1877. I wish everything good wouldn't all come upon me at once! Laura's letter - that was enough alone - for one day _ a gentle gift it was _ and watched for! Then Earle Abbott cast [her] shadow for me which pleased me immensely. and on top of it all Ad Spicer came _ I was out by the back-door in the sunshine writing to Huldah _ and feeling that I was entering into the afternoon joy - getting a goodly portion of this day's fullness! When I went over to Aunt Mary's with the check found Mr. H. there _ he came home last night quite unlooked for _ and with more trouble in his head! I'm getting on in Gil Blass _ have an idea it would [prove] more enlivening if every separate person introduced wouldn't feel called upon to relate his history from the beginning! Ad left me a lovely bunch of flowers: ___ My solitary places are made glad117. Friday, April 27, 1877. Yes we kept still Fannie and me! _Trotted out about the first thing and put Huldah's letter and Rhoda's postal into the mail-box _ and then came back to a nine o'clock breakfast _ a little lazy this morning _ How's that?_ Do you spose mother'll be down to-day? "Hardly" _ This is what we said when it got to be afternoon and no mother anywhere around: Well _ Morning - dig away in back diary pages _ Dinner liver! _ Afternoon _ Gil Blas _ in small doses on the sofa - also Earle's postal! Later - I am on Gracie's blue gingham apron. Supper Dried apple sauce and eggs _ at the close of which there I hear the cane and Nellie and am honored with a "Come over & have some supper Franie" from the cane! "I'd like to go very much but I've just got up from the table" says 42 I hate obsequiousness! Founder's Day - ...!118. Saturday, April 28, 1877. There's everything to make us think its going to rain _ it still holds off_ but will trickle down I guess in the night of things! We betake ourselves Fannie & me at an early hour on a tramp! Don't feel highly like it _ and end up kind of wiggly_ but never mind! Saw the Dr. State St. Steve - and a man who advertises for a job printer Each separate individual undertaking [verged] on a fizzle - all but the Savings Bank. A long nap _ with my mouth open _ On top of this in walks Mrs. Dodd! We talk! Supper with Aunt Mary on yesterday's ...! A great many performances from Nellie _ We need to laugh all we can!119. Sunday, April 29, 1877. A Sunday of promises and [gleams] ! _ Of green fields and bursting buds - and spring [banners] to some _ and they needed it all and were glad _ Mine live further on in the summer - and only touch me in the happiness of other people - or in the Mays that live in my heart! _ Mary and ...went up to the cemetery to plant lovely, white daisies on the new little grave _ Margaret and ... have flowers for their mother's grave _ so all day long it is still _ and I am alone. I take little walks up and down in front of the house _ and long rests between _ It is long on into the afternoon when the folks get back _ I look at Margaret as if she had been on altar stairs near the angels and try to find some of the [spring weather] about her but there's only a few that can bring such things to you. I, too, shall go to the altar stairs. You dear ... living so large and [loving]!120. Monday, April 30, 1877. There I was, walking up S. Ferry St. _ almost to Pearl _ I had just had my breakfast and it was my first taste of the morning _ (not the breakfast) _ Aunt Mary sees me and comes up to meet me _ urging Miss Nellie to slight courtesies toward me which she is quite as likely as not to forget _ as soon as possible _ so I get down to ..., if it can be done, some marked attention _ & who comes along on the spot but Dan? _ This meant good _ in my quick interpretation _ but the boy looked sorry so sorry _ It came out presently what was up _ "I have come down to look for work in the offices - Mr. B[] discharged me Saturday night" The foundations on which society are built creaked for me _ It was to our family what the appearance at Windsor of the Sultan's forces might be to Mrs. Queen Victoria Guelph or the failure of Jay Cooke and Co. to Wall St.! A crash _ until in ... our bones _ and man the big guns _ I talk as bravely as I can to the boy and give him money to buy cloth for his spring ..... [right margin] mother left the cottage last ...121. Tuesday, May 1, 1877. The "first floor front" looks not enticing _ as my opening eyes take in the situation of things _ We are carpetless and in chaos! _ I proceed on an enterprise of rashness _ if you should stand most anywhere on [Green] St you would see me go by _ I am fairly frightened when I arrive at 70 1/2 Hudson Av. to find that I walked it! _ not so "scart" however but I try it again going back! _ The Dr. says when I take up this bottle he'd warrant I can walk two miles and a half _ Think of it! Aunt Mary, Nellie and I take it into our immediate heads to celebrate May Day - twelve cents worth! _ So we ... along up to West Albany in the lovely May air - and call it happiness. Coming back the wind blew _ but nothing could spirit away the good time we ... ... ... 122, Wednesday, May 2, 1877. The "first floor front" is pretty much over for me _ We are getting ready to go_ we _ who don't belong here _ There was more of "the roll of the stirring drum" about it _ than had come into any beforehand plans of mine _ an outside ordering _ I compose myself for a minute or two at Laura's Greek prose _ the only quiet minute I guess there was in the whole of it _ I go over to Aunt Mary's for a little visit - and Aggie comes down - looking like a queen just about to go into exile _ Its dark up home _ I suppose she has come down to the play because it was too hard _ because she must get away for a minute! but there is help _ I know! ah, how well I know! _ Down here _ Fannie and me to the last of it _ the last of Aunt Mary's running in - of the lamp chair by the window - of the shadows afternoons on the pillars of the old Dutch church!123. Thursday, May 3, 1877. This was the day that I came up home and found them all in trouble! I couldn't say "never mind" - for it was like a wall around _ a sky shutting down for a hard night perhaps_ How do we know how and when the help will come? _ Ah! how well we know there is help even for blind seeking. I think I shall always remember how bright the morning was and how Aunt Mary dressed and went up to the cars with me and Mr. Hughes stood there laughing as he punched my ticket _ while I laughed too and sang out - "Punch punch, punch with care _ Punch in the presence of the passenger" _ I thought I was going home and going to straighten everything out forthwith _ Yes - yes she thought as she rode alone _ "Circumstances" I make circumstances This is what Napolean said: "Circumstances as I make circumstances!" _ This is about what Frances was saying going up in the train - But the one went sorrowfully into exile - and the other [sits] down in the [fog] _ trying for [feelers]! -124. Friday, May 4, 1877. And am yet _ I only succeed in getting a good ways in _ in a fog that has proportions! _ I follow mother around and we talk! _ Then I lie down on the sofa and we talk _ and as I sort of intimated to you up there - the more we talk _ the more fiercely close the fog seems to close up about us - The only thing that looks at all like springing a [valor / value] is our dropping a line to Mrs. Stuart - apropos of me plan of me looking to a refuge in Albany for now _ I find its a pleasant change from the knocking of my head against the stone wall of our miscalculations - to turn to Susie's letter which was here when I arrived yesterday _ It says - "Why don't you write for magazines or something?" _ People with half your talent &c &c &c _ Well! _ Its a good day up among the constellations _ the great things _ Its only down here among the little things that we make mistakes and grieve125. Saturday, May 5, 1877. Yes _ this is a pretty house _ we want to stay in it _ the thing we only see darkly how we can do, yet _ It has such a sunny dining room and such pretty rooms up stairs _ There are great sweeps of the hill country _ ... we look out and the view to begin the days with! _ Yes _ its all dear - and pretty and just what we want . I get almost wicked in my passion for money lately. money for mother - you see - so she can stay! - If there was any way for me _ any way at all! _ "Now, Dan see ..." "Yes mother I will" from a time of possibleness it gets by this time into a time of hopeless emphasis - the last holding out of hands for a possible plank! _ Mrs. Stuart's answer here - but we ...! _ We have no open pathways yet _ []ding out _126. Sunday, May 6, 1877. I don't wonder that John stopped in the midst of the gold _ the pearl _ the precious stones _ the richness and fullness of all things to tell about that river! Is not any gentle flowing-rolling of waters to the sea a river of life? It was this I wanted to-day _ Down past the houses _ across the track _ in the dust and the tired ways of travel _ to the bridge _ a hard kind of walk for my ails but so good for my eyes. ... it once more to see the water - to take in for a ...half minute what it meant _ then back to the other things - Ah - take it all in Fannie _ how far how very far the wearisome 'what shall we eat and what whall we drink" and the rest - are from being the real things. After all these things do the Gentiles seek _ and yet _ Father knoweth - but ... the real things are glad things and laid up!127. Monday, May 7, 1877. As yet _ nothing _ ... seem[s] [truly] very great and important ... that we see no way of paying our rent in this new house since boarders are not forthcoming - that Dan has no work, and no clothes, that Aggie is on the verge of ... long vacation, and helpless Grandma is to be cared for : very dark and unfathomable ... that we have no place of move to and that nothing opens to call me anywhere _ and that Fannie is "stricken, smitten God and afflicted"* _ I sit before these things and look at them Yes _ they do look large _ now but the [sense] of it comes over me a little _ how very small they will seem by and by _ when the glory shall be revealed _ It is well sometimes to ... over these things a little of the light that comes from the real things _ then we know how foolish a thing it is to let our hearts get down over that which must be little enough to us soon It is so much better to be strong and brave and to say "Your father knoweth that ye have need of these things" ** * Isaiah 53:4 **Matthew 6:32 and Luke 12:30128. Tuesday, May 8, 1877. Up in the Tree! What would you see if I took you up My little aerie-stair? You would see the sky like a clear blue cup Turned upside down in the air. What would you do up my aerie-stair In my little nest on the tree? My child with cries would trouble the air To get what she could but see What would you get in the top of the tree For all your crying and grief? Not a star would you clutch of all you see You could only gather a leaf But when you had lost your greedy grief Content to see from afar, You would find in your hand a withering leaf, In your heart a shining star. George McDonald. A hard day _ but not all hard _ sitting here reaching out mostly _ glad of little pieces of brightness_ and remembering that the eternal God is our refuge We grasped no more at floating straws _ driven into our last corner we surrendered to fate _ and Mrs. Fairbank! The green reaches way off over the blue river _ kept just so far all we were heavy of heart! I know for I looked _ But behind those hills there are others and they care! I wonder as I sit here all alone waiting what mother will have good to tell us when her horse-car comes _ Here I wait _ [In right margin] A lovely box of flowers from the college _ No name no sign _ no anything to tell who it was that blessed me but ... could [tell me]129. Wednesday, May 9, 1877. Things seem to be being answered for us if we don't read the signs backward. At any rate there are rush-lights! and we think we see a little ways. Mother came back so cheery last night and we all sat up and talked till very late "That place for Dan _ is just the thing" _ "Maybe he'll get eight dollars a week" _ "I guess that's why all the doors are shut here because its meant we should go to Albany" _ so we keep on fairly [crazing] poor muzzy _ who has had all the brunt of it and who must be very tired _ but we woke up this morning _ and are glad to keep on thinking the last [thot's] of the night before! __ To me it seems so good to put my finger on something and say " this must be what God meant" for we've been so blind as to our whither []hither . We start Dan off to Albany early but he comes back at [noon] without being set to work. This is like cold water on our enthusiasm , but we don't quite ... I go to the [bottom] of the ... and...up [one] thing [&] another ... ... 130. Thursday, May 10, 1877. "There are dreams that never die" _ They must have gone into the safe places within us _ It came out strong and helpful when we came to winter and to desert ground _ I cling to stories & the old thought I've had and old visions of summer places _ to-day as if for a forgetting of the days burden! _ a spiritualizing of the strain and the ... __ Mother - away again all day _ Grandma and I _ so sadly alike and so sadly unlike _ I wonder does she go back for respite into a sunlit past - or ... into a glorified future. That is the being[] thing in old age - the being safely past _ the rest of days and days when no wor[] comes or goes _ Mother said "Maybe I wont come back to-night _ I shall stay until I get a house" So by and by we all go up stairs to bed thinking what a queer house without mother. "... [that] horsecar stopped" said I in a half dream - and I went down and [let] her in _131. Friday, May 11, 1877. "We've got to do something This comes in to wind up all my little deliberations _ our taking of counsel together _ Yes _ we say _ always a little sadly, looking at the green hills and the queen's palaces _ "We've got to do something" _ People that have homes and palaces _ and ends that meet, go by _ and we watch them with a strange interest _ Then we turn around and say "we've got to do something" _ I find a tender meaning these [w]earing days in these words of the dear Jesus _ "I go to prepare a place _ for you* _ I look at mother tired - worried - driven - [pressed]! I look forward and see her life lifted into the "place" _ the Life and the Glory _ and a great warm wave comes over me _ The poor little ... life of ours _ It shall live again in fullness of joy. Aggie climbs the hill after dinner _ also thinking _ Then she comes home early and goes to Albany _ to look for a house Comes back in a [quandary] _ day after day goes & we are still in ... [top corner] I begin a letter to Laura called her ... first *John 14:2 (KJV)132. Saturday, May 12, 1877. This time mother said the council of our suspenses should adjourn _ With Aggie and mother both as rallying forces _ it looked quite probable _ Grandma sits behind the stove in her corner - and I limp around a little, washing dishes or something _ There's a big piece of the day in the middle and each side when there's no dishes to be washed or something! So I sit up stairs and write a little _ or down stairs and watch the hills across the river where May sits like a queen! _ The 4-45 train from Albany brings them _ I meet them at the little side door. The first thing from mother "We've no good news for you" _ "Never mind", I think _ we'll find the best there is in it and if its more to bear than to rejoice in _ it is because we all expected to be good soldiers and are called to the front! Supper waits while we go over the debatable ground.133. Sunday, May 13, 1877. The uncertainty of human affairs, especially ours, comes to us with each returning dawn. We say to ourselves as we stand "with our loins girded about" _ and our satchels packed, "where do you suppose we will be next Sunday?" _ Notwithstanding we take a quiet breakfast and then I go to find a place thats green and new in the spring places _ and Aggie goes to write her diary up _ Down by the river there is an old apple tree and the water gurgles by it and its still and sweet there _ so says the poor faint heart that I [take/took] down there _ Four little dandelions, the only ones that I shall pick or know about this spring - I take them in my hands reverently _ and come home. Aggie said "Would you go to Troy and back for the fresh air and the sake of getting out?" _ "O, dear yes" _ and so we do_ and are lifted up into the heart of the hills134. Monday, May 14, 1877. Family still consulting _ and looking as if a plague was raging and had begun on our street _ We breathe desert air and keep erect on weary camels _ but it is such a grand chance to "purely endure" that we send for our reinforcements and try to march through the evening's country like conquerors! Mother keeps saying "We've got to do something" _ but we sort of hate the first step _ We do [fairly] get at it at last _ though sonmebody's else answer has to be waited for _ Mr. Davis we'll take your house so and so _ let us know first mail" _ Answer comes back at night _ "Yes _ madam" _ Then the china and glass begin to go into the clothes basket _ and the things up stairs to take a ... _ We retreat inch by inch _ Evening _ Mother in [close] pro and con with her favorite cartman _ Out of such a day I tried to []alk a little with to our Earle _135. Tuesday, May 15, 1877. Still the sun keeps on shining it _ is good not to be forsaken in our hard places _ glad am I that it is the summer's and not the winter's light that is upon us! It begins to look now as if we should get off to-morrow. Mother says with the air of Bismarck "I've got all my tinware packed" _ Our cupboards begin to look like Old Mother Hubbard's _ Every morning Grandma says "Are you going to move to-day? [because] if you aint I'll go and make my bed" _ I guess the dear old soul finally believes that "we have here no continuing city" _ Mother goes to seek one to come* _ takes the 3:30 _ When Aggie comes home she thinks she'll go and not "make her bed" exactly but get her trunk ready _ she can't make herself feel like it so she don't _ We sit by the front windows and have a dear little time - clear on until the dark _ *Hebrews 13:14 (KJV) For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come136. Wednesday, May 16, 1877. The day when we moved again _ Our household goods are hurriedly snatched up and some banged _ It was some as the Israelites made their way out of Egypt _ "The people took their dough before it was leavened, their kneading-trough being bound up in their clothes upon their shoulders _ neither had they prepared for themselves any victuals" *_ Nor did they get any until dark and twilight when we sat on top of trunks and boxes and ate some crackers and cookies helped along by some of Aunt Mary's sublime tea! _ Grandma and I had a famous time getting down. We came by horse-cars all the way . Dear old lady how pleased whe was! "Israel is a vine taken out of Egypt and planted in Palestine"** _ So are we _ plucked up it seems by the roots _ The worst of moving, Israel, is the upset feeling it gives you _ I've got it _ When we get rested the place where we is set down and anchored will look good to us _ Mother says "Look at that two [shad] had for fourteen cents!" * Exodus 12:34 ** Psalm 80137. Thursday, May 17, 1877. Well I had a night of it _ for one reason and another _ Twasn't enough to ache in every bone _ but my shoulder had to set to and put in and if you know anything about that shoulder business you know that the ... that seethes and boils there is such a ... tough that the one that can get hardened to this would do to be a Quaker in the Mass. Bay Colony in 16 hundred and something! _ You'll be surprised to hear that I arose in due season _ You'd hardly expect me to _ It was nothing after getting up to stay up _ Somebody had to go to the bank _ also to Marshall and Wendell's* _ As I could neither whitewash nor paper nor put to rights _ I turned my face toward the bank _ and thus was a blessing in my day and generation! Our wilderness howls [less] [some] _ Mrs. Sullivan is one of the propelling forces _ also Dan - The weather is extremely [odd] weather for May _ She does not caress us simply - she embraces us _ and her breath is like [steam]! * Albany piano manufacturer138. Friday, May 18, 1877. How to look well enough to go to the doctor's was a question big enough to vex my first hour and a half _ After prolonged efforts on the effect of a black underskirt and cambric [sack] and overskirt - also an old Castleton hat - I put on an abused look and abandoned it all for my black cassimere - my one sole standby _ When mother & Dan put in - "Why don't you wear your other hat?" Twas too crushing - a last feather &c - for poor camel _ Then I came up stairs gave a last look at the partridge-berry wreath - & took up the burdens of life [again] [viz] - that Tuscan steeple _ and even put on my one precious pair of three-buttoned gloves! Dr. Van looked happy as usual. I made an effort [to] detail that low-down miserable stir below _ to him _ "Try a Belladonna Plaster" _ Yes _ I think to myself coming home _ 'The next angel sounded and there was a new woe! I wore a Belladonna Plaster [once] _ There aint a bitterness nor a sorrow in one that I haven't fallen upon! Piano's here and ...139. Saturday, May 19, 1877. It was a grievous burden but in the night I carried it as one heavy-laden* and now it lays at the gate of the King. Borne it was long ago by Him who was smitten - stricken of God and afflicted.** I needn't ever have taken it one step but sometimes when a trouble comes suddenly _ I forget about Come unto me"* _ Dannie might not suit the man after all and here we are and thus and so is everything _ but the King's messenger [rode] fast. Before us is no longer darkness and for the Sabbath to dawn - we can be of those of whom it is written "Light is sprung up"*** What a long queer place we've been going through - Its almost nine in the evening when Aggie gets here. Dear little heart _ Its good we are together again I thrive in spite of everything. My strength is coming back wonderfully _ and I walk even as of old - It seems as if other trouble were as nothing - nothing at all with this [untold richness] of blessing [Upside down at the top of the page] The day is begun to study Greek together Laura and I * Matthew 11:28 ** Isaiah 53:4 *** Matthew 4:16140. Sunday, May 20, 1877. We have come to one of the unhappy mornings, friends when we couldn't have any breakfast until wheat could be planted, watered sprouted, developed, cut, winnowed, ground, leavened _ mixed and baked _ Such things do mysteriously sink our household in gloom now and then. I arose but not with the sun _ and read "My Summer in a Garden"* _ through before I heard any sounds from below! There's nothing that so lowers the mercury in mother's mental thermometer as saying something about getting into the "bottom box" The necessity was upon my sister and diving and plunging in its depths _ my mother's afternoon went quite askew! We none of us dare hope the process is not to be repeated _ for _ well _ wait and see! Where was I all this time? Come up stairs and look _ on mother's couch _ She has "Scarlet Letter" in her hand _ and you don't hear much from her Aggie thinks her interests and that of the race can be advanced by her taking the Troy boat which she does _ while we say "Vale - vale" *by Charles Dudley Warner, 1870141. Monday, May 21, 1877. I suppose that really the farmers need to be rained on - You can hardly stick your finger on to a day in the calendar when they don't so _ it is of course very desirable for them that this dropping begins _ and there is such a tremendous stirring up overhead - I usually feel quite like taking rainstorms with an unperturbable spirit but this one has such a hang-on air! _ After turning over a great many things in my mind I set stakes and begin a vigorous pull _ at De Oratore I give me five weeks to get the stuff ready _ I am not fond of argumentatious Latin _ Mother's interests collect around the bed in Dan's room - as also do the bugs(?) _ that is the "oak" is to be set-up _ it is hardly expected we would say planted when the oak takes definite form and shape and is ... round by pulleys _ I'm on the spot to help So like me _ "Where duty calls or danger* _ &c _ Our boy's first day at 31 Green - On the end of it a hall oilcloth to be [tacked] . He has no fondness for such sports! --- * From "Stand Up! - Stand Up for Jesus" hymn by George Duffield142. Tuesday, May 22, 1877. Mother thinks waking me of a morning not so easy an undertaking as she at first supposed _ She bangs on the floor with agility _ The weapon being nothing more nor less than the broom handle _ but she finds herself a general in a lost cause _ I came marching down something after eight - disclose the pathetic fact that not a bang was heard! I go at De Oratore reverently _ Its one of the bothersome facts of my existence which has worked itself into a necessity with me - One of the compelling forces of mother's existence to-day led me where glory lay and curtain fixtures! My part of the opera bouffe _ is to sit by just below and reach things up _ A way of spending the afternoon so as not to get too elated! "Move again in September" _ No, ma'am" says my mother vigorously! ___143. Wednesday, May 23, 1877. I managed to get that letter off to Earle which has been such a worrisome thing to construct not because of an over fastidiousness on her part - or any lamentable deficiencies on mine but because of the burdens by the way _ the hard days _ A little bit of brightness huddled with a little bit more into the morning _ but the afternoon was a great gray cloud everywhere _ Aggie comes home done up in a big shawl We think its awful nice to have her come - though she reiterates with emphasis -" I got to get up at 6 in the mornin"! Among the treasures of her bundle sleeps in peace my college letter _ Tells about all Vassar tiptoeing to the Highlands the 26th _ also of getting rooms for next year _ wonders what kind of a dreadfulness Fannie's gone into _ and can't say a word! __ Well _ I don't think about it as I'd like to _ for maybe I won't need any room there next year. I take quiet sips of Tom Brown's Schooldays* instead *novel by Thomas Hughes, 1857144. Thursday, May 24, 1877. But we haven't sailed into sunshine yet _ The turbulent and thickly-set in the heavenly spaces _ Who shall rise and say that this is May time? We keep saying _ "A little more sunshine to-morrow" _ Poor muzzy's head aches _ Aggie has to take stock in the 7-15 train _ and starts off ...its raining great guns _ Two uncomforting pieces out of a morning _ I go on a commission for steak _ (10 cents worth) and drop in on Aunt Mary _ Find Helen [Bly] suffering untold troubles from biliousness; this goes to Aunt Mary's heart and soul _ By and by when the bad little head gives mother "a minute's peace" I go around to various stores meekly inquiring _ "Have you smoked salmon?" Nobody has. One dapper youth _ just launched out in the sea of groceryism follows me out ejaculating "any thing else - tea - coffee - butter _ butter for 15 cents a pound! I close the affair by going to Jamaica & buying a mackerel _ 145. Friday, May 25, 1877. Yes'm I say meekly when I look at the date _ and bring to mind that it stands for just so much rain and grayness on the face of our world _ Rain and grayness a whole week through _ When our back yard _ well there's no drop of consolation to be drained from this [punch] _ but I was only going to say, again meekly, that when our back-yard looks dismaller than it is wont _ De Oratore _ Then my corn begins to yowl! _ Two fruitful sources of cheery thought. Found Aunt Mary ironing (which I [never] fail doing) She showed me one piece of her work in its culmination _ a skirt with say forty-five tucks ! _ O shades of back-aches! _ As for me I've nothing to show for my work. Not a thing _ My ... of heroes is a good deal _ about Crassus and Sulpicius & [Sulla] and Antonius _ no end of which is as [un]instructing/[un]interesting as even Livius Maronius could desire _ A postal from Letty _ also the arrival of my notebook from Laura --- I ... a postal [of] thanks - the only thing I'm rich in146. Saturday, May 26, 1877. It looked pleasant enough to begin with - you'd have thought it meant some thing _ but it didnt _ Our planet turned over and whopped us into pourings down - and under flurrying, scurrying clouds _ just as if we hadn't staid there for a week! I got up as big as you please _ (only figuratively) and walked to meet a coal man and get meat for dinner - also to see Aunt Mary and read the morning paper. This is all there was of it - I went back to bed [groan]ing _ and sort of hung round there mostly! Mother said she felt just like work _ and [went] into it like the noblest Roman of them all! Last accounts are explicit - she was nailing down the stair carpet . My languishing way was plaintive _ Aggie gets here along in the P.M. _ Says a man in Troy advertises for a tutor for two children - I [let] down a small [boat] _ Vassar Miscellany comes - So does a postal!147. Sunday, May 27, 1877. There's the Sunday feeling in the air _ the stop and the resting _ This I can [bear] _ "A day in thy courts" _ better" _ says the singer King _ "than a thousand"* _ But thy courts are in the great open spaces _ or in my little four walls _ not alone in the places where great walls are and altars! So I can be in His courts though I can't walk much _ "At the feet of His Christ" _ I can be there. There's that dull low incomprehensible pain all day _ Why there is such a thing [as] getting back to it - is a dark riddle _ but its there. I look up pieces for Aggie some - Find a few. We talk about going up to Vermont some - also Satie's wedding _ Aggie's tired thin little face worries us. Mother keeps talking about it _ Dan appears in his new pants _ "What shall we eat _ what shall we drink and wherewithal shall we be clothed"** _ are questions of increasing interest to my brother __ *Psalm 84:10 ** Matthew 6:31148. Monday, May 28, 1877. In spite of uncomfortable places in my solar system _ it was a good day _ It has to be kept in mind by me _ that I'm not as good as new _ not quite yet _ Without this pain who knows what rashness I might not be guilty of? __ I read the thirtieth chapter of De Oratore - then comes the thirty-first _ I get hopelessly stuck on the first sentence _ and am there yet! _ "But Crassus said _ "I think" "But Crassus said "I think" _ and then the [wagon] came down! [Some] like Aggie's way of entertaining us yesterday - "He said - yourpin's unfastened and I said Thank you _ then he said your pin's unfastened and then I said Thank you" _ After all I'm afraid I understand English better thean I do Latin ! _ [I] perched in my study chair out on the back porch? _ trying to get it through my brain what it was Crassus thought - Up comes Mother with a postal from Letty _ and "A Princess of Thule"* from Laura __ bless em both [along the side] I do manage to get a letter begun to Satie * 1873 novel by William Black149. Tuesday, May 29, 1877. "How much will you give to go and see the greatest, living white whale" _ "Not a cent," said my mother "I have not cents but common sense" sing I - going up stairs - "And darn little of that," sings another from below _ this on the heels of my walk to the letter box to start off Satie's letter _ there was nothing in its nature delightful to come up to the back parlor window and take a lone dig in the theory of oratory _ she didn't care two cents what Crassus thought! _ "See that you bring me a letter from Troy" was her parting injunction and she placed space between them and went up to take her metaphorical ... _ Twas one o'clock and she hadn't got quite half-way down the page - the letter was duly brought up from below - [There's] [less] danger of my going to Troy tutoring _ Mother says "He don't want you cause you don't know what [tum, sum, com] means strung along in [one sentence] True enough - How can I go to Troy to teach Latin when I don't know what it was that Crassus thought?Decoration Day _ 150. Wednesday, May 30, 1877. In which ironing goes on down stairs all day _ not [fretty] ironing - though _ there's a sort of good cheer air where the folks are to-day _ I am duly informed that the water out of "that icebox" don't run out of the hole mother foreordained _ Also that she's going to tip it on one corner - so the water will go immediately where she intends _ nature will gravitate water to suit her _ How glad we are it is settled! _ It was my wonderful power of invention that first brought it up in the family that it would be a good day for Dan to have his new hat _ He institutes proceedings _ but mother vows she never saw such a miserable little equivalent _ "The most becoming hat I ever had" remarks Sir D _ Do you want to hear how I am in the bleak mountains bleating in Latin _ no _ not bleating in Latin for that I could never do, but bleating in English the most pitiful [ever] Latin that I cannot put into bleating or sense! -151. Thursday, May 31, 1877. I began it by going for lime: a great many orders from mother _ cautious to see it _ to be sure it was a lump and not a powder. Great was her satisfaction when I came back with it! - I wasn't "such a ... smart to-day _ but got on metaphorical rocks and poked around like Vermont sheep - for the sense of Chapter thirty-three. You may not be thinking about it but I was ... tired _ Mother is going at the kitchen to-night _ ... in a perfect ... having begun to scale the ... walls _ Mr. [Has]brough and I discuss the feasibility of buying a lawn mower and a rubber hose. Dan sings. Our pleasure is not so complete in this as it would be if Dan knew some of the words- [Thus] "And broke the old man's hm hm hm leaving us to supply _ He goes up to mother the last thing in tragic attitude with "My heart is full of misery and woe" __152. Friday, June 1, 1877. Dear June - how good you sound! I'm taking in this world's comforting assurances early these mornings _ not because I believe in early bird and early worm nonsense but because its nice! I believe also in the comforting assurances! _ To run, for me, to-day, is to be weary and to walk is to faint _ but I do _ I can't give up and keep still _ Mother's whitewashing has come to a timely end_ The kitchen has a decidedly new smell _ indeed, its worth glorying in! _ Aggie comes home _ and "by a baby [buntin] - mother's gone a [huntin]" - She casts glances back to that strawberry shortcake she was obliged to leave to catch the ... and wishes mother would come! We are entertained in the meantime by Dan - in his great "Mary had a little lamb" act!153. Saturday, June 2, 1877. Those light-brown kid gloves with three buttons are again trotted out _ That one precious pair _ and what do you suppose come of it? _ nothing _nothing whatever- It is very hot _ the air seems to shut us down and hold us _ and nobody is hungry _ Muzzy works among us in and out - Aggie pokes around a little _ I poke a little - and Grandma sits still and dozes _ Mr. Hughes brings Nellie around - and the poor little miss is sad of heart _ She entreats us with all pitifulness to take that muzzle off _ Grandma takes in the length and breadth of the affliction and says _ "I'd like to but I dasn't" _ _ Again Mr. Hughes - this time with a piece of Aunt Mary's beef-steak pie. Dan comes home - no clothes This calls on him for his [sternest] powers of endurance! Come here - Princess of Thule You quite please me154. Sunday, June 3, 1877. "Good morning! - and are you very well!" Very well whatever. Miss Sheila _ very well _ and its a dear morning. The church-bells have such an inviting ring _ but Fannie and me - can't go - not exactly _ I suppose it was just as well that I didn't read Princess of Thule to day _ A little from the Latin of Thomas a Kempis was better _ but the sea-air [around] my Sheila almost drives me to her _ and around Thomas a Kempis even in the grand old Latin is the convent breath _ and the life so utterly unlike the freedom of our lives and Sheilas _ It is well for me that I read of the best and highest - of self-renunciation the most sublime _ I need to _ I who live but do not realize _ I dreamed of heaven for mother a little while - her earth-life drags so _ It seemed so unspeakably blessed to think of her being taken and cared for _ this has never been _ After all _ there were upsettings _ Talking up what we shall do in the fall _ isn't [some]thing the day I find _ It is better not to We - which is me - do hate to call ourselves disagreeable - 155. Monday, June 4, 1877. Grandma's all swelled up on her cheek. she says she's sorry enough for "that's her best eye!"_ It was beau temps - Very! A question _ Duty versus inclination! _ or to be a little plainer De Oratore versus Princess of Thule! You aren't [insane] to that point that you imagine that I took the best hours right out of this ravishing day to dig out that Crassus speech when he himself says that it is not worthy my wisdom and [ears] even if he comprehended the subject most perfectly which he don't? So I bestow my wisdom and [ears] on Sheila bless her - and bless the bright day that it was - and the sun coming in! - There's room enough left to tell how I made a safe and this time effective journey to the doctor _ There [button] [l]ight brown kids and so forth! The dear man _ whom, I know, I venerate sat up straight and looked at me [scattering] as is his wont the faculties I've been all these years gathering _ and ... no entertaining [remarks] whatever But near ... I saw the ... & all out - in her first season ...156. Tuesday, June 5, 1877. "Do you need to be told "where the flowers came "from? I thought they would "carry my kisses better than that_" [No] my [Love] - it isnt anybody that knows better nor me _ I'm an unrelenting priest _ fond of bringing little girls like you to the confessional! - I'm glad the little letter is here - I know that it has been wind to my sails _ and I'm off and off with a better heart! _ I, even, get started on a letter to No.12 _ and astonish myself by finishing it - Satie's letter says _ "come after the 27th -" It talks about going off to stay _ written as quietly and read as quietly as if it were not the end of her girl life in the girl-home _ "The point a life has got to beyond which it must pierce the dark" _ So it is with the things that happen to us - We somehow just live on! __157. Wednesday, June 6, 1877. I wonder if I shall make you know what it was like - To begin within the lower regions the sceptre had departed _ Poor mother _ until on into the very afternoon in an inquisition headache! _ It might have been some easier if there'd been an open space or two overhead _ but no _ out of a thick wall of sky the rain came paddling down not like a June rain _ lightly and like music _ but in a dolorous pitch and a homesick way! _ It sort of beat at you _ Then that pain I have such a horror of _ sat down within me, and [Anne] Phelps' letter came and Dan had no work in the afternoon _ and our solitary places were not anywhere made glad! _ But there's something within that's greater than any [of it] And are we not like the little children led in a way that we know not, The [advance] De Oratore is finished Shout! __158. Thursday, June 7, 1877. This is a most mournful rain _ I think of pitiful sorry things _ as of birds waiting in the tree-tops for the caressing sun to come back - or the people [unshod] - and hurt - and tired - to whom the constant dropping - dropping - is like one more hand to hold them down! _ The day drags for me with a dull-dark pain _ and I am afraid I've not been a noble six-hundred!* _ Home is so hard _ O, June, June - with your flowers and your bringing of good - is it to be like this that we cross your pasture lands? _ Give me my troubles still - I want to be accounted worthy to suffer _ to [learn] _ but can't something come to mother - Putting out the lights the last thing to-night in ... trouble seems like the way we are being led but whatever you do - Fannie (right margin) don't forget that in all th[] afflictions he was afflicted __ in his love and in his [pity] he endured [them] *From "The Charge of the Light Brigade" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson159. Friday, June 8, 1877. The doctor has to be seen the first thing - so I go up to lay before him this that is such a worry to me _ This morning _ the coming back of the bloat ! _ Don't say you worry, Fannie "Learn of him" Let him say to you by and by "Great is thy faith" Aunt Mary _ the dear heart , is []eal sick _ and mother has been over there with her a long time to-day _ Hence for me who stays down-stairs to sit with Grandma _ a still day _ with De Oratore off and on! [A] cherry postal from the college helps _ and []attie comes in with the baby - The latter is not in the least humored by any of my attentions - she'll have none of me! _ How bright it is everywhere! - so unlike yesterday - So does the sunshine follow rain - day the night - and after the tempest - a great calm! -160. Saturday, June 9, 1877. "Is that all?" said mother to the mailman when he handed over three "Daily Newsances" from Qhoes [sic]. I _ inside would like to know where that postal is I expect from Gertie's sister! It would afford me some very considerable sastisfaction [sic] to be enlightened as to the name of my old friend - let alone existing circumstances as ... and begun! _ Latin begins to grow easier _ some A large fact when I feel like this! _ My resolutions on the subject of keeping still - are immense. Our boy is off - on the half-past five ... _ The parting injunction "Now Dan, be sure and see Mr. Bran" _ I'm afraid my letter to Mrs. P. for Sis _ is not duly appreciated _ It begins "It is a pleasand [sic] day _ The sunshine up in the sky" _ Now isn't that a [nice] way to begin?161. Sunday, June 10, 1877. We notice a certain persistence in continuing to button that smallest [waist] even the very button where it hurts! _ It is as if the poor child (I can hardly help calling her a poor child had some vague idea that the bloat could be squeezed back! - There's a pitifulness in it. Grandma's bed is a very good bed - a very good bed whatever I am the genius who presides over this _ to-day bed when I'm not dozing or chatting - my eyes roam along the pages of "The Gates Ajar"* _ "If it were not so" _ do you take in the thoughtful tenderness of that? A mother, stilling her frightened child in the dark, might speak just so - 'if it were not so I would have told you"** Aggie went back at half past one [right margin] Dan's not back yet _ We sat up late to watch for him *1868 novel by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward ** John 14:2162. Monday, June 11, 1877. If George A. Birch had got the nomination there's no sort of doubt but that he would have been elected! Couldn't help it _ As a dogma attached to this the severe consequences would have been that Mr. Hughes would have been "court-officer" _ This is one of the forbidding fates against which Mr. H. knock his cane _ This is a piece of a very [frowning] world which he is facing _ Which is another one of those things that it is so much easier to sing than to do! _ Dan comes back from Cohoes somewhere in the direction of noon _ Is up and coming on a project - of size ... ... _ going into business with Will Keelan _ Mother pulls away the imaginary proofs he had set up _ and starts him off to 31 Green. A sucessful start _ both ways _ for he's in our hands presently for the afternoon = "Laid off" is getting to be a technical term at our house that I have learned to translate rapidly! Mother bless her brave spirit _ goes out to see what she can do! _ I wish I hadn't got to write this letter to Mrs. Fairbank - on this afternoon of glory [too] [right margin] Poor Ella - she is having her trouble now - and I feel so so so sorry -----163. Tuesday, June 12, 1877. Grandma's occasional little ways of being saucy _ are of such an unexpected nature _ Her characteristic meekness _ gives these bubbles a funny splatter! Thus _ "What are you chewing, mother?" "I am chewing a piece of raisin if you want to know"! _ Mercy! _ if the explosion had come from a Russian advance guard _ but no from the gentlest little old Quaker lady in the world! As for me I lay around as for mother she goes out foraging - as for Dan there's no work - and he's taken to fretting largely! Interpersed with by the arrival of Will! _ It was a day to go out and take comfort in A world of the purest comfort lay out where the trees were & the sky - I had glimpses of that which might be. The morning winds were winds of blessing - "Si[] here" they said _ "a letter from Susie" Ah! ah! _ what better? Mother comes back cheered up She's on the track of something Our door out seems ready to [swing]!164. Wednesday, June 13, 1877. An uninteresting day! Think of having to say this - here in the heart of June. It seems as if I just sat down here _ and the things came and went around me _ who had no wings! _ I'm afraid its the hills and the green places that I think about _ Mother washes_ and Dan goes a fishing! There might be some comfort in this last _ if the cat hadn't got into the ice-box and eaten up all the fish! I call this melancholy _ "If George A. Birch" begins Aunt Mary - and then we [hear] it again _ A sort of "Queen's Chair" performance _ by this time _ "The Chinese" [our] Dan remarks "live on 25 cents a day. Now if we [were] Chinese _ we might almost get along on his salary" _ here he checks himself _ "But not this week" __165. Thursday, June 14, 1877. I didn't wake up with a mind keenly alive to the joys of the journey this morning _ It would have been better - its always better to keep with us the sense of the comfort we may never lose _ We know that the heart of things is glad _ always _ Mother says "now don't you come down until I knock" _ I found when I responded to the call further on that the cat had saved one fish for her breakfast and had forgotten to [call] for it _ That piece fell to me - How did I know [but] it was trout _ easy enough to play it was - and ... at Schroon Lake _ eating it! Mother says I have "a bloated imagination" _ She is ready for any blueness on my part _ [with] "Yes _ the lump just below the ribs is one-eighth bloat and seven eighths imagination" _ The blueness [gives] me a dreary morning and spends itself - A postal from Miss Goodwin _ Says yes _ if I can get a permit from the office [Ah]! more red tape! _ I [dash forthwith] [on] a [strain] to [Its] Susie's [birthday] bless her! ["Pussy"]166. Friday, June 15, 1877. It was I that saw the first iceman and made his proximity known _ He bore aloft the concordant name of Schifferdecker! _ Enter mother from the ouside bearing a good sized piece of ice _ hardly large enough in her view of the case to be worth five cents "I won't take of that darned old Dutchman again." _ But he don't hear: "Here's another piece of ice madam" shout he from the wagon: _ "I mean" said mother _ "I mean I will take of that Dutchman again!" _ It was a breathless way of living _ hot and stifling _ was everybody _ down to the "ad extremum" of the day! The principal parts of Latin verbs - are [s]ought [gasp]ingly! _ A very unenlivenig business even on the front door step! _ Dan comes to a boil on the subject of Sheila _ Is [vastly] interested - as is also your humble servant! _ "[Dress] up and be cool" _ says mother _ so into my light blue I swing _ and am yet ! No Aida - to-night! [Marmion]167. Saturday, June 16, 1877. We had to think a good deal about breathing _ and air _ and such things for we awoke into a close morning _ and longed for spicy breezes _ which might "blow soft _ blow hard!" Mother began to "clear up" early - so I took my ink-bottle _ and pen and pen-wiper? and the nice, new paper Dan gave me and my line of march was westward and my station was at the north window _ near the waxcross _ Here went the morning _ in telling the girls about the clover we planted the cat that stole our rock-bass _ and why I liked to read Marmion* yesterday! It is my present intention as I remarked to have our next conversation on the 1st South firewall parlor! Yes'm - Mary Dodd stopped in on her way to the train _ I blessed mother for the cleaning up immediately preceding! _ A novel way of getting down stairs - in Aida's arrival _ Considerable good-cheer. *Epic poem by Walter Scott published in 1808168. Sunday, June 17, 1877. It opened cool _ a breeze blowing in at the windows pure and strong! _ I had almost said - life-giving! A light which was of the sun - and beautiful _ lay everywhere - touching even common and homely things to a rare suggestion of glory _ I like to think of this ... to-day _ of rest pictures and help _ and tints and hues anywhere _ All day I lift up to God a burden of pain and His strength within me to bear seems taken _ Even the daylight goes _ and down on Grandma's bed I lie as the dark comes on _ The two darks _ and I only cry out _ "I never was in such a dark as this" _ "No gleaning on the wide wheat-plains - Where others drive their loaded wains?"* Thou, then hast been our dwelling place in all generations!** * from De Profundis, a poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning ** Psalm 90:1 King James Bible169. Monday, June 18, 1877. 7:50 _ at Hudson No. 70 1/2! _ 8:50 still there mournfully sitting _ Quite a collection of individuals _ A sorry many _ not so sad perhaps as the multitude that lie in dark-[end] rooms this morning _ and can't come here! Well. I [move] on - its forever before my turn comes Then he says to me - "I don't see as you can do anything better than to keep right on with the same medicine" _ just like that _ to me! Out on the front steps in the coolness _ the thirteen pages of De Oratore - get gone through with - The people who pass think me on the [verge] of losing my mind - Earle sends [up] "Tell us we can - meet you Saturday" Ah - my dear - I'll go you one better! How gratifying to mention right here that Dan has work to-day - On this subject I announce to mother that I am tired of balancing over an abyss on a hair I dine in Helen Bissell's []tion _ and my missive gets off! All day [br]ight _ as June knows [how] and at night the loveliest moonlight!170. Tuesday, June 19, 1877. The heart of the house is not there to-day _ so the hours go by to drill beats! _ She's gone "way OSS"_ into one of those hard sick spells _ that keep her away from us _ and give us to know something of what it would be like if there were no little mother _ I am so sorry _ for the pain. Grandma in the meantime has nothing more to desire on earth _ she can wash the dishes As for "Fannie and me" we get on the front steps and watch for an iceman! _ We're not worth much to-day _ and _ when we can we keep quite still! The early thunder shower cooled the air and we have lived under Italy's skies with Azores' breezes _ My letter got there yesterday and lo: here's the answer swift and sure _ Polly _ you are a turnip! (which look ... turnip ) I write to [Connie] Laura and Emily _171. Wednesday, June 20, 1877. Which was not much of anything that yesterday was _ except cool! _ My towering genius is at work over the absorbing Liber Primus de Or.!_The few moments in the day when my mother tongue is my medium of expression are soul-reviving! How nice it was sitting out there in the sun _ I could almost feel that I was going to be well again _ as if the time would come when I could move the camp-chair out by the door without losing my breath - "The certain remarkable and almost unparalleled genius" of me stands stock still! _ you'd think (existence) I might (debet) to be able -(print) by this time (jamdudum)* to write a letter - but jamdudum I wasn't _ and jamdudum I aint yet! _ Never mind Annie _ I'll try again next day _ Dan and I talk going into business _ setting up in ... ... Duncan's - Well __ *jamdudum = iam dudum - for a long time172. Thursday, June 21, 1877. Well - which is intended to denote a pause! _ A proper intention _ Pause also proper - Some records are very valuable viz _ the following _ It is duly decided what and how much wardrobe starts with me on the Vibbard* in the morning _ The letter to Annie Phelps is duly done. Still farther _ The valise which was Luther's is here _ I hope I am properly thankful to Luther's [greek word]**! _ To mention a comfort not so large - my watch is being trotted around by Mr. Potter _ and unattainable _ I lie in Grandma's bed _ and chatter _ Mother at the other window rocks _ The dark comes up _ "Mother do you suppose?" _ and so away into [unsnarlable] things! _ * C. Vibbard, passenger steamboat on the Hudson River between New York City and Albany **father173. Friday, June 22, 1877. Well - Bozzy I must say this is well to happen! I feel very much propped up _ and a week seems a long while _ To tell you about the river ride I can't [slamming] yes that was it coming up in the car with Prof. Backus _ He might possibly have wished there was less in that valise! _ You ought to have seen me walk in Parlor 12 _ ... You might to have heard the doors swing open and watched the girls walk [out] [and] then the Martin spoke _ "Let me be the cannon to 82" _ She made a very effective "son of a gun" for it didn't seem any time at all before Lorle was down. The upshot of it all was that I forgot examination and had to be sent for _ Miss Goodwin ventured some mild advice _ I am afraid I didn't impress her with any preponderance of brains!174. Saturday, June 23, 1877. To see the light coming early through the inside blinds _ how nice it seemed again! - How very good to wake up and hear Lettie chatting _ and know that Huldah was in the other room dressing and Polly _ energetic spirit _ poking into the ribs of some stern duty _ Ella _ "the unity destroyer" as she insists on calling herself _ kissing us all good bye - at half-past five! _ seems nearer some way than she need to - only she did [fret] us _ It was well _ we needed to learn to be patiently inclined toward some one - We had things far too much our own way _ There's lots to say _ but then things must be packed _ Parlor 12 as far as we are concerned is coming to dissolution presently _ We talk about it some _ yet it seems old already to talk of "Parlor 80" _ and "next year" _ I see Lorle in little lovely minutes _ and the sun comes in and the sky over Sunset Hill is clearest blue! _ Polly's first [dorm] party and Polly's in a [whew]! [Along right margin] I saw Dr. Web and taked a long time up stairs in her room _ She says - "Wait a year" _175. Sunday, June 24, 1877. There's a kind of quiet enjoyment all its own in the "no hurry" _ of a Sunday Vassar breakfast _ We eat no more under Hiscock and Whitney auspices! _ there may be some all[evi]atings in this but aged Sophomores would hardly be expected to say so _ Much that was the brightness of last winter's Sunday lives again to-day _ for one day _ I take the sweet giving reverently but down below, my heart is aching _ I am braver when I am not here _ The President had dear last things to say to the class going out _ "No man liveth unto himself" _ was the keynote - I did not go up to dinner. Laura hurried down _ and hunted me up _ She found me in room a ... the Earle's bed _ She brought ... me out of her treasures - and the world for me wheeled toward the sunside" It is a wonderful gift to know how to be tender _ to others! Surely in my Lorle's heart is the "true riches" __ 176. Monday, June 25, 1877. Mostly on the fourth south! _ A big chair wheeled out by the very big box which Lorle is to pack _ holds me _ She makes little comments and I nod approval _ or comes out with a purely Skinner* speech and I laugh! _ It is a comfortable standpoint "whatever" to take life from _ It pauses by Miss Moore coming along _ seeing me carrying me to her room _ but I came back _ Polly's soul [takes] is itself bliss _ George is coming _ Huldah's too _ with "Electa" Dye for props _ The Earle looks for her missionary _ new from India! They all exert themselves variously _ mostly though on the [gym] path as night [draws] on apace! _ George is to board out _ The missionary is a college guest _ by virtue of her office! _ but Electa - dare I tell it: - is to be [smu]ggled! The concert was very nice _ [There was] life in it _ and sweet the interpretations _ It was a voice to me out of the weeks just gone _ and it brought me meanings of things _ [right margin] Lorle kneeling on the floor in front of [us] - her head upon her hand _ *Laura A. Skinner, Vassar student177. Tuesday, June 26, 1877. Jeanie Drake and Lee have gone _ So has Grace Darling _ [Kate] ... has come to live with my Laura _ I like the way Kate Darling has _ It is such a bright, dear atmosphere that is in and about 82 _ Miss White comes to us in Parlor 12 to live - to us a pleasant feature of Com. week. "The sun has always shone on '77" _ So ... the record "It always will" _ we feign would add - Her Class-Day fair and bright _ warm and winsome! _ Thrills of expectation seizing hold of even our staidest Huldah! _ We were together on the south side of the gallery _ Laura with us_ We didn't get fairly to laughing until the [Dana]" began _ Then it was the easiest thing in the world" = It was rare fun to watch from Dr's office window the scene below _ As pretty a picture as I ever remember _ We are still talking it over when Laura comes down to stay with me _ The Earle's missionary [left margin] is a subject of some solicitude to the matronly Earle!178. Wednesday, June 27, 1877. "The last time we shall hear "Stevie" play" _ says Laura leaning forward in our gallery seat _ It was the [mirror/minor] that ran through the whole day _ It was nothing but doing little last things _ "I am going out with Miss Spalding" _ says the Earle "Some of the Seniors are going over to Sunset Hill for their last little walk" _ So it was _ all day _ Something could happen to me too! _ At Polly's most beseeching entreaty I go up in the parlor to be introduced to George _ While up there, '66 looks at me in the face of Josie Shaw! _ "I'm half a Sophomore" says Laura, while the girls are wh[]ling round for their diplomas _ At this stage of college life it doesn't take long to get one! _ for a long, long time I shall see Laura going down the board walk to the lodge _ for a long, long time I shall remember how the lake looked as I sat and watched the shadows grow longer - over the trees across!179. Thursday, June 28, 1877. Our "one" and "two" with George and the missionary take flight on the Mary Powell _ Am "in season" more: _ at half-past eight I am steaming away from the sight of even of the Poughkeepsie hills - on the Eagle ! _ Miss Rexford _ for an hour or so _ doing it with me! _ Then I am left for a whole, long day to the joys I knew of old _ It is such a heart-resting journey up the river - on a day like this! _ I have Lauras "Bits of Talk"* with me _ and yesterday's flowers _ and the companionship of happy thoughts _ I could be content with one such day in a summer _ I get out of the poetry to begin immediately in realities _ bartering with a [trusty] looking individual to get my valise home "How do you do _ little mother? I've come to you out of a lovely dream!" _ * Two books by Helen Hunt Jackson: Bits of talk about home matters, 1873 and Bits of talk, in verse and prose, for young folks, 1876180. Friday, June 29, 1877. Here are cheery letters from Vermont _ waiting for me _ "Come" _ they say _ and when I am rocking in the big chair by the window I think about it _ Mother thinks the good time of the week way has got into my face _ It is a thoroughly glad feeling that comes over me to-day with every thought of it _ Here at home where the worries are _ where the daily living must be striven for _ I was going to say fretted for ! _ I am glad I can take Aggie out of it for a little If we could think of the [weight] of glory sometimes _ and not the afflictions! _ but we are so apt to []uddle down in the dark places! _ Dear Aunt Mary drops in on us _ bless her heart _ "To dream and dream of yonder amber light_ That will not leave the myrrh bush in the height!"* * from "The Lotos-Eaters" by Alfred Lord Tennyson181. Saturday, June 30, 1877. It was funny _ getting off _ We waited for Dan to come with the "dosing" and "he never"! Mother is behind nobody when it comes to engineering! Fannie bundles bottles and mother were dumped down together on the deck of the Whitney in time! this shows what a captain had our expedition! _ At the Troy landing my sister stood _ We eat cream at Sinsabaugh's and change hats _ also talk Vermont a little _ Just as the T. and B. wheels off _ Dan steps up to make his best D.B. bow and wave me off: _ Good boy! Wh[ere] our train stops a little girl in plaid stands waiting. Behind her my boy Frank with a buggy! _ The doors all open _ [the] flowers in front _ the sun coming in_ makes [S]atie's house seem a pleasant place to drift to _ this fair afternoon in June's departing flying hours! _ and then there are those hills across! _182. Sunday, July 1, 1877. Peace and no thunder was a thing unknown _ The day was divided up into little spells _ easy, comfortable minutes _ then a few [dreads] of the very uncomfortable kind_ then awe, consternation- grimness when the two biggest showers came together overhead, and hail-stones knocked at the windows. In the wonder and awe our thoughts have no centering place _ They shift and drift and lift with the clouds that file in solemn marches up where the storms are. By and by to watch the night in the wonderful places where the clouds form and meet the sloping hills in the south - a night well worth it _ Frances _ "our last communion before Mr. Robbins goes for his vacation" _ but that wasn't what she began to say _ I caught a little [sadly] at the thought that lay below _ One's first one's own church is always so much the nearest _ and its a long way the child is going. By the dining-room window - till the last line of light fades out _183. Monday, July 2, 1877. In which we get out of the thunder and feel as if we were a day ahead of it _ which is a very good [state] whatever! A shawl first and then Frances in the Shaker chair out where there is sky and a world. the sight of hills once more - Frances - do you take it in? Pretty busy everybody here _ Work goes off on []tters . I hear cheery voices from up-stairs where the dresses are being born and begun. I like Hermine's way. talk a little with the minister on Greek. He - well he sort of breaks off quick and begins something else every time _ His sentences are like Poor Richard's maxims! _184. Tuesday, July 3, 1877. Mrs. Forby _ is domiciled in the front room up stairs _ and much appealed to _ They call her "Lemmie" _ Her needle and thread measures are vigorous _ Hers is an active administration_ for she is quite alive to the magnitude of the occasion! So is Mr. Robbins at the head of the table down stairs! _ Well! _ I quite enjoy being up stairs where the work [is] _ though what I do mostly is to sew on sheets! _ I think that I am thus of great benefit to them! _ There's no danger of my being underestimated when I am judge and jury! _ The really great event "I spose" is George's coming. He must have felt raised up on alighting to find himself met by Stella and several Aunts! _ Authority up stairs says the night her prospective "husband arrived she flew like a bird to the clothes press! Satie does not proceed to follow her _ How the birdies sing _ how bright the flowers are in the house George has come to take her from! __185. Wednesday, July 4, 1877. the Glorious fourth was helped along by arching blue - and a sun in earnest_ To eat cherries and shoot the cannon off were the high ends and aims of a portion of us _ there was dignity left _ a few had no banging in their souls! _ We _ of the up-stairs sanctorium keep mightily to the proprieties _ Mrs. F. sews and quotes her Aunt _ Frances is quite bent on being demure _ She thinks of a once fat pocket-book _ and there does come up a sigh or two but they scarce avail - A guinea would be better _ I've got to begin a hardening process in my conscience - if I've got to ask Sis for money to make wedding presents with _ More []sing - and still more! _ I hope they are having a nice time down home to-day _ I'd like to see Nellie perform _ Her little dog ... quakes _ at gun-caps _ as the [souls] of larger people do over bigger noises _ in this strange world -186. Thursday, July 5, 1877. I was sitting out on the back steps stoning cherries when Lorle's letter came! It was sweet with pansy-breaths and mignonette _ the next thing was to dress for tea _ and go out and eat it _ Meals here are mixed up with a good deal of minister _ The Rev. George R.R. He is given to little jokes _ also to short college stories - It is prayer-meeting night _ and some of us go not thither _ George _ who does this evening walk in the counsel of the godly _ comes home "glad he went" --- Satie is tired and things fret her _ little outside things that ought'nt to _ "never mind" speaks up Mrs. F. "You won't be of any account after you're married" _ George and Susana are at work over onions - cut up in vinegar _ Bermudas _ ma'am!187. Friday, July 6, 1877. Lamartine and the Girondists as far as I am concerned are not much of a success_ Spasmodic French [even] out on the piazza in a Shaker chair _ is not good for me _ Satie's fuchsias _ her pride and her joy _ give themselves gladly to her [uses] _ They are a marvel - in their pink and purple I write quite at length and on many topics to my sister _ Could she _ would she _ get the wedding present? It will have to be a book _ I wanted something else - something rare and sweet _ and costly _ and yet we live a life of typical and interpre[tative] things _ Let the love and the heartfelt blessing _ live in richness _ Give to these immortality _ These are spirit and these are life! _ You would have to be very rich Fannie _ if it is from such treasure you would take for her _188. Saturday, July 7, 1877. In which there is great use of wings _ Billets innumerable speed to Dallins St _ Number Two _ It involves silk to match gloves to buy [ru]ching likewise also ribbon _ Well _ we are getting on - we work fast and we think fast these days _ In the meantime Satie is here and there and everywhere in the midst of it all - and gets scarcely any quiet free minutes! _ These we all need _ at the threshold of the new and strange. I hear the six o'clock train as it comes whistling in _ the train that has come up through yellow light _ and made its way from Troy to the hills in sight of my round hill _ It is gently that the week dies _189. Sunday, July 8, 1877. Something's wrong in the room next to mine - Grandma is stewing _ It makes me laugh when she pitches in to Emma _ Her shafts strike metal armor there _ I had written two pages to Lorle _ and was just beginning on the third when George wanted to know _ "Would I go up stairs and fix up Satie?" _ found the door locked and the child in tears _ Well _ we shifted toward sunnier corners _ and let the world lift up to us its cheeriest face _ the little home held out its oldest treats to charm us _ It gave to us a dear afternoon _ We could sing and talk _ and be lifted anew into His holy place _ It is God that has us in hand _ I would like a piece of my own little home to-day _ I hope indeed they see His light that is shining on them _ sure to be shining _ such a day as this190. Monday, July 9, 1877. Quite early you could have seen us _ Satie and me _ out among the morning dews and morning flowers _ snipping off _ now here _ now there _ any thing that looked as if it would grow _ These properly packed _ are to go with many directions _ into the hands of "Jim" to be borne to my mother _ eminently a success as far as we are concerned Minnie and I preside alone in the up-stairs places to-day _ Mrs. F. makes other solitary places glad _ Showers come up _ in off spells _ impromptu fashion _ During the P.M. we keep our eyes on the flying clouds - and our ears open for flying trains. Equilibrium seems quite restored when the "last train up" _ whistles _ Minnie and Satie in their "blues" _ run out to look _ Yes _ they are all on hand _ "Jim" - and George and my girl _ It does sometimes clear off just in time!191. Tuesday, July 10, 1877- A dark day for Frances _ All through the sunny hours of the fair July day there was for her only pain. It is in the little bedroom down stairs that you will find her. Satie's world is all astir in the other rooms _ The pleasant hum of it comes to me in the pauses of the pain- After the morning mail comes Satie runs in to show me her pretty wedding present from Ida _ Then "Aunt Carrie" arrives _ with Uncle Nathan _ bringing the pretty silver spoonholder _ Meanwhile the hemlock wreaths and festoons are being wound sending the evergreen breaths through the house _ Kitty Peters comes over to help and Aggie helps and by dark I am able to put my fingers in the pie _ O.O. what a busy house _ till into midnight _ Well _ Satie _ my dear _ we have this one more night to [say] the rest in _ 192. Wednesday, July 11, 1877. Such a morning as it was! Such lights away and away and away on the hills _ a day to pledge love in _ How glad we were for the little girl that is putting her hand into another's _ God grant he may be strong to hold it _ I was down to Mrs. Peters' early _ all of us at work on the great marriage bell which [proved] when the time came such a perfect surprise _ Beautiful flowers were everywhere about the house _ Good wishes _ and God bless yous were round about her whom most of us had known so long _ and him _ who had come to promise us to love and cherish her "for always" _ Good-bye _ my Satie girl _ We are glad that you have been so faithful in the little house as to leave a large vacant place _ God bless you - girlie! _193. Thursday, July 12, 1877. So we settle back to be still _ and to find comfort in the places as they are to be _ thinking much and many things _ It is so very, very still _ As for Aggie she's up stairs mostly _ writing is on her hands _ My station is below _ at the little bedroom window! _ So we write and write _ so does the morning go _ the tall grasses over the brook where Lorle is _ ... me softly in their singing _ and I almost [see] the flowers gathering round the heart of her gladiola Sweet things these that form the pieces of our lives! _ All of them go to prayer-meeting _ but the tired-out mother _ and this girl _ It is a cosy little talk we have at home _ our thoughts following the little new wife _194. Friday, July 13, 1877. Sick again! _ Why Francie it seems to be it is in a very bad way you are getting! _ And then how it rained! _ It just came down upon us _ shutting us out from the happier light that might have come thro' the little bedroom window and been a sure and steady help _ Well - I lay and I thought a little of the sweetness of being called on to "purely endure" _ Aggie said _ "Go home - and see what Dr. Van thinks _ and come back to-morrow" _ She did think just a little that she would _ but it seemed best not to The flower pyramid is lovely yet _ If we could only keep it just like this now til George and Satie come _ Nothing comes or goes across the face of things that sets the day apart by itself __195. Saturday, July 14, 1877. In which we betake ourselves into strange places _ To see me walking over to the depot so grand you would think I had dropped upon those dreamed of borders where "I shall run and not be weary"* _ but it is far away yet _ that those borders are _ On my way thro' this Massachusetts country I see the spires of Williams College rising up out of the valley _ like a picture! George was at North Adams depot to meet us _ Satie just crossing over the bridge _ What a ride that was up the mountain to Aunt Carrie's _ How we did enjoy it! _ As if this were not enough for one day _ we must add to it the wonderful beauty of the other side _ and see the sun set in drifts of color over the []est mountain masses that I ever saw _ What a giving unto us it was _ Aunt Carrie's company keep late hours to-night _ I am glad Aggie is having such a nice time - *Isaiah 40:31 King James Bible196. Sunday, July 15, 1877. Another day of gladdest sunshine after so many perfect ones _ This mountain air is soul-inspiring _ Aunt Carrie and Uncle Nathan have an old, old house - and as far as you can see ezch way there is no other. The rooms are little with low ceilings _ and funny stairways _ and queer little touches of their own - Think of Beatrice with her sad eyes _ looking out upon the staid [stiff] country parlor _ all these very still years - We go to the quaintest old church you ever read about _ and hear a wild, [tearing] kind of a man _ Not a very pointed text _ did he start from _ "Take ye away the stone"* Uncle Nathan takes me home round by the "central shaft" of the Tunnel - I get out and explore! _ I drive away from Aunt Carrie's glad in my heart that I have seen the inside of her home _ We get in North Adams as the bells are singing for church __ * John 11:39197. Monday, July 16, 1877. "Flora and Dannie" have a pretty, cosy way of living _ Everything about them seems so young-like _ and new _ Their windows seem to look everywhere - Frank gives Aggie and I quite a little drive around North Adams _ over by all the factories _ and the pretty streets _ and Mary Cady's home _ and then to some Natural Bridge _ just out of the town. After dinner I take sundry naps _ and play with baby _ and talk to George- The rest of the folks have their pictures taken! Aggie quite merry over it- We are off on the six o'clock train _ and the golden light is over all things as we move along _ Those chestnuts _ those chestnuts! what a picture they made standing up against the hills - We are home _ first thing _ "from the announcements come?" _ And George and Frances begin _198. Tuesday, July 17, 1877. And we are still at it _ addressing envelopes and tying up wedding-cake _ We are getting so accustomed to weddings Aggie and I _ that to go back to every-day realities _ and have festities null and void will seem like a new phase of existence instead, my friends, of a very old one! _ We're a funny world anyway _ the best you can say of us ! _ We "take stock" in a goodly portion of "doins" that have just started for the people at home _ Bless them! _ I have a dear letter from Susie to read - It comes like the dews of Sharon! _ We have packing to do _ and little lookings about over the places we shall see not soon again_ My dear little sister girl and Bruder Frank and I have a little matter of business on hand - purely ours _ It is time for the "good nights" once more and we finally get in very still [nooks]!199. Wednesday, July 18, 1877. It is very early "whatever" that we are ready for our start _ and one of the dearest mornings in the world that we have to shine us off and away _ We kiss them all around _ give Satie the last, little hug _ and sh[oot] off in the sun glory out of sight _ at Eagle Bridge we take the "accommodation" [a] train much misnamed! We are twitched along ungraciously _ and after being shoved into the [jaws] of a train that would move _ ... pretty near _ we get off in disgust at Poultney _ We think the 18th of July is verily against us when we find no Emily _ [or] "Vicky" there - and we do find the horns of a dilemma _ also a cross depot-man! Never mind! Emily is on her way and in a minute we see her _ and ride off with her quite happy _ Such a pretty bedroom as awaits us _200. Thursday, July 19, 1877. And it set up to rain - and the rain up set the haying - quite _ It was just such a morning as would do nicely for us - with our letters to write - Besides there was in it a benign fate _ We could have a horse . The boy had to go to the station _ This too was in our favor _ for we did want our trunk _ We think Mrs. Williams has such a dear motherly way _ She gives us such an easy feeling - the horse we could have, as I told you before _ and as the rain was kind enough to stop _ we made our way up to Ella Ward's _ We made a most pleasant call _ lunched with them _ waved most graceful adieus _ and then broke down _ It was the hills_ then we had to do it all over again _ except the lunch _ It was Sinclair's management that got us off at last __201. Friday, July 20, 1877. "Emerce" _ (is that the way to spell it?) is inclined to be benevolent _ Any way it was his horse that wasn't needed in the meadow _ and as we did go off away with it _ you may draw your own conclusions! On and on _ up and up _ on that road that used to delight me so _ that is after this day a new memory to me _ as I see it in the freshness of this new summer ! _ We were well received by Mr. and Mrs. Cook _ and almost the first thing were presented to the new baby _ A very fine baby whatever _ We were there to [ten] - and came home in the sunset _ taking the road along the lake to Hydeville - It was one of the treats of this world to me - a very sea of Galilee _ where I strain my eyes for a sight of His ship __ [upside down at the top of the page] This day's trip was an immense pleasure to Aggie ___|| 202, Saturday, July 21, 1877. I am reading "Shirley" _ I was so glad to come across it _ here at Emily's _ The visit planned for to-day is with Fannie Lewis and her sisters in the village _ Lizzie was to take us down _ and Emily to come by and by _ the principal attractions were croquet _ Edith's music _ and the long pleasant piazza _ We had a most sensible tea _ of _ well _ it would be much below propriety strict _ to tell what _ and proper I must be _ whatever gets left out! _ We had just got up from the table when Ella Ward and Frankie Lake came _ It made quite a buzz on the "long piazza" for awhile _ We had time for a nice little visit _ as it began to grow dark Aggie, Emily & Lizzie started for home - and Fannie & I went to call on Addie Taft _ [right margin] Eliza [Laub] - likewise was at Fannie's203. Sunday, July 22, 1877. In its own beautiful way the rest-day came to us _ Remember it _ to keep it holy _ was the sweet verse everywhere _ in the still, soft air _ in the solemn arching sky _ in the hush of the [winds] _ the pauses of busy men and women! _ And I _ to wake and find myself in Poultney _ with only six miles between me and the places I think of so much _ But I shall not see them this summer! _ We listen in the mornning to Rev. Mr. Savage _ of the Methodist faith _ Are highly pleased _ In the evening we attend Mr. Pierce's service _ He has a ...pleasant way of saying things - but seems earnest _ We tried to get up to Middletown to see Ella Mills but the boy we raised couldn't catch a horse _ This counts us out! _ After evening church we take our glass of milk and visit in the cosiest of ways ___204. Monday, July 23, 1877. The last we see of Emily she is stationed in the rear of a milk-cart _ bouncing over the road supposed to lead to Granville _ We watch the little round straw hat and the bright face under it _ as it gets away out of sight. We have it to thank for some very bright pieces of life! - Aggie thinks that afternoons out are rather wearing _ but decides finally to stand one more! _ She is glad she went when she sees Mrs. Armstrong's pretty baby girl _ Addie and her sister make it very pleasant for us _ It is a right-pretty home. The flower garden has great charms for us _ Every wind that blows to us is filled with mignonette and pansy breaths _ It is quite dark when "Vicky" comes for us - but we have pleasant moonlight to go home by __205. Tuesday, July 24, 1877. We get the bed-room straightened out _ such a pretty bedroom as it is _ and Aggie and I fold things up and lay them in our trunk and talk over our visit _ and think how nice its been so far_ It was so kind of "Vicky"_ she took us way over to Fair Haven _ got our trunk disposed of for us _ and after landing us safe at "Auntie's" she stayed to visit with us a while _ I call it a very lovely way she has of being friendly _ and Mrs. Lloyd! she is another one of those women whom it does me good to see! Aggie was delighted to have a chance to make even this little stop with her _ Emma and Katie were over to see us a little while this evening _ It is not going to be so that we can visit there _ this time _ Imagine us lying down in one of the pleasantest rooms we ever saw _ with dear Mrs. Lloyd asking at the last minute what one more thing she can do __206. Wednesday, July 25, 1877. We are up and on our way to the depot at an astonishing hour _ Mrs. Lloyd staying with us until the last minute _ and telling us in her fascinating way to be sure and come - when Winnie is home _ It is a glowing day that we have for our journey - We couldn't ask anything more _ We have time enough to give Whitehall quite an inspection _ and are not over and above elated _ Stretched out at our ease in the hotel parlor _ Aggie and I talk up railroad riots _ My sister is some disturbed _ but I apply balms! _ The "bus" out is a welcome sight _ We buy a paper _ and go with speed to the "night car" _ when found! at Ti Landing we have quite an experience! it being as my sister insists "out in the middle of the lake!" _ But _ there's worse places! _ A man is raised up to get us over _ and once there we all laugh to think we missed Mrs. Ward in such a funny way _ Well _ it seems good to see Julia _ We all go to prayer-meeting at the school-house __207. Thursday, July 26, 1877. It is so much pleasanter here at Julia's than I dreamed of its being _ The room that we are to have looks out on the lake _ Aggie still insists that we came near being at the end of our days yesterday _ but her usual equanimity has returned this morning and she consents to look at the lake _ Julia wants to know after breadfast if we would like to take a drive _ We are [harrassed] by no doubts in the matter _ and are soon seen stepping along toward Chipman's Point _ Aggie thinks it a dreadful name _ A letter there for Frances M. Bromley _ from Burlington sends me home more some other girl than me! You see me for the rest of the day with quite a determined air _ "You going?" says my sister _ "Yes" _ promptly _ you hear me say _ Aggie _ by the little stand writing _ I _ down stairs - talking to Julia while she is here and there _ and around __208. Friday, July 27, 1877. Any one would think after all these weeks of learning things that nothing could come _ to set me tossing and grieving for my way _ my way _ How much hard pain it would save me _ and Jesus too if my every thought could be brought "into the obedience of Christ"* _ but here I wake just begging for the touch of his healing hand upon me _ because I have one more earthly place that I can hardly give up. His own "good" time _ Fannie _ How sure it will be to be a good time when it comes! I write a ... note to Mr. Alger _ and a letter to Dr. Van _ Aggie is still busy with her letters when I drive off with Grace _ who comes to take me to her house for the afternoon _ When I get home I find Aggie and Julia quite enthusiastic over Chinese billiards! _ It is such a hot, uncomfortable night _ and mosquitoes rage in storms! __ [right margin] We have given up "Lake George" for this time. * 2 Corinthians 10:5209. Saturday, July 28, 1877. This little sister of mine has had a fretty night _ With the asthma and the mosquitoes - and the steam vapor baths _ the chapters read quite appalling _ We rise from them to enter into the merits of a hot day _ Julia's morning was cake and things _ ours was easy and comfortable like! _ We thought Annie Addie and Winnie would be over _ forestalled by written entreaties but we see nothing of them _ and we give it up! _ A carriage with a dignified lady at the rein walks in in stateliness _ "It is Annie" we say _ we are in Julia's room by the window _ We file solemnly down and are presented to Mrs. Dr. Ward of Northfield _ The next thing was to get our bonnets _ for Julia made it apparent to our "torn up" minds that we were going for a sail We were quite ready _ and we dipped our oars in the lake waters _ and dipped and dipped them again _ It was quite worth while ___ [left margin] Aggie and Julia's mother carry on at a great rate!210. Sunday, July 29, 1877. Our "written entreaties" so eloquently touched upon yesterday proved the unconscious intruments of a casualty _ so we hear this morning _ Put into the shape we heard it _ "Addie and Winnie were run away with yesterday" a miserable [invention] all through _ concocted in the [brain] of some thistles _ to sprain Addie's ankle frighten Winnie and spoil for us that pleasant visit _ which "might have been" _ A dreamy Sunday morning _ and through the church windows I can hear the soft summer sounds in the air _ and see the waving grasses _ Mr. [Sever]ance preaches about Peter and John _ So he did Wednesday night _ at the the Mount After church there were greetings from my Orwell girls that did my soul good - and I came home through the sunshine thinking about them _ Annie looks very sad _ sadder even than I had thought. Aggie goes to bed d[escre]tly hoping there wont be "skeeters" at our next place! ___211. Monday, July 30, 1877. When the mists unfurled at daylight it was hard to tell what kind of a day was breaking upon us _ Things looked formidable _ but maybe the rain clouds would float up to Plattsburgh _ or down over the heads of the rioters ! _ Any way we'd wait and see _ Done! _ When the heavens cleared _ "Burt" trolled off with us _ We are disposed of as follows _ I am firmly borne from Burt's vehicle into Annie's _ somewhere between Col. Warren's and the depot _ which means that I'm to be with Annie in school [doins] to-day _ while Aggie keeps on her rejoicing? way _ to spend the day with Mrs. P __ So does it go - Well _ this is like battle-smoke to an old veteran _ I am ready to put my finger on my sword hilt and spring! _ Aggie goes smelling round the assigned bedroom to see if its hot - also to see - are their(sic) winged creantures(sic)? ___212. Tuesday, July 31, 1877. We had just performed all our various arduous duties Miss Sister and I: _ made astonishing toilets _ straightened out our room _ taken breakfast _ [seen] Annie off _ Then my sister produced her worsted work, and I had read aloud to her a page I guess of the Princess of Thuli(sic)* _ when we saw Ella Royce coming for us _ What a very pleasant day we have had there! _ It must have been the home atmosphere _ that made it every way so restful and happy to us _ Any way we felt as if we were taken nearer to the heart of things after this one day of quiet visiting There was a charm even in the way the rocking-chair was offered _ of the flower-garden shown to us _ Even father left his haying and came in. _ At Annie's, letters were waiting for us _ Miss Burlinton to set my head to spinning - Well ___ *A Princess of Thule: a novel (1873) by William Black213. Wednseday, August 1, 1877. Aggie is present at the ushering in of August _ or pretty near - Anyway I took several naps after I heard her taking part in the active affairs of life - The drive was to get a letter and a postal off by the morning mail _ She hadn't returned from the station when Mrs. Forbes came for us _ In the meantime Annie is paying off her hired girl _ and healing imaginary breaches between the hired man - and the existing state of things _ Rather ruffling processes _ Mrs. F's sitting-room has an air about it that I like _ it is a "used room _ it is full of books and pictures _ selected evidently by one who knew both _ Aggie sits by her pretty blue work spread out before her _ This chiefly _ I _ also in a rocking chair _ talk up the health question _ Mrs. Forbes - has done me good in what she has been saying _ Evening characterized by a ride after the colt --- Allie driving ---214. Thursday, August 2, 1877. We slept in a large airy room - with three large windows _ and cool matting on the floor _ The sleep we got was a blessing to us both! _ Mrs. Forbes has a very pleasing way of entertaining _ The decided unquestioning way in which she says _ "I believe you can get well" _ does me infinite good _ We stop at Annie's a minute on our way to Mrs. Bowker's _ and find a letter there for me from Burlington _ Well _ there's one sure thing _ A final yes or no must go to-morrow _ Which it shall be rather perplexes me _ and I hear naught from Dr. Van _ Mrs. Bowker has a very nice way of making people have a pleasant time at her house. Mrs. Billings _ and Susie are stopping a day or two with her _ Aggie takes quite a fancy to them both _ There's a "sing" in the evening and we see Janet Thomas for the first time _ also some other people.215. Friday, August 3, 1877. I get up early to send that final word to Mr. Alger. It is with a sorrowful heart _ that I pull in all the cords that have held my airy hope [structures] and tell him _ I cannot come _ But it is best so _ It took me so long to say it that the letter will not go until to-morrow! _ We visit to-day with Grandma Forbes and her pleasant people up in Shoreham _ It looks so pretty as we drive up to it _ where they live. Inside it seems as if most everything was birds and flowers _ Aggie has already bargained for one of the canaries! _ We have a most comfortable talk with Grandma _ and tea in her own little room - on a cunning little table _ In the evening Uncle Charlie and Grandpa - come in to help the visiting along ___216. Saturday, August 4, 1877. A day by itself = hard to talk about or write about _ but to think of always _ Was there ever a clearer, more glorious morning? The very day of all for Snake Mountain _ this is what we all said at Grandpa's _ This is what Allie said when he came over with the big lunch basket _ When "Uncle Charlie" and "Aunt Lucy" were ready _ we were off. it seemed as if every sight and sound were perfect on this day of days _ At the last we climbed where there were great pineforests _ and trees with great swinging branches - maples, birches elms _ Then we crossed the sawmill brook - climbed a little more and lo ! we are at the very top - Such an outlook as there was for us! _ "O- for time to see it in" we said - "for days and days up here _ with nothing to do but to look" _ 217. Sunday, August 5, 1877. How still it came over us _ up here in Shoreham at Grandma's _ What lovely, lovely sunshine lay over the face of the earth! _ We took the longest way back to Orwell - so as to get all the pretty views _ Allie showing us all the points of interest as we went along _ It is good for us sometimes to drink in a sermon of the living beauty as profitable as to have all our sermons from the living spoken truth _ I had told Annie that I would give all of this Sunday to her that I could _ It must have been about noon when I reached her. Aggie in the meantime riding on with Allie - home - It was a easy Sunday talk that we had - sitting through the bright afternoon where we could look out thro' the open door _ But the rain came up _ and the brightness became storm _ and the blue - vanished _ In one of the lulls we started for Minnie's - It seemed almost a treat to be out in such a storm ___218. Monday, August 6, 1877. We are once more on the move _ No storm upon us _ as we had feared when we heard the rain through the night of things _ but all is smiles for us _ as we take up our line of march _ Birdie _ to whom most any form of life is as yet strange enough _ (he is very young!) _ [keeps] up funny little flops _ We feel as if we had a menagerie on our hands! _ Aggie scours Rutland in search of some device _ to make birdie come into better humor with this world _ How hot it is _ and Mrs. Brown don't like to wait for matters of so small account _ as birds _ Once off and it is a smooth - green ... side _ before us _ and cool ... awaiting _ We try to visit thro' the afternoon with Mrs. B _ but there are momentous pauses _ Laura won't be here until to-morrow to help _ In the meantime I'll tell you what we'll do _ We will go to Jennie's ___219. Thursday, August 7, 1877. That's such a cunning little room we sleep in at Jennie's _ We are quite happy to wake and find ourselves here - The new housekeeping in Jennie's home is full of bright little ways _ and we are glad to see Jennie - We get back to the Brown's just before Mr. B _ starts off for Rutland _ and we take seats with him - and trudge along _ nothing particular to worry about _ or study up! Very good! Laura gives us energetic hugs - as she steps up to us _ from off the train - We capture our trunk _ stop at the Rutland P.O. and retrace our steps to Clarendon _ Aggie gets papers from home _ This rejoices the souls of us _ So would a letter but our boy is a very still boy whatever! _ The word from Dr. Van is significant! _ We settle down to knitting and tidies and any amount of visiting __220. Wednesday, August 8, 1877. Birdie's [new] cage hangs over the side piazza _ birdie in quiet frames of mind since he got out of that box which he effects to have despised _ Aggie is quite engaged with him _ his faintest twitter is of moment to her _ and we are summoned in crowds if he warbles! _ I knit and am very quiet through the morning _ Mrs. Brown is not an awfully comfortable person _ Aggie vamooses to do her to-day visiting with "Em" and Miss ... Existing states are interferred with by a call from Sarah Hazelton and her mother _ Afterward Sarah [Squire] and Lizzie Gibson come over and stay for a nice long talk _ It does seem good to see the old faces "Sweet summer sky bending over _ beyond your blue depths is there not Heaven?"* * from Gala-days by Gail Hamilton (Mary Abigail Dodge)221. Thursday, August 9, 1877. It was a long, still morning in the house _ We talk and break off and begin again _ I in one rocking-chair by the window _ Aggie in another rocking-chair by the window just across - and Laura - in and out _ now with us a minute _ now _ out where the work was! - I got a line from Mr. Aler _ and I break it open quick and read it _ In the kindest manner possible he regrets my illness _ and says in closing - I am recommended for even a better position in Burlington next year! - Well - if this is the Lord's doing _ He will make me well enough to go _ Jennie and her mother stop and take Aggie with them to Rutland _ It made the child quite rejoiced _ as she was out of worsted _ she comes back in the happiness of blue cambric for sweeping caps _ "If the men were all transported"* to [hums] Laura - away __ * from the song Reuben and Rachel, words by Harry Birch, published 1871222. Friday, August 10, 1877. "Well" - says Laura - "I can have a horse this morning- and we'll have a ride right off" _ but disaster is upon us _ The first glimmer of it to my consciousness is when I put my head out of our window up stairs and behold my sister careening thru' squash-vines & [beet]-beds _ chasing all the birds whose breasts are yellow _ A dire day _ We peer under grass-blades _ stand in rows to gaze piteously up into the towering Balm of Gilead trees _ and lessen our hopes, but not our labors _ No good! Well - we ride - This is of the nature of a small comfort to my sister _ The falls we go to see are well worth seeing _ The gorges where the still waters are after their plunge over the rocks are beautiful with mosses and fern-growths _ There is a wild beauty about it all _ that we don't often see - Mr. B. takes us over to Jennie's after dinner - We end the day in jumping from gravestone to gravestone in pursuit of "Birdie" _ Our diligence is rewarded! ___ We feel quite soothed -- [right margin] We call a minute on Sarah [Squire]223. Saturday, August 11, 1877. I go off with "Will" to the queerest, wildest ride you ever heard of _ He _ ostensibly to salt the cattle _ the other side "of a thousand hills" _ I _ to see scenery _ Our trappings are not kingly _ We don't look like a picture of an Oriental pageant _ It was more like a woodcut from "Manners and customs of the Ancients"_ a Hebrew ploughing! But we'll take mountain pictures, if you please - and not our own _ the very joy and strength of the morning has witched itself into us _ Aggie and Jen are left to [carry] "mother" to Rutland _ and make sweeping caps! Evening - a party at "Mother ..." nice and neighborly in her to think of _ but it gets carried through with divers pushings and boosts! __"Won't you please play?" "Won't you please sing?" Jen's entertainment ... ... But where is Ida? __ Miss Ten Broeck & I visit in a corner224. Sunday, August 12, 1877. In which we go to the "South Flat" to hear Mr. Morse _ "I just love that man" _ This from Laura B _ some days ago _ It is a pleasant drive over to the church _ We come to a place in the road where the way is fringed with tall green willows _ Its rather hard on us to say the least that "father March" should have selected a pew so far front! and those last touches to our [toilet] added to the situation - poignancy. I presume Jennie feels as if she were chairman of the committee on ways and means - in this present draft upon her powers _ A sort of army of us sprinkle her table _ Miss [T.] B. favoring us in spite of Laura's testimony that she was "awfully good" _ Ida is with us too _ Tho' she won't eat _ Mr. Adams managed this _ I mean the getting here _ It is a very comfortable after dinner talk that we have _ Aggie comforting herself meanwhile with "The Princess of Thule" _ Silence by & by & Will takes us over the [March barn]225. Monday, August 13, 1877. It showered a little early _ and then the sun came out in a great, magnificent burst _ It was fairly sweltering to people who had to go to the East Clarendon depot _ thro drifts of Clarendon [sand]! _ The plan of yesterday proposed and carried out by "Miss Todd" has been a timely procedure _ I am quite in love with it _ It has given me a long, much wished for talk with Ida - and a day with Rhoda and her dear people _ Their house stands far back in one of the trimmest meadows _ "Do you suppose this is the place?" _ "It looks just like [Rhoda] let's try it" _ They were very right! _ My ! how dark it was - but Will there to pick me up [from] the arms of the Vt. ... conductor _ Aggie has news for me _ She has made her blue cambric sweeping cap _ too small! __226. Tuesday, August 14, 1877. Imagine [it] _ The aspect was a martin-house stuck up on two sticks _ with a little hole for the swallows and martins to crawl through _ They call it Clarendon station _ Its us _ standing there - peering _ I tell you we were on time - Will has a genius that way. We rattle along musically _ and when the outside shows are gravel-trains _ and fields covered o'er with pine stumps we devote ourselves to "flippy" in the cage _ We bring up at Helen's front door - somewheres near nine _ to find her setting out on an ironing which promises to be [huge] _ I'm glad to see her _ bless her heart _ We just go into visiting like everything _ My first glimpse inside the little home since "that night" __ Henry takes Aggie to see "Dellwood" _ We walk as far as the Equinox with them - and how happy I came home with this long_ long letter from Westfield227. Wednesday, August 15, 1877. We settle ourselves for a day in doors _ that is mostly _ the piazza in front has great charms for us and with the doors open through we can gossip away at Helen _ just as well _ I think its just fine to live under the eye of such a mountain as old Equinox _ "flippy" too is happy _ up there on the hook He is impressed with grandeur _ I know! _ "Lu" skips about and is everywhere _ When her [mamma] washes her she says - "Go way" _ Her tendencies are more of the Miss Thomas [order] _ then one might at first suppose _ She has the air of Gen. Sherman! _ ... us [down] completely! - While Helen is meeting Aggie round the old '...' Where our boy used to hold forth - I compose myself over Holland's "Mistress of the Manse"* __ the mignonette coming in currents through the windows! _ Night - and Equinox early __ a rain impends ! [right margin] Helen gave us some Manchester [views] that I think ever so much of ___ * Mistress of the Manse, 1874 novel by J.G. Holland 228. Thursday, August 16, 1877. It looked for awhile as if "Mr. Vanderlip" wasn't coming _ So long as we were flapping our wings _ and supposing that we would bring up at Burlington _ & an air of impatience stirred when we stopped But we learned better! __ The seats in the Manchester depot are not alluring _ We shall never divert ourselves from life's cares by calling to mind the four hours we sat on them _ F.B. Golis could hardly be looked on in the light of an amelioration! Well we don't see the President _ We give him up _ North Bennington and the next train home was our final conclusion _ We do the rest of our waiting - where there's at least a remnant of curled hair to sit down on _ "Do I have to buy something here if we go in?" _ says my sister _ it coming over _ how it was at "Hall's" _ We sweep in on them at home with gusts _ We like the feeling _ of "home again"229. Friday, August 17, 1877. There's almost always some pleasant surprise in waiting for me when I get home _ This time it was the letter from Miss Fields. I write a line to Mr. Alger _ on her behalf _ and send it with all speed but I am afraid I'm very late _ whatever! _ No. 2 Dallins St. looks good to me to-day _ We stand out by the little green stand where the plants are and watch mother dig up places for the slips that have come down from Vermont with us in a [fruit] can _ The English ivy my special pet looks as though it might live _ tho' I am harassed with doubts _ Aggie and I make plunges into "that trunk" _ with the pleasant intention of disposing of its floating masses and then locking it up for a spell _ Then my sister leaves us for Cohoes _ I write to Lorle _ that is I begin __230. Saturday, August 18, 1877. Aunt Mary says she didn't dream I had improved so _ "Why you don't look like the same girl!" _ How splendid it seems to live where we can have her running in! We don't produce any perceptible shock in the family _ displaying the pictures we were going to surprise them with! _ They all clamor for one that has "flippy" in! All the sensations must be traced to him! _ Our venerable uncle has not dropped in upon us often as his wont has been. It discourages him somewhat because he can't pray with grandmother _ One could hardly be expected to press matters! _ I took a time when the spirit of it was quite upon me _ to answer the letter I spoke of yesterday _ "O - for one short hour _ to feel as I used to feel!: There are better prayers for you, Frances _231. Sunday, August 19, 1877. It is not early that any of us are up _ unless its grandma _ She has a talent for it! _ Isn't it nice to get back to take another look at the table in the corner of the front parlor _ the one with the red spread on! I believe I think more of that corner every time I go away and come back _ I wish "Eida" was here to play the dear Sunday hymns for us _ We haven't got Flippy so he can sing them for us perfect _ yet _ We intend to _ His warbles now are uneven toot-toots! The young minister in St. Paul's Chapel is not clerical in aspect _ How do I know? I was there [mum]! Well - my sweet, still Sunday - God is in the midst of you - It is not a stranger that we follow!232. Monday, August 20, 1877. Who under the sun and earth it could be ringing our door-bell and calling for mother at half-past five _ A.M _ was a poser _ To be asked for at any hour would be rather remarkable - considering how many times the bell is rung and we aint asked for - but at 5:30 _ this was an experience! - And then to think it was I _ that was called for _ It is simply astounding _ a green card explains - ... Allison Forbes! _ Mr. "Slip-and-Fetch-it" _ assisted by mother did the ushering in! He comes back at nine o'clock bringing Mr. Stack _ and by dint of put forth exertion we get the use of [our] Dan _ and [trot] him off with them to the "Royce's Gallery" _ That's what we always do with our visitors "Five minutes for refreshments" _ You've seen the picture _ A very good reproduction of it in our front basement _ to-day _ Aggie don't come - and she don't come _ I sent a letter to Mrs. Forbes by []llie _ full of pros and cons __233. Tuesday, August 21, 1877. Mr. Hughes hopes he'll get "that gate"! _ It would be a :mercy" to Aunt Mary if he'd get something _ Poor soul _ I wish St. Peter wanted my old uncle to help [tend] his gate! _ "I don't expect anything else but what we'll have to go to Earlville" _ This brings on a chapter of special [ations] in our basement _ and no end to ever! Aggie comes home with a dreadful cold _ is so hoarse she can hardly speak! _ We are all so sorry! _ To begin over I will start by telling you that I conferred once more with Dr. Van. He made his usual three seconds inspection _ didn't care anything about hearing anything I had to say _ O _ yes _ yes _ I could go to Vermont _ with a [mental] "or some other place!" _ I think I'm kind of "fraid" of him _ I'll keep this prescription for a "momentum" _ Everybody is talking about the shooting Sunday _ out [at Mr.] Ten Eyck's _ where Aunt [Esther] isDannie _ poor boy, is having about all he can bear these days _ Its "galling" and no mistake to be asking for work _ and not getting it _ People that have work to give out are not always _ courtesy itself' _ and Dan's heart is young _ We have many worries over the little girl to-day _ She came to day light _ up through a long _ sick night _ and she's scarcely any better! _ "To each is given his burden _ on whose shoulders would we place it, that we might be free?" We read _ so many times that our griefs have been "borne" & our sorrows "carried" _ Shall we hold our tired shoulders to bear them on still wearily _ or shall we look up and rejoice that we are "free indeed"!? _ Shall we be faithless or believing _ an appeal is in progress to Mr. Dawson of the Journal office _235. Thursday, August 23, 1877. We think Aggie is just a little more comfortable this morning _ She and mother both got a little rest last night_ I begin to copy in the new red blank book that is to be Ida Todd's when it is full _ There gets to be a sameness in it _ even after laying out upon it all the enthusiasm I can muster together! _ I like it there in the front parlor by the window. I talk "Orwell" to mother and she don't like the idea much _ "Still if its best" _ she says_ Fr[] comes back from Mr. Dawson _ It looks as if there might be a chance for Dannie _ Anyway he's to go up and see _ Mother's heart is full of fretly things _ I can't make ways out for her somehow! __236. Friday, August 24, 1877. We get Dan off for Wead Parsons and Co* "bright and early _ They'll "see" _ "Come in again in a few days" _ He throws his hat down with a defeated air _ "That's what they all say _ Everywhere I go" _ "Well _ says Frances _ "I'll go up and see him to-morrow!" _ Aggie is well enough to be about a little _ Frances copies _ mother cooks _ Now you have _ dear reader mine _ about the story _ Over to Aunt Mary's _ their hero likewise is dangling over an abyss by a hair" _ Nellie has [proven] poor over [gun]-caps _ She pipes "Il Desiderio" _ and keeps her head held down_ Mrs. Forbes has written me a very nice letter _ On the strength of it I am fully decided that it is best for me to go back to Vermont awhile! __ *Weed Parsons and Company, Albany printer and bookbinder237. Saturday, August 25, 1877. In which I think I am taking something by the horns - dilemmas perhaps - when I assault the doors of W.P.and Co _ with my meek face - and gliding in way _ enquiring for Mr. P. He will see _ would I call again next week _ I think when I came out _ Everybody I passed had a hopefulness about them! _ Then I sit down to copy _ copy _ The end I guess sanctifies the means or else I don't see how I keep a doing it - for it is not happy work _ Not exactly a nice place to do it in there by the parlor window _ folks passing _ noises _ a stir in the world _ that is what I like _ Sometimes _ The bird croaks a little The singing we get from him is poor yet! __ "And the full will be beautiful up there" _ I say to myself _ many times thinking of Orwell - and the mountains where I shall be pretty soon! _ It is Sunday, you see, and I do not do anything but sit and think _ There are sweet breaths that come to us from the gardens _ when we sit at the east doors _ We can see grape-arbors that are green and [wooing]. Yes _ I think _ There is still that to do _ We may live low down but we can think high up _ The church-bells break through my thought _ calling to thoughts of a better life _ There is something better then _ better things to do than we have ever done _ "a better rest to go to than we have ever known" Received _ unto Himself! This is whither we are drifting and He knows it _ so He is ever cheery _239. Monday, August 27, 1877. And there is no more stillness _ no more stopping to look off _ It is wheels over cobble-stones and all the various horses under Heaven _ I copy away at the window and mind nothing else much There is a forgetting in it _ that much _ The thought, too, that somebody will be pleased. Now and then I hear mother's slippers _ pat-pat up the stairs _ Perhaps she sits down in the big chair by me _ with the look in her eyes _ as if life pressed her _ bone hard _ Perhaps she will have come up to say _ "Fannie, do you think it will do any good to write to Mr. st[]____ to go up and see Mr. B[]" - to do this or that or something? _ and Fannie will say _ "Perhaps_" and down in her heart she will hope so _ Then she will hunt up her paper and write to Mr. St[] and lay the letter away in a drawer _ Well there are not "flowery beds of ease"!* _ in any stance_ *From "Am I a Soldier of the Cross?" a hymn by Isaac Watts, 1709242. Thursday, August 30, 1877. I'm reading up in Mineral Water _ I have leisure and a no inconsiderable library _ Its excellent summer _ reading _ I lie on the couch in the back parlor and get hints that there's summer over the world _ from the open back_windows _ When I get lonesome - (I sometimes do) then I betake myself to grandma's bed down stairs - We are there in the dark talking always when the hush comes over things _ and nights _ Most always we are alone unless Aunt Mary happens in to sit a minute! _ This time its Emma _ Aggie out of the grandeur of her heart prepares to do her royal service _ I've got a pain in my chest _ Makes getting along sort of "drefful"_243. Friday, August 31, 1877. I suppose I call this getting ready to go to Vermont _ Some needed stitches get taken though not in time to save nine _ O'_dear_no! _ I always take getting ready to go away from home - sort of hard _ Like to talk and look at the folks until an hour or so before starting time and then tie up the budgets quick _ to keep me from thinking _ This does _ Aggie is busy entertaining Emma _ Dan is still "enquiring at the Express Office" _ Mother's caesuras are all "Why dont you's" Flippy's training is somewhat neglected in the midst of all these things _ "Susie Sinkel" devotes herself very much to me _ My cookies -(mothers's I mean) have a drawing power _ Well - I've read this page over _ and it reads some like the first column of locals in the "Daily News" _ If I should add "hop time" _ and "dog days ended" the column would be complete! mmm___244. Saturday, September 1, 1877. This is the day in which I drank Waukesha Mineral Water _ Do it all I ought to _ Have no fruitful memory as to any other proceeding except to make a comment or two on my black straw _ We debate some on the feasibility of getting a half a barrel of the "water" up to me - Give it up. Well - there's enough for to-morrow - "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof"* _ another awful query_ "Who's to be the cart-man? and where is he?" _ A dark saying _ Something has happened Dan's got a postal! _ "May be" we say "maybe [its] the door to something" _ Too bad Fannie's going Monday morning before she knows" _ so say they all! Dan to the top of the house in three bounds to tell Aggie "B[urchik] has written for him to come up" I'm glad there's a disposition in ... in the [uncertain] things to let [our] [hoping] be the ... side *Matthew 6:34245. Sunday, September 2, 1877. Well - we've halted _ waiting for daylight _ then I'm going _ We've done all manner of things to-day _ but that important thing _ []ained a cartman. ... yet been seen [to] _ Dan says _ "Leave it to me" _ We're very happy to _ finishing touches have touched everything _ even me _ Our lunch was as much of a matter as was Mrs. ... Sanitary Commission fair dinners _ pretty [near] _ Aggie is very perverse when it comes to such a matter as getting a dinner to carry _ Aunt Mary comes over and wishes me all of everything that any girl could have in this world _ Then she cries a little and goes her lonely way _ We go to bed to lie awake a long, long time _ We keep thinking of one more thing to say _246. Monday, September 3, 1877. And the night shifted and by and by it was early day dawn - but you just ought to have seen the rain come down _ not a harbinger in all the heavens that it would be clearness itself afterwards _ and serenity! But it was _ the clouds were lifting before we drew up to Cohoes and let my dear litte Aggie girl off _ I watch her go to begin her year - watch her out of sight _ Then I try to comprehend the pleasantness that lay about my all day journey _ It is a country that I know _ some of it _ our little glimmer of green that I know so well _ That I am glad to have known _ But I'm at Rutland speedily _ but where's my trunk? Not in any sense a soul-inspiring conundrum _ I may live to find out yet _ In the meantime live with what clothes I have on! I land amid afternoon grayness at E. Shoreham Mrs. F- in waiting - Other company also [land] - and we proceed up the hill together _ a big load!247. Tuesday, September 4, 1877. When we were coming home last night there was a gray sky and an unfriendly breezing _ about us _ This morning it is not brightness _ or dreaminess _ now September - do you call this kind? Your feet are "beautiful upon the mountains"* _ Is it not so _ Is this only a sweet delusion to go after this and for always out of our lives? No _ No _ you dear one _ tried and true _ We shall not be sitting by a soap-stone stove rocking all your precious days! I don't do anything but rock _ This is no misfortune _ you see _ I have made a good proper commencement to what I came to do _ There are sounds of visiting about me _ right good sounds they are _ People who have come together again after a long time _ apart _ I sent out a few electric queries as to that trunk _ I made a few computations likewise on how long I can do without clothes [right margin] A postal from Aggie "Dan is at work__ *Isaiah 52:7248. Wednesday, September 5, 1877. To be sort of refreshing I'll begin and tell how about the first thing I saw was my much looked for trunk riding up to the front door _ This was transporting in more senses than one! Then I sat down and made my blue sack _ and after I made it, I wore it! _ and where do you spose? Over a lovely road to Orwell village that I've never been on - then out toward the lake - on and on to the very lake borders _ to Julia's very front door _ You see _ Ida is there and we wanted one more day with her _ The only question was - "Would Harry take us over safely? Harry did! _ Everything most propitious was on our side! With "summer everywhere and sunshine too" _ In spite of all we could do though the west would take to itself somber streaks and the night of things would come on So we came home Harry's hoofs beating time for us _ and the forests very still around us -249. Thursday, September 6, 1877. A lovely Snake Mountain day and they're all going but Minnie Allie and I - We are booked for something quite as felicitous _ Horton Pond! You ought to have seen the wagon we got into at "Herr Hibbard's" _ You'd have said "This is holidaying of a high order! And it was only begun! A country picnic in its charm - makings is not to be put aside _ No_ No _ not for any pleasure or a day like this _ The better if its ... Horton Pond! We lunched on the island we hunted for birch bark _ we rowed across and watched the men fish _ we sat on big rocks and let our feet hang over _ we laughed at Janet's speeches - and Mr. Horton's way of [serving] pickles _ we looked to see the way the sun ... on the bosom of the still-still waves _ Then we came home _ listening to Janet's songs ____ 250. Friday, September 7, 1877. No _ we needn't hurry to stir around this morning _ The Snake mountain people too _ are glad of a little license to sleep _ When things do begin we take life light _ The minister _ rather "[]" amd "Josie" play croquet _ "Aunt Mattie Dickey" _ helps about the house a little _ I take the lounge _ and listen to the mallets _ and to Aunt Mattie's mild, sweet voice _ In the evening Minnie, Allie, Josie and I _ take seats in the big wagon and duly present ourselves at Mrs. Bowker's _ to the first "Shakespeare Club" of the season! My first in any season _ but don't mention it _ I must act the air of one long accustomed to Clubs _ any kind! We are all very pok[ery] at this the inauguration one _ I'm sorry too _ Why couldn't we have left our shoulder braces home? __"Miss Bromley will you favor us?" (The President benignly) Her composure where is it? _ It is unbecoming to shake one's head! 251. Saturday, September 8, 1877. I knew there was a kindly heart in dear September _ We are finding it more and more! Think of me to-day riding along in the gladness of everything ten long miles _ Of feeling like it and taking in the joy of it _ as those only can who have a little of it just a little _ in their lives! It was such a nice cosy call at Addie Royce's boarding-place _ ending up with a play with the baby-girl _ We came home another way and stopped at "Uncle Paulus's"_ a pretty brown house almost hidden by the trees _ "Aunt Jane" _ a young and pretty looking lady with a pretty wrapper on _ was in the very unenviable position of being "down with a fever" _ You'd hardly have guessed how nice things were made for us _ It was really fine visiting _ Pet took hold and ... for us _ and "Mother [Jane]" made the biscuit & Uncle Paulus & Mr. Knox talked away _ and it was [right margin] all just nice__252. Sunday, September 9, 1877. Dr. Post's sermon was a real treat _ A holding forth concerning the way of life we are apt to hear but rarely _ And then there is something in his being such an old-old man _ His hair is so very white _ his voice so long ... and so thrilling in its being so almost done _ His text that dear one _ beginning _ "Whatsoever things are pure"* _ We sat just behind Mr. Fisher's seat _ I happened to look up once and across and somebody nodded to me and smiled _ That was Vassar right over _ and a Vassar girl _ Gertie Bascom** _ I was just wild for a few minutes It seemed such a very nice thing to happen! "I want you to meet my father and mother" Gertie said - and when she could get them away from other people long enough _ she brought it about! _ I came home with lots to think of _ one door can open - on a jar and let in such floods of ... & Vassar is near my heart! * Philippians 4:8 ** Gertrude Bascom, Vassar College Class of 1878253. Monday, September 10, 1877. A getting well ready for to-morrow _ this was most of it _ A quiet, comfortable day at home, you can call it _ The country places are glad - and smiling _ The mountains have a new face every day _ It is good to be where life has large outlooks _ and I do love this ridge _ I watch them at croquet _ I [play] with Bertha. 261. Tuesday, September 18, 1877. "I have been in a dream all day Lorle _ and such a dream Out of the still sweet beauty of it I call for you _ Come and live in these places with me to-day and keep the charm for me lest I wake and find it gone _ Is it true that we are together in that wonderful thought world or am I forever in a dream and forever alone? _ Your last letter was such a dear one - I am glad we are to hear from each other often this fall_ God be with you, my beloved - You too are having your time to wait and to bear - The covenant of his peace shall not be removed and his peace is better than anything. Once more God be with thee" fb William Henry Hotel Lake George _ N.Y._274. Monday, October 1, 1877. It does matter after all a good deal what kind of a day it is - It gives one/me a genuine thrill to see October come in like this! I feel as if I had "loafed around" mostly _ but I got my license from the pink and promise of the day. Nothing heavier to do than to ride along in the glory _ or sit at the dress maker's Well _ I wish my blank diary pages didn't gape and stare so_ A dear evening with Annie Phelps _ A right good spirit of cheer to take to her _ Saw a woman to-day who told me that 22 years ago when she married her husband he had valvular heart-disease _ Has overcome it _ Here's one more "perhaps" for me ___275. Tuesday, October 2, 1877. Neither was to-day exciting _ but I bound a ruffle _ I consider that quite well worth happening. I have been [born] without a [reportive] instinct - else why am I so far behind in getting up my dailies? _ I can't trot out one other item for you unless I tell you that I was just getting farther in some other intricate portion of the work when Uncle Paulus and Aunt Jane drove in the yard _ Then we all changed ...! It comes out that I appear at tea when summoned _ (They called it "tea") in my brown suit _ and white jacket _ I had an eye to helping grace the scene _ you see _ with what success _ you must wait to be told! _ I envy them the ride home _ it is so lovely as the afternoon goes gently out! __276. Wednesday, October 3, 1877. Well - there's no use talking I've got to sit down and write my blessed mother instanter! How her eyes will grow wild with wonderment when she reads the announcement from my postal that I have actually put a band on a dress-skirt _ Maggie Ryan - you don't know much _You were an exaggerated dismay to me in the days of my [flesh] _ You have a sort of hang on to me as I think of you now - but I'd give a good deal to be the thing you called me once - "handy" _ well there's need of it! _ Am I in bed yet? __ Perhaps not _ but then _ everything else can wait till morning _ In a racking of [osseous] system - up go the crimps - This is important _ at the surface maybe not _ but prowl! _277. Thursday, October 4, 1877. Who can help giving one's self a quiet sh[ore] of satisfaction on finding that one had started out to do a thing and - - - - - - - - - - - done it _ As a rule I fizzle _ but to-day I march gloriously into realms where quiet satisfaction sh[ore]s _ I can deal out to myself _ H-m! We - perhaps I ought to keep to the courtesies of this world _ although ego did sew on the buttons - up there in that creaky door place - Ego _ bought the buttons too! _ Ego took Mrs. Forbes to where Belle Skeeles has her rocking chairs and things _ As for lining She does it mostly in the school house - Well - this isn't telling about Baptist State Conventions - but I can't help it Belle is of big account to me - Saw at the B.S.S_ Elder J.S. Goodall and lady _ the years have parted _ and I peep through - Well I was young once - We all sat down in the parlor and visited _ Julia, Mrs. Green _ Mrs Spencer _ and us! __ Mr. Burchard of Brattleboro gave us the evening talk "More than conquerors"* ____ * Romans 8:37278. Friday, October 5, 1877. "My Dear Ida Todd _ your letter reached me safely a few days since and I take this opportunity to send you my blessing and my very best wishes _ I do this with the strong hope that the happiness you so nobly merit may be yours _ We who have been associated with you in the pleasant intimacy of school life are glad that you have grown so strong and self-reliant and we feel sure that you will be equal to the new demands of the new life and that those with whom you have to do will be better and happier for your companionship. Begin by consecrating yourself to the dear Lord and that you may receive his abundant blessing is my earnest prayer _ I am glad you were pleased with the note-book _ I still continue to improve _ Good bye and God bless you" _ The glory of the October woods about us _ everything ours _ as we ride along _ up home Fair Haven and the ministers a memento mori!* _ Reading club - not any! _ Our glad girl _ Also sleevless[sic] jacket not any _ *a memento mori - Latin "remember that you will die"279. Saturday, October 6, 1877. Enough sun for a sun-bath _ taken with shiverings. Great props in the shape of extracts from the Trotty books* - also some account of the Peterkins** _ Arrival at last of ""News" per uncle Paulus _ Explanations begin: _ My sister's letter hails from Quoes _ She has not yet seen My lately wafted blossoms _ Stirrings go on in side of me _ a queer world _ Things wrong end up! __ Mother's at Dr. Jones _ H_m! Divers places _ Sunday times I still [continue] _ "Quoth the cedar to the reeds and rushes"*** Evening _ In phalanx deep to Mrs. Bowker's _ Miss Taylor and a young widow in demand _ Mrs. Non[] D _ Well _ I wish I could play _ * The Trotty Book (1870) and Trotty's Wedding Tour, and Story-book (1873) by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward ** The Peterkin Papers by Lucretia Peabody Hale ***First line of the poem "The Apology" by Jean Ingelow280. Sunday, October 7, 1877. Whew! it begins to get cold! _ Dressing, mornings hasn't in it that calm delight one might desire It might be well to mention that as a fact unprecedented in our history as a family we drove up to the church door alarmingly early _ Mr. Severance hadn't even begun to preach! _ Was paid for having my S.S. lesson Announcement a la Branch _ "No Sabbath School service!" _ Well its a peculiar way of doing they have here in the country _ that's all I've got to say _ Squirrel for supper - Taste my first _ was prepared to be delighted _ found no pleasure therein - Deliver me hereafter from stewed squirrel! _ A ride to gaze again upon the new baby _ the new little round [ball] that she is! ___293. Saturday, October 20, 1877. All the cheerful chapters these days are in-doors. The time to take sly peeps in windows and294. Sunday, October 21, 1877. We splashed along to church in the mud under scurrying clouds _ and were not early _ We sailed in _ the door creaking _ and showed that we were not intimidated by knocking over several stools _ What Mr. S_ impressed upon me chiefly was that "the Lord did not come down to earth to teach astronomy" - We rode home under a streak of blue sky. Annie drove in the yard and as I told her I was glad to have a chance to see what she looked like once more _ She was on her way to the grave_ Evening at Mr. Murray's singing and cider _ Fannie [Parrish] has a fresh face - and she sang "I stood by the bridge at midnight" _ (as I thought) charmingly _295. Monday, October 22, 1877. The mountains are all white _304. Wednesday, October 31, 1877. A hard kind of a day to lay away to rest one of the old citizens of the town _ The rain came down in such a dreary way _ in Judge Both[]'s open grave this one of the things I thought of with us there was "Joe" to get off _ but clouds and storms and ... holes - were as nothing to his asserting spirit _ Having donned Minnie's waterproof sometime before it was in any sense necessary _ he undertakes our refreshing!? entertainment for a few minutes - Then curtsies himself out of our sight _ and we are left a vision of rain! Well! _ In the evening scarcely less of a drama _ You see "Roll" is back _ and in close consultation with Minnie and "pa" _ [Dorna] stationed in the hall near the scene of interview brings in telling dispatches _ [fired] with comments of her own! _ The rest of us mostly sit and laugh ___ 305. Thursday, November 1, 1877. To be fully unpersuaded in one's mind is not a quieting state of things in any sense_ But then - we can get along without being in superbly quiet states _ This according to a preconcerted plan! _ It is ever before me these latter days that "I'm but a pilgrim"* here" although I am present in my usual haunts with an unperturbed brow _ I get my trunk in readiness _ which may mean home to-morrow _ or Julia Miller's on Sunday _ In either case []tures placid! _ I entertain to-day _ That is there's no one here to preside but the pilgrim _ and Grandpa and Grandma Forbes are here _ ..........._ Well _ I staid home from Brandon and this that the old lady has to say is what came of it! _ and afterwards - golden silence forevermore - They drive away _ and after all the old lady's reminders Grandpa Forbes handkerchief is still sticking in that broken window-light! __ * from a hymn by Elisha A. Hoffman306. Friday, November 2, 1877. I don't like to set up and say that it was dreary _ but I've really stumbled this day on to an uncomforting text _ its keynote taken from the skies above us _ I seem completely under the influence of this determined rain-storm _ and no alleviating circumstances! It is not to be wondered at that I sought a balm in Jules Verne's "from the Earth to the Moon" _ 218000 miles isn't any too far to go in such a day as this _ Well _ I wrote to my boy too - and - rising up _ after folding the sheets I give myself private little words of approbation! _ What next? _ Lying on the lounge in the corner Roll, a sort of god-send rehearses for my benefit _ full accounts of his trip to Lockport _ I bless him _ One resource is left me _ a nap _ this at four p.m. I wake up to find it dark & Minnie and Dana coming .307. Saturday, November 3, 1877. "My willinah soulah ... not stayah _ in soochah frame ay zis"! - Not exactly _ I am surprised to see me so meek _ A surprise I do not rally from! The inside of meek people don't say - "Blessed are the meek"* _ not if they're put together my way! - Not having any red flannel garments to sew on _ and not finding in "from the Earth to the Moon" that bliss I sigh for _ it falls out that I roam about in an aimless sort of way chatting a little at various times with Dana concerning Anstiss and Richard _ She is on the last pages of Hitherto** _ I might take that for wings to upland places - but I don't want to read it here! _ I wish somebody would say something _ If they won't I wish they'd cut out some red flannel! _ It blows out and its cold _ but blessed be Nature there's a light in her leaves! The young people have gone to Shoreham No mail for Frances to-night to [right margin] [bless] her birthday with. I'm going to Julia's to-morrow! *Matthew 5:5 ** book by Adeline Dutton Train Whitney308 - Sunday, November 4, 1877. - There were silent silver lights all along the mountain wall _ early _ This is the way the day broke _ There was joy in the east - how could there but be joy in the sense of living! _ "As it really is at the heart of things" _ I drew nearer to this to-day _ I could think of the "stronghold" with such a sense of rest _ as if I were gently drawn! - That dear "dwelling-place in all generations!" _ There was nothing of this in the sermon _ but the lovely text went to my heart "Romans 14-17" To church thanks to Mr. Fisher. To Julia's thanks to Mr. Clark - in other words _ "Life"! _ Those white birthday chrysanthemums in the sitting room - waiting for me! _ Wasn't it beautiful? _ I whisper sweet things to them _ for we both plainly under-stand one prayer - to-day - "O _ for grace my heart to soften Teach me, Lord, at last to love"309. Monday, November 5, 1877. If you want to be sort of moderately satisfied with yourself - ... a dressing before it is quite light _ It makes you feel as if you too could sh[] where other people were sh[]ing - as if you were emerging! - We have a smoking breakfast which I am properly hungry for _ Then I "write up" I and the chrysanthemums bear one another company _ We like it! _ Ah! don't we? _ After dinner "Doll" is brought around _ and Julia and I are off for the Point_ The wind blew and it was some muddy but we are dauntless spirits - We have a laughing call at Gracie's _ I quite decide that I will make a bed-spread _ Mother needs one _ Then point lace takes my eye _ Ah _ that is what I want to do _ Grace makes startling proposals to me and I come off with something to begin on in my pocket _ I think I must be of a progressive mind! _310. Tuesday, November 6, 1877. The quiet sitting room here at Julia's makes me think of those Thanksgiving days at dear Mrs. Lloyd's! _ It is a kind of life that I love to drift into _ We had some sunshine to-day _ to lighten the sombre faces of the woods and to throw a sparkle over the old Champlain! _ How glad I was in the day before it was over _ My birthday week is rich in blessing _ With "The Divine Tragedy"* in my hand from the dear little mother the messages from home _ the good word from the Earle and Huldah _ Laura's dear letter. Edith's greeting _ the "Story of Avis"** at home _ and the flowers on the way _ surely _ my way blossoms in rarest ...[ting] _ Down in my heart I feel so glad to be thought of _ Love has such a sweetness in its coming. [left margin] I make my beginning in point lace ___It goes fine! * by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ** by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward311. Wednesday, November 7, 1877. The day went in little pieces of things _ as far as I was concerned _ and I believe its "I" that I'm telling about _ One spell you'd find me [darning] _ Later along she went clambering over the rocks at the Mount _ looking for soldier's graves _ and saying over "Winstanley"* _ It was not until afternoon that the flowers came _ The darlings how imploringly they looked up at me _ the tea-roses could hardly wait to open their pretty lips _ the "pink bud" "the queen of them all" had kept its "very sweet kiss" for me _ and I have taken it into one of the very sacred places of my heart _ then there were Earle's carnations _ full of color _ and with a fresh word or two from "So" _ Evening _ Reading club at Mrs. Royce's _ a house full of pictures and pretty things _ Everything _ quite festive and my [lands] _ a letter from Sue __ * poem by Jean Ingelow312. Thursday, November 8, 1877. I am not very adept in the art of point-lace _ not yet. I am fairly at it _ Grace buoying me up _ and keeping me out of deep water _ "The stitch" _ is a wery [sic] portentous word to me _ Julia gets over in the neighborhood of one o'clock and in an hour or so _ it takes to raining _ This to her mind is very distracting _ whatever _ It blows up hard and gets dark early _ but inside _ we know very little about it _ Grace makes a pretty picture in her home. I am glad for these little glimpses of her _ in the home place _ Julia goes out into the arms of the night with a boy _ "You don't know" _ she says _ "you don't know how peculiar father is" __313. Friday, November 9, 1877. "How did you feel, Grace, when you were ripping your lace-work off the pattern?" It was easy to see from her answer that it was a really enlivening experience! I am doubly anxious to live one such! _ The storm has forsaken us and a bland spell is upon us _ I washed my face in some of the new rain-water out doors _ and felt like as if it was May _ in earnest _ My "[phelinx]" would not encourage much depth seeking in learning "the stitch" _ I am not such a wery smart to-day _ Mrs. W. and Stella came for me about one _ bringing sorry stories of [wind] - and ridges _ I read a little in "The Divine Tragedy" _ and was glad enough to get off up stairs where I can feel bad to myself _ This is discouraging business - to look at it from below _ but our eyes ought to be up there! _314. Saturday, November 10, 1877. A day when she thought she would write to Dr. Jackson but she didn't _ She kept at "Dr" persistently _ darned two stockings _ it was in the midst of chaotic [stirs] in the sitting room _ At this stage _ the quiet satisfaction in other people deserted her _ and she did the right thing and laid right down for a nap! It was not a beguiling day _ and the roads are beyond anything? If we might only have a little Indian Summer! Longfellow's "Divine Tragedy" is very sweet. It is one of the books that rests _ and reconciles My "queen bud" is sweet yet. How rich I am _ I wonder if I ought to wish less pain out of to-day _ it was the dragging, wearisome kind _ that makes me feel how slow _ how very slow _ all getting well is! __315. Sunday, November 11, 1877. It was good to see the sun shine again _ it meant good _ we thought _ What with the roughness and the wind _ there was hardly any way for us to get to church _ so we looked for the Sunday sweetness that there might be about us _ and we found [rest] everywhere - for reading I had my "Divine Tragedy" _ and my "De Imitative - and my Greek Testament _ There was such an inviting in the day that I walked as far as Mr. Arthur's _ It seemed to be [a real] piece out of the rich outside _ though the steps were accomplished in a dull misery _ O _ for a Dansville, Dansville. I say to myself _ to-day as I have said so many, many times _ I don't know what this trouble inside means - exactly I am reading Headley's "Civil War" and it just holds me -316. Monday, November 12, 1877. Well- a letter has been given a comely shape and form and early in the morning so ... ... will be on its way to Dr. Austin _ It proved to be a lack of dimensions _ to get said _ what I began to say _ There were streaks of sunshine coming and going _ I have needed props to-day. The dear Sunday words from Thomas a Kempis - do not go out of my heart _ "Be thou so full of courage - and so patient in hope that when inward comfort is withdrawn thou mayest prepare thy heart to suffer even greater things" _ "Junge me tibi inseparabili dilectionis vinculo quoniam tu solus sufficis amanti" _ So very quiet all day I and the chrysanthemums! __317. Tuesday, November 13, 1877. A better color in the face of things _ It seems such a comfort to wake and find that dragging pain wearing away _ The world is steeped in sunshine _ We are not to be denied our sweet Indian Summer ! _ We are having, too, the luxury of a new moon _ I sit upstairs by Julia's window and try and thank my Lorle for the birthday flowers _ I can talk to her better with the lake to look at. We are having visitors - Mr. and Mrs. Severance. They are very pleasant people to meet _ There is something wonderfully cosy to me in country visiting _ When Burt comes back from the point with no letter for Frances _ She is quite too amazed to speak. She had inordinate desires that way! and had built! ___318. Wednesday, November 14, 1877. We are blessed this week - We could not ask for lovelier days _ As for feelings my state is strangely comfortable! Writing up _ and I mean it _ is a pure affliction! _ It grinds slowly _ Mrs. Burk thinks it a very nice day _ and to be made of _ so she comes a-visiting. Brings ... to sew on! "Rome" Sholus _ our neighbor drops in a minute _ and tells us rather queer news _ "The Forbes's are to be "tached"" _ I don't know much about what it means but it has a sort of dreadful sound _ I am sorry enough for poor Mr. Forbes. Burt says _ reassuringly _ "They are going to "tach" every one that has been there this fall" _ Grace gets here just after dinner _ We have ever so nice a day with her _ and point lace comes on wonderfully ___319. Thursday, November 15, 1877. A box of "bitter sweet" is on its way to Lorle _ When I get it tied up _ I stand up straight and with an air in front of Grace - and I say _ "All of which is respectfully submitted " _ "To my tender curiosity" = wickedly _ from this young maiden! Mail arrangements in Chipman's Point need to be understood to take in the merits of her joke! _ There were sweet south weather to-day _ You could be very glad _ in the out-doors of things _ My writing up went like a consuming _ on through most of the afternoon _ dismal thought _ wasn't it? _ When Julia came back from the Pt. she brought me a letter from home _ I feel better now _ I lie down for a minute on the lounge _ Am off in a sleep in a twinkling _ In two hours or more am pulled back to time and sense with a fierce grip from Julia "Miss Bromley _ Mr. and Mrs. Sholes are coming!" _ Miss B. rises with an air distingue! A nice evening with our visitors _320. Friday, November 16, 1877. ------- There was nothing of the nature of proving invincible in my first feelings _ However it was valiantly I got up _ and valiantly I "wrote up" _ could see the sparkle on the lake every minute while I was a doing it! _ The roads are simply at the worst _ Julia didn't believe Annie would come for me and we could have Doll _ so we started for the Point _ the myrtle-green has unquestionably arrived _ this gives a cheerfulness to things _ so Julia thinks Just before we get to the brick church we see Annie coming _ she looks, we observe somewhat forlorn _ but her buggy wheels forlorner! _ I don't pick up my property to go _ without thinking _ how very pleasant these two weeks with Julia and her mother have been _ We turn a leaf _ Annie & I plough the [road] _ with tender moonlight to help us _321. Saturday, November 17, 1877. It had not been a cheery night - last night _ You see my limbs were swollen or looked so - and they pained me - there was room in this alone for endless conjecture but with the light came something pleasanter _ and the day and I began our acquaintance well braced up _ I did nothing heavier than to read St. Nicholas _ found a chaming installment of the Peterkins - Glad of it! _ My respect for Miss Annie is being "exceedingly augmented" for the patient way that she has with her mother's quirks _ Its kind of intolerable by my gauge - Well _ About noon I guess it was _ their cousin came _ She has the name of "Jane Smith" _ Nice eyes though - Down in the corner I will put my one poor little protest _ I can't have my way about air o' nights _ They will stuff that broken pane ___ Alas __322. Sunday, November 18, 1877. Sunday sometimes means sunshine and heart-rest _ but this one was off one side _ and not quite like the beautifulness that we know _ One little lighting on the face of things _ Aggie Bowker's ways with the kittens For the rest the folks talked _ At dusk Charles Phelps and his wife came over _ and "Glen" their four-year old _ gave our scene a piquancy _ that we surely should not miss _ Thomas a Kempis talked a little to me _ and the Greek of some of the blessed gospel words that lie in my heart _ An out-door glimpse or two over the hill-places _ and the stretches of brown - a remembering in little pauses that this is the Lord's Day Mixed up though with a good deal of "Olivia" and "I thought I would tell you"_323. Monday, November 19, 1877. "Jennie" must be got off early _ It was distinctly so stated in talking up last night _ "Ma" gets up with spirit and fries some griddle cakes for her _ potatoes not to be waited for _ Then we start out over the hills and past the cheese-factory and Annie can talk but I can't_ My fingers have a time of it in the gloveless [race] ! Annie warms up - washing but not I _ Besides I got up - early and I must doze a little I get a story or two in short Harper stories _ and I make a few visible marks on the point lace _ We have a truly cosy evening after the lamps are lighted. Close by the oven door we draw up the big sofa _ I vanish into Harper's _ and Annie into "Tale of Two Cities" _ We finish up with the Latin of Thomas a Kempis _ I go to sleep thinking of my brave little girl working down in Cohoes _ I often do.324. Tuesday, November 20, 1877. More point lace _ more Harper short stories _ more soft November sky and sweet Indian Summer weather! _ Life seems to claim little of me these days _ and gives so much! _ Annie sits down right after breakfast to finish "ma's" black dress for to-morrow night _ I wake up to the impressive points of the occasion _ and engineer the sleeves! Annie tries to persevere in spite of opposing [fates] _ The things "ma" finds to make her get up _ would be "stumps" unsurrmountable to any but the "Grapp" spirit! _ She winds up the day setting her at hunting tours for "porous plasters"_ The check that "ma" expects arrives _ "This aint no great" _ is Mrs. P. on the situation. We get up stairs finally _ I _ defeated as far as a means of getting out-door air in! __325. Wednesday, November 21, 1877. "Ma" wants a chicken for breakfast _ This is very plain _ nobody could be in this house and not know it _ but by the refusing to turn of a contrary screw _ she writes in her diary _ "not chicken but pork"! Annie you've set herself like a big perversity against it_ There was lots to do _ piles of things _ and a jewel of a day we had to smile on us from without! _ And such a moonlight - such a moonlight at the end! _ I had one ride - It was over to Mollie's for [lamps] _ The first arrival on our scene was Aunt Logina (long i) _ I shall always see her _ just as she looked stalking thru' the parlors _ after they were filled _ Reading club _ an entire success _ Nice people in plenty with nice things to say _ and all right merry _ I had a long nice talk in the corner with Mrs. Warren about Dansville ___326. Thursday, November 22, 1877. This time "ma" got chicken _ neither screws nor perversities to prevent _ While its cooking, the aunt talks _ She has opinions on the way folks ought to do _ Lives in the village where news in plentiful _ It would be wrong to be chary of it in visiting the benighted outskirts _ Not along the hedge-rows exactly _ but out in the crisp air _ and past very brown fields Annie and I are pretty soon riding She is taking me back to "East View Farm" _ I find Minnie putting her quilt together _ I find a needle and set down by her _ after I have had my kisses from the little people _ Naomi has gone and it seems very still in the sitting-room _ I am glad to be back for another look on this valley of the fair _ and the mountains profiles rising up dark behind it _ You're such a lovely picture.327. Saturday, November 24, 1877. I am awake and up moderately early - looking out tenderly for the last little peeps at the blue-earnest east _ Just think what it has been to have had these picture outlines nine weeks! When I got down stairs Minnie was just taking up _ the ... meal _ Bertha was trotting around - fresh as a damask rose _ Well _ I taught Minnie a new scarf-stitch _ and sat down on the floor and cut out a Briton jacket pattern and we talked over what had happened and how things were going to be and the day went _ ... the ... whistled and I heard Addie Royce driving in the yard for me _ But _ mind you _ Mr. Clark drove in the same minute and I got my Dansville letter _ This was interesting to me _ and so was the charming evening at Addie's - They are lovely people _328. Saturday, November 24, 1877. How beautifully everything has dove-tailed! It is all so safe and comfortable a thing to think of _ as I ride along in the early night-fall _ After breakfast an hour of two of visit in the sitting-room _ then over to say the last words to the kind friends at Mr. Forbes' _ a pleasant ride in the big wagon with Addie and Ella along _ the sun deciding no longer to be uncertain but to come out with a good, [brisk] shine. Dinner with Grace _ and a most comfortable visit _ with her to see me even to the very steps of the afternoon express _ What very pleasant little ways of doing _ I glide along the lower hall like a phantum and knock at the kitchen door not like a phantom _ Mother sings out _ "Walk in" _ Aggie says _ "for the land's sake" __329. Sunday, November 25, 1877. The storm that has been signalling these last days came down to-day on our devoted heads _ Its purposes were in every respect most tenacious _ How very cheery our front basement looks since mother went at it _ it begins to seem as if we might make a home out of this after all We have thought we never could _ I have a new scare _ My limbs look large and swelled up _ and they pain me some - Well _ it is better not to think about it much _ My! how it rains - Its a dark prophet day! I take up the "Story of Avis"* reverently _ turning back many times to the dear []** on the blank page _ It is in a rain pour that our dear little girl goes _ but it is best, she says _ I go to sleep saying over and over _ "Now all the meaning of the King was to see Sir Galahad proved"*** *novel by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps ** Greek letters lambda, alpha, sigma *** from Thomas Bulfinch's King Arthur and His Knights, XIX The Sangreal, or Holy Graal quoted in "Story of Avis" 330. Monday, November 26, 1877. "By the time you get the floors painted here we'll be ready to move again" _ "Yes ma'am" _ says she _ "And then you can go to work and paint some body else's old floor" "Yes ma'am " _ This [qaint] piece of scene shifting from Grandma's bed _ where I had paddled thro the paint to rest my swollen cords _ I guess its cords _ I stitch considerable on Aggie's handkerchief _ I tell 'em every few minutes they must ask me no questions _ they mustn't dare look! Aunt Mary says - "Don't be sassy" _ Dan reads Bob Ingersoll's lecture venting a few occasional comments! _ I get a second letter off to Dansville _ and then give up the long evening to "The Story of Avis" _ Lorle _ You are right it is not a "comfortable book" _ but "we love Miss Phelps" __331. Tuesday, November 27, 1877. Grandma says she don't want to go to Heaven _ she wants to go to that other place _ "Yes" _ says mother "You want to go where you can get some "cold meat"! Dan has found a misery _ his tooth aches _ Odors of creosote fill the house _ Can't we call the bird "Avis" I make bold to enquire - not a word from anybody on the subject _ Point lace proceeds _ You'd be surprised to see how little one can do in a day _ especially if he or she works [steadily] _ I am trying to talk mother into my Dansville plans _ but she is far from being readily brought round However I have hopes _ She says _ "But where you going to get your money?" _ That's just what I don't know muzzy! - I find Mr. Hughes in a "Glare" at last but not a gale! ___332. Wednesday, November 28, 1877. It was a loss of a morning _ "Sunshine everywhere and summer too" _ Rather dry to begin right off in the little green chair by the kitchen window _ at spinning wheel stitch ! When our eyes ached properly we dressed us and went over to Aunt Mary's _ A circus ensued _ Aunt Mary chasing Helen Bly around the sitting room with the market-basket. Helen was very mad! Mother has got on a streak and everything must be painted _ Besides all visitors must be yelled at _ Even the best of us will forget to take hold of doors by the knobs _ Mother and I are coequal in another project _ three "childers" _ "We'll use Miss Pangburns doctrine" quoth mother _ "If its right we'll get them" . Dan wants to know what we are going to have for Thanksgiving _Thanksgiving -- 333. Thursday, November 29, 1877. "There was the sound of revelry at night" * _ but not at our house - good folks - though we did have a dear nice day _ our way _ Dan said when he came home to dinner that every house he passed "smelt like turkey" _ Ours don't _ However he deigned to dine with us - on roast pig _ He has read Charles L[] probably _ Come to think though ours was stewed! _ Mother insists on [washing] [some] - so she and I have a little dialogue about it _ If folks would listen to me they'd squeeze a good time in _ holidays _ and wash-tubs - I gave you my opinion long ago - I [putter] over the star-stitch - and have a sort of dreadful time - but I achieve! Then I take my Greek "die" and things out of my trunk - and read up old diaries on Thanksgivings _ and Tennyson's Elaine _ Something a little cold and dark comes into my warm peaces as I think of a year ago - but I put it away - and try to understand about being triumphant! ___ *from Army Life in a Black Regiment by Thomas Wentworth Higginson334. Friday, November 30, 1877. The wind has changed _ mum! It is raw and cold and bleak out! _ This is one of those days "You're ... tell on" _ which governs the winter months _ Hardly consoling! - I get well-nigh on a verge - its that star-stitch! I am glad that there's only five on a side! _ I've got another trouble _ my "point-lace" thread for which I journeyed up to Reid's in Broadway is like welting cord by the side of my dainty Madame Gurney's gossamer! _ It has got to go back! My star-stitches are beyond anything - I feel quite forlorn over them! Aggie comes home with a small craft of Oliver's meal - and nobody to meet her _ but there are a legion of alleviating circumstances, Hot supper _ with ... _ and "[swirling] coals in the American Base-burner! Now we're ready _ lets hear! Just hear that wind __335. Saturday, December 1, 1877. You show us not a very rough face _ at the outset _ but your name sounds cold! _ Yes - yes! I get up like a soldier called by the long roll _ and get the point-lace shirt done quick because pretty soon Aggie would be up _ and would catch me at it! Not star-stitches _ thank my stars! Aggie is a household diversity _ to-day _ Mother is at the blue and black plaid! So am I _ Its awful nice to be so sort of comfortable _ and get around a little and begin to know just a wee bit what my old self was - Cheer up Fannie _ You are coming out of this! We eat our Thanksgiving dinner the second day after with airs ! - Its a fine fat chicken that we have! Aunt Mary has got educated up to calling it "fowl" _ No letter from Dr. J _ Grandma is feeling better to-day _ Says her head is more settled! Aggie and I talk up Dansville in fits.336. Sunday, December 2, 1877. I told Dan I didn't see why he hadn't pretty near as good a voice as Joe Sault _ "Yes _ and better than Joe Pepper's" shouts mother from the kitchen! Aggie goes off without her blue and black plaid_ its done but it isn't the thing _ We are sorry mother and I that our energies were not put forth to better advantage to all _ Avis startles us with his efforts to sing _ Wants to, I write to Satie _ Its [time] I should think! _ This hasn't been a right comfortable Sunday _ Too much packing up to go - and flurrying _ Some of our Lord's days here at home are almost pitiful_ "God forgive us if hereafter Our hearts break to hear Him say, Careless one, I never knew you _ from my presence flee away"* * Last verse of "If we Knew" by Helen H. Gates, 1863337. Monday, December 3, 1877. "Good morning, Mrs. Hughes" I said - She came over with her dress-up suit on - and looked quite to my mind ! Mother has a lovely new felt bonnet to be trimmed and she's going to have a new long cloak - but don't you tell _ "Don't you ever breathe it" _ While they"ve gone up to see Mary and [Jenny] _ I take my station directly under Avis _ and pull my thread through and sing "When the general roll is called I'll be there" It is not a song that builds up the family _ However _ let's sing something. To-morrow is Huldah's birthday _ I think I will be good and write to-day _ so I do _ amazing truth _ I don't know when you've thought you'd be good and been it before! _ Mother makes a raid on Grandma's head - same as if it were the enemy's [trench]works _ Then comes the ameliorating circumstance of a fresh-ironed cap __338. Tuesday, December 4, 1877. It is a real family affliction that Avis has turned out to be a female bird _ Mother can hardly be reconciled to give it seed! _ The postman has a way of coming in the hall and shouting "Bromley" _ instead of knocking at the window as on former occasions. It must be that he has [aspect] into our new lace curtains! The postal was from Susie _ I was in the middle of a debate with Frances' self - at that moment _ all about what should she do _ stay at home this winter _ or what _ I give it up! _ Mother's dialogues with Dan are not soul-inspiring _ My _ how my soul would drag if I would let it! _As it is it almost smoulders [over] point-lace _ button-hole stitch - I go to see Aunt Mary _ and we talk _ and in five minutes more I would have fretted - but I came home!339. Wednesday, December 5, 1877. "Well" says mother last night _ "Dan was going to start out Monday morning to business _ As soon as he made up his mind to this, Dawson and Parsons left the city and will never come back _ Henly in the Express office hanged himself to death so Dan couldn't get a chance to speak to him. As soon as Eaton at the Capitol saw him coming he discharged all his hands _ and now he wants to get in the Assembly that won't set this winter" _ This and kindred things is the high tragedy of our lives. Where our talk drifts - and our dreams _ Well _ we have [swamped] _ and that's the truth _ It has rained out _ so for my part exercise has been minus _ Dan is blue _ uncomfortably blue _ I aint _ nor Avis _ I seem to have only one prayer these days _ "Lord, thou knowest" _ I begin and end a letter that is to go to [Chelause] _ I've come to the conclusion that point-lace business aint good for me - exactly __340. Thursday, December 6, 1877- To-day small pieces of high-comedy _ Dan in rehearsal previous to going up to see Smythe _ "Mr. Smythe - I believe _ Well I've come to give you and Georgie Dawson a place in the Assembly _ messengers _ or something _ I know your mother is poor _ and your sister's teaching in Cohoes - and the other sister's got the dropsy _ and I'm a popular young man in Albany and I've come to give you my influence" _ Etc. etc _ Many times _ Exit left! _ Postman appears - armed with a letter from Grace _ Its full of pleasant little things _ The pattern came - in it addendum! _ I'm awful smart to-day _ Trot around at no great rate _ Dress up - too - and go a visiting my Aunt Mary _ Bless her heart - she brought me over over an apple and a pint of milk to-day _ More star-stitch but my reason remains _341. Friday, December 7, 1877. "I wonder who Dan'll give the place to to-day" says mother while the lad continues his tour upstreet - He don't come back to tell us _ even up to our awaiting dinner! _ How long the winter is holding off _ The weather is everything that's good - besides! _ Avis sighs for a little more adaptation on our part to his whims. He thinks us a very cold shouldered set! _ Grandma is like the moon - she sets an hour earlier every evening - Its later with the moon _ but the force of my comparison is not lost! "Jefferson" to-night in [Masonic] Hall _ I have "hurries to ..." __ Very pleasant pieces of talk come from Mrs. Forbes _ Aggie arrives _ her new cloak huge enough [borne] along by her _ in spite of Dan and another's both on the spot at trains - but not the train _ bad luck _ to the ought to be __342. Saturday, December 8, 1877. It consisted in buying more pants for Dan _ The time has come around I humbly beg leave to record! The "pedestals from which his aspirations soar" fate ill-natureally [sic] seems bent on shortening! _ This time he's going to pay only three shillings to get them cut! I button-hole and spinning-wheel - and [tent] - pushing on in minutes when Aggie is "non est" _ These were the emphatic portions of December 8 _ to me who came pretty near becoming non est _ as to eyes _ and spine! It comes out that Aggie goes back to-night _ Then mother walks to Duanes-... or less for a dress-maker and comes home with the ear-ache! _ I _ Dansville - pm and am - until blessed sleep folds me from it _ from hard life for a night!343. Sunday, December 9, 1877. Grandma "has the dreadful ... - and is froze to death" as mother puts it _ This to Dan when he came in to supper _ I guess it was pretty cold though the sun is bright enough to give one the feeling that all "his irons are in the fire"__ As for me _ "I'm ..." _ Amounted to just precisely nothing whatever _ unless its "amounting to something" to lie there on Grandma's bed _ and be what comes _ I wish I might leave my Dansville prospects with the Lord, who "suffices for heaven" _ This perpetual reckoning and counting up _ tires me - tires me - tires me! _ I am very weak and very foolish O Lord! _ Aunt Mary comes over twice to see me - How quickly she would send me to Dansville if she could! 344. - Monday, December 10, 1877. - "its your mother's birthday" says Aunt Mary _ taking out two cookies from under her shawl _ "Shan't do it" says muzzy _ want a better [present] _ I ain't a going to tell how you're going to have a new cloak - No _ I shan't _ The first thing I heard of time and sense was the postman's "Bromley" in the hall below _ A letter from Polly _ [fresh] and very Vassary _ I needed to read up on Vassar _ its so long since anything has helped from there! _ Avis has gone to a righteous (we trust) tribunal to hear whether its a he Avis or a she Avis _ Will be gone a week _ She may come back and retrieve her fallen fortunes in this family! _ Most everything [in] family [limits] has been "coat and pants" _ a source of very serious debate between my mother and Dan a beginning of the end is [arrived] at and Miss Anderson [mustered]in! _ It snows - out to-night - acts as if it meant to ___345 - Tuesday, December 11, 1877. - I've got over reeling for one thing - this to my consolation _ I was not much of a "tower of defence" yesterday _ Didn't stand well! _ I got better just in time _ its "star-stitch" day _ Mother says _ "Don't you think its sticking to that work so close that makes you feel so 'misable'"? __ Guess likely - Star-stitch is debilitating. Dan's getting ready for a party to-morrow night _ Our family foundations snap and crack! _ Mother thinks a [bare/base]-floor committee not imposing _ Brings her energies to the sticking point _ on the old coat _ We miss Avis Even the occasional cheeps and twitters were something! _ I write up to Sis _ and duly inform her how Avis has gone out to board _ Our snow of last night was a delusion and a ... - Its warm out to-day _ but O dear! I can't walk much _ "Now is our salvation nearer [right margin] than when we believed"* __ *Romans 13:11346. Wednesday, December 12, 1877. I think it must have been the brightness _ for the sun was glad and gave to all things a glow and hopefulness _ to-day _ I know my heart has lacked no courage _ How good it was that I could get out a little ways _ "walk and not faint"* Point-lace is getting to have a dragging about it _ The little needle goes in & out only patiently now _ but just think _ its almost done! Dan is not chirk and chipper today _Don't know why _ Don't know a bit _ "It was so kind of pleasant" says Aunt Mary _ "I didn't know but what Aunt Esther might be in" _ Nell has found some untold attraction in our east window _ Don't explain herself but goes away from it reluctantly _ Wonder if there's poetry in it to her dog-soul _ or rats! _ I give it up! _ Plevna** has fallen - so runs the war news _ The effective stroke, so say the papers, that shall end the war _ and yet _ we must wait to find out! * Isaiah 40:31 ** The Siege of Plevna was a battle of the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878)347. Thursday, December 13, 1877. Grandma feels tempest-tossed and forlorn enough _ I suppose _ She has broken "..." and mother went over the subject somewhat_at length giving leading points! _ That was the first I heard this morning. Then the postman came with ... letter! Yesterday had inspirations _ to-day there's considerable less _ But leave out all the rest _ drags _ aches _ wills - whatnots _ one precious_sacred fact stands in letters of light _ I took a walk that was a pure pleasure _ I feel as if I had nothing else to desire! Dan has gone up to Cohoes to see Mr. Bean If something only may come of it! _ "We kneel at the knee of a mild mystery"* _ To-day it is in drumbeat silence _ out or in - not weaving blossoms there or chance halos _ but standing still and looking dumbly ___ * From A Rhapsody of Life's Progress by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, 1844348. Friday, December 14, 1877. A milder atmosphere to descend to this morning _ though an awful mercury stands and testifies. Its the great tendency in us all to placidity that I began at the outset to comment upon! _ We eat the last of those fish-balls - and mother does not fail to express the sentiment of the united house when she says she's glad of it! Awaiting my rather unenthusiastic fingers [were] _ the last five stars _ on that lace work - I approach the end breathlessly _ for fear I shall allow myself to become somewhat excited! There's only one more thing to do _ sew the linen in! Aunt Mary brings over a letter from Aunt Mary Griffin _ A mild row ensues _ It is not a family spectacle that I would like a lithograph plate made to set forth _ but I shall never fail to laugh when it comes before me _ how Aunt Mary looked whaling protecting Nellie with mother's clothes stick! Aggie has arrived once more but no Dan _349. Saturday, December 15, 1877. \\ I'm afraid I don't feel like writing diary to-night. There - that doesn't sound very toothsome so far - but go on - See what comes next _ The dressmaker I guess _ She's the one that's turned our water courses out of their olden channels for the day _ a mild, silent little woman all in black _ A silent woman to come in and sew is a rare thing in this world _ we are glad we've found one _ glad Aggie's new pretty cloak is all done - glad that it is so pretty _ Well _ I took a walk up street with Aggie _ the first since when? ___ It was a long, long one and I'm some tired _ but will omit that. Its a year ago to-day that I wrote my first letter to Lorle _ just a year ago to-day _ Saturday _ We have tickets for "Hamlet" Monday evening _ I've begun to read him up _ We can't sing "one boy day"* to-night very well _ He isn't here _ * from Helen's Babies by John Habberton + + + 350. Sunday, December 16, 1877. To begin where we left off _ he is here now _ I couldn't have told though for sure this morning _ I mixed it up so in my strange dreaming ! _We hoped he might say Mr. Bean wanted him _ but we must wait for that _ just as we have _ Dan keeps at what we dumbly fancy to be the spring of our fortune but it won't spring _ No_No! Something has sprung though for mother _ A man has come for her _ and the little new satchel is brought right straight down and before we've got to the end of the first conclusion she is gone _ The Sunday had been blue enough before _ This betokens good - so we think. And Aggie's gone and its lonesome sitting here by the little stove _ thro' the still evening and then creeping off to bed _ alone_ I must say I have known much cheerier occasions!351. Monday, December 17, 1877. And my boy made my fire so nice last night all I have to do when I come down shivering, is to light a match and touch it to the little end of paper that wiggles below _ then I sit down and wait till a fire happens _ All day when I've done the cosy little housekeeping things _ I like so to do when mother's gone _ I devote myself assiduously to that lace handkerchief _ I needn't have kept at it so hard _ I have less sense on some subjects than one would suppose_ But listen _ it is all done _ I have been thro' the whole category of pleasant sensations that come when you're ripping it away from the cambric Yes'm! And we've been to see Booth in Hamlet! I don't know what it was to other people __ it seemed perfection to me - We come home too delighted for anything _ 352. Tuesday, December 18, 1877. The sitting-room fire didn't go out last night _ You may not think it but this is a large item! _ My sister has to wake her own little self _ and move away from Albany scenes before the day is fairly upon us _ She does it in a vigorous way _ which I inwardly commend! I'm tired of buying Larrabee's Graham bread _ in the first place its dear _ and in the second place it is not delicious! I've appealed to Aunt Mary _ and not in vain! I quite enjoy this minding things for mother while she is away _ I don't have it hard _ Dannie is so nice about it_ All day little snatches of Hamlet keep coming to me _ I see Booth's hand go up_ and hear him say the best parts over _ or some more of [his] comes back to me done with that perfect grace of his _ It is early _ real early when I fix the fire and go off up to bed _ "A sleepy/sleeky cat" as Laura Skinner would say __353. Wednesday, December 19, 1877. Another comfortable thing has happened Mr. Burdick has sent for Dan _ Its not large _ O_no_ but the boy is glad of straws _ So I fire him up a breakfast and he goes off somewhat brightened up _ Then I go over to tell Aunt Mary _ Dinner-time Dan and I work in a somewhat haggly manner over those pig's feet _ which just came to light _ I'm not perfectly at home in making souse - Perhaps I've cut away most too much _ but I poke the residue [down] in the kettle _ pour on water _ and then go at my dinner dishes _ It is not long after, that the little mother walks in _ "My little woman died right in my arms last night" _ This was the first thing she said _ Then she took her bonnet off and told me all about it _ Of the quiet passing away the entering into life eternal _ The beautiful rest for the over tired body _ of the "rod and the staff comforting" _ * *Psalm 23:4354: Thursday, December 20, 1877. I am actually surprised at myself _ to think that I could go way up to the Delavan with Aggie's postal _ I spects I am tired but _ that I could do it at all is kind of bewildering! I've gone into another speculation _ a motto to be worked for Aunt Mary _ shaded gold to work it with! _ Something else for to-day is walking toward me _ the postman is bringing it _ It sets the afternoon a quivering _ I'm so anxious to do some more dovetailing _ Mottos and things become of little account in this shifting of the fates! _ I open to Mr. Alger at length _ Then abstractedly to Julia Miller after it fall to wondering how it will come out _ Winter is so gentle with us _ no snows _ [no] storms do we know yet _ Nothing but etherial wildness! _ To-day "I spose" they are scattering down to the college _ Last night, I spose my girl went through here ... & not to _ ...355. Friday, December 21, 1877. Avis has fairly astonished us to-day with _ singing _ while we were in attitude expectant he didn't deign any [musick] except "cheep" _ We give him up _ and lo: he breaks forth! We are completely dazed _ how our vocabulary lacks sweet things to say to him! Mother engages herself in the not [aesthetic] pursuit of washing shawls _ Its a good day for that _ or anything _ clear and bright! _ I don't know anything but "motto" _ Don't say anything to me _ Let me keep at it till my head swims if I will be void of sense! _ We are having our shortest day _ This rejoices me - I hate to have it get dark so quick! Mother says she is going to buy me a little carriage and let the rats in our yard be harnessed to it _ This plan meets with my commendation_ Then muzzy tugged home that gallon of [Waukesha] - to-night356. Saturday, December 22, 1877. Do you suppose we are coming to a cheerful chapter? Hardly _ More mope-y _ like and void of the little agreeable nothings that make the complexion of a day _ No letters - no visitors _ no news - nobody to say anything to except deaf grandma _ an awful feeling that my motto I'm working aint going to be pretty - my codfish at dinner a very melancholy success _ Aggie coming home and telling me maybe she won't eat Christmas dinner with us _ Aunt Mary gliding in pale and ghost-like _ dear me its easy to believe we are all spectors - and sit grimly looking at each other _ on the borders of something more spectral still _ Fannie I think you will put your pen down pretty soon and go to the gospel of St. John If we all do have our "trubs" as ma[] says _ never mind _ Nothing can quite touch love _ That is forever and forever safe _____357. Sunday, December 23, 1877. And so the Sunday comes to us _ a day of heights if we but know where to look _ A day at least to be still in _ and to call to mind the "new and living way" There is no winter over the world yet _ Not an omen in the sky or air or anywhere that storms are preparing ! _ I turn to Thomas a Kempis and it says _ "Be then so full of courage and so patient in hope _ that when inward comfort is withdrawn then mayest prepare thy heart to suffer even greater things"! __ To think of lesser things then this I have no heart to-day. In the morning Aggie and I went up to hear Dr. Bridgman It was a dear service as his ever are to me _ Text Hebrews_ 10 _ 14.17. Christ able to make us come up to a perfect manhood and womanhood ___ The church was beautiful in its Christmas deckings __358. Monday, December 24, 1877. Let us get together the bits of to-day that were glad _ We can find them in most any day _ only Frances _ sometimes your eyes are holden _ The dressmaker, one of the quiet yet steadily propelling forces in this world _ gets Aggie's blue dress on toward the [end]- Aggie on a pinch catches the train _ in time, as we trust, to see Miss Chisholm married_ Aunt Mary's motto under my proprietorship gets done and that aint all _ It gets framed and borne to her _ I feel as if it was I that had discovered the way to take Vicksburg! _ There's good wholesome cheer everywhere - faces are full of it _ steps go by with a sort of joy [and] expectation in the sound! _ One must be in it _ to be in the world _ _______________________________________359. Tuesday, December 25, 1877. The bittersweet gives us cheery greeting as we come down to the places where it decks our Christmas _ Avis too, sets up curious little sings! The calla holds out broad green leaves _ "See"_ it says _ "I have been frost-bitten and died down at the top these ever so many winters _ but my courage is greater than my misfortunes _ don't you see? _ I've read Hamlet to-day all through and the second book of Aurora Leigh* _ So I've been royally entertained_ We [wanted] the little girl home with us to-day _ all day _ She came just as tea was in progress _ then Dan came _ He insisted on wishing us "Merrie Christmas" Mrs. []ports' way _ The audience keeps calling for it! Our evening turns out to be "wery" full of good cheer _ here in muzzy's little home. * 1856 epic poem/novel by Elizabeth Barrett Browning360. Wednesday, December 26, 1877. The voice of the dressmaker is still heard in our land _ but hardly enough to make a note on! She talks the least little bit and then in the mildest possible way _ My sister's world [wags] _ how/now she's cleaning up _ now at the silver _ then at the fires - now at the cupboards _ then something else _ so it goes till we're all amazed we're so clean! _ As for me _ I go up-stairs "way way way up" _ as our family put it _ I hunt up Dr. Austin's letter of five years ago _ bring down my old "[Laws]" and ponder and ponder over Dansville! _ If we only knew, Frances and I _ if we only knew what was best! We have fallen upon wondrous times _ there have been ... here to-day after mother! _ Its very exciting _ As a sort of tail end to it she spends the evening with Mrs. Cork in Dove St. while I tend to the bread! _ Aggie's company has arrived ! 361. Thursday, December 27, 1877. Mr. Dawson tells Dan his chance is "slim" _ O _ our prophetic souls! _ and yet we don't one of us say "I told you so" _ We've disposed ourselves variously to-day. I'm getting short of diary phrases _ Mother has attended to a washing of porportions _ Aggie and ... have helped at a Normal Reunion _ I've taken a few stitches in the point lace barb _ and for the [rest] part _ it was mostly rocking chair and lounge _ Miss [Mark] came in a few minutes to see me and it was ... in the extreme _ We aren't flooded with visitors! _ After the girls go upstreet in the morning mother and I sit by the fire and we have a long long talk about getting well - and the dark ... of it - of Dansville and what might _ what might not be _ 365. 365. Monday, December 31, 1877. What a sleepy heroine to close up this story with - I can't begin to tell you how sleepy she was _ To dismiss the subject and not sit here talking about it _ we'll explain how that all she could do there was no ... sleep last night and she had told Mr. V_T knock her up at five thirty! Sleep was shy of her to-day too _ this she did get an hour of it and got in indefinite dozing! The snows of a year ago are not here - none of the wailing and storming to-night _ only quietness and steady cold! _ The sun has been a beautiful smile in the face of the dying year _ I chanced to pick up Bits of Travel* and it gave me a lovely hour - I have not looked in it since that day I came up the river _ I'm giving Avis a second more careful reading- I like its little suggestive similes - and it is full of them! _ I brighten up in the flow of the evening fire _ feeling much less disagreeable than I did - Well to happen - Thea Frances! *may be : Bits of Travel at Home, 1878 by Helen Hunt JacksonMemoranda. Dannie began with Weed, Parsons and Co. on Saturday _ Feb. 9 _ 1878.CASH ACCOUNT. JANUARY Received. Paid. Aggie's bill. Diary 32 Toothbrush 25 For cleaning watch 1.50 Felt skirt 75 Ribbon 30 Money Jan 10 4.00 Paid ... Wm. W. 70 Postage 14 Carriage 50 Fare to Albany 25 Furniture m[]d 1.50 Stamps & money 20 Mothers fare 50 Camphor 20 Book binding 5.25 Change 25 Money 5.25 " 1.00 Hat 1.75 [right margin] Board at Aunt May's - $3.00 | Paid I think it [ought] have been |CASH ACCOUNT. FEBRUARY. Received. Paid. Fare to Cohoes 25 Postage 06 Money 10 Watch crystal 15 Pin mended 15 Money 15 " 3.00 " 1.00 " 16 Trunk at H.F. 20 Fare to N. Adams 70 " " Poultney 1.60 " " Ft Ti 1.20 " " Rutland 1.20 " " Ida's 45 " " Albany 3.20 Trunk at " 13 Prescriptions 85 Milk & Ferry [pass.] 27 Ruffs 08. CASH ACCOUNT. MARCH. Received. Paid. Aunt Mary's bill _ Hack 50 Stamps 09 Telegrams 50 Lent mother 1.00 Whiskey 10 Meat 14 Lent me 05 Camphor 25 Pd Lent Dan 25 closed ______________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________ Postage &c 40 [Rhetine] postage 11 Cards 05 Note book 45 Box of paper 12 Money 25 Postage 06 Money 5.10 Postage 06 CASH ACCOUNT. APRIL. Received. Paid. Money 23 Book 1.12 Linen thread 25 Envelopes 05 Stamps 06 Books to Lettie 12 Vassar Misallany postage 03 Linen lawn 44 Dan's pants _(my share) 2.50 Mother's Christmas 3.00 Shaded floss 06 Forwarded letter 03 Mineral water 40 Postage 07 CASH ACCOUNT. MAY. Received. Paid. Jan. 1878_ Candy for the girls 30 Postage [on] candy 18 Postals &c 07 Block of paper 15 Postage 25 Medicine 1.00 Postage 06 - For "Dansville" 12.00 - Envelopes 05 Postal cards 05 Stamps 03 Ruffs 10 For Dansville 15.00 Medicine 25CASH ACCOUNT. JULY. Received. Paid. Mother's account _____ _____ Money 18 " 45 Mineral water 80 Car fare 11 Medicine 45 Camphor 50 Shoes 1.00 Money from bank 11.00 00 Medicine 25 CASH ACCOUNT. AUGUST CASH ACCOUNT. SEPTEMBER Received. Paid. Dr. Vanderveer. __ ________ Examination at office Feb. 20 Call _ 17 Westerlo St. " 21 " " " " " 24 " 42 S. Ferry " Mar. 1 " " " " " 6 " " " " " 12 " " " " " 13 Examination " " " " " 17 " " " " " 22 " " " " " 30 " " " " Apr. 5 " " " " " 12 Office prescription " 19 (Jar[vie]) " " May 1 " " " 18 " " June 4 " " " 8 " " " 18 " " " 29 " " Aug. 21 By letter _ " 3 CASH ACCOUNT. OCTOBER Received. Paid. Dr. Vanderveer _ Call _ 2 Dallins St. Jan.23 Mother went to the office twice _ Dan once _ up to Feb_13_CASH ACCOUNT. NOVEMBER. Received. Paid. Miss M. A. Hastings 35 Spring St Hartford _ Conn. _________ Miss Naomi Taylor - 119 1/2 Vroom St. Jersey City Heights Mrs. Huldah Calkins Alpha Henry Co. Ill.CASH ACCOUNT. DECEMBER. Received. Paid. "It seems to us saddest of all that discord on the music fell and darkness on the story" _____ We can but be glad that now it is all made clear to her that her friends are dearer than ever and that she is glad to be among us - [Named] softly as the household name of one whom God hath taken" - Vassar MiscellanySUMMARY OF CASH ACCOUNT Received. Paid. "The most sensitive are walled and padded with stupidity _ it is well it is so else it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrels heartbeat and we should die of the woe that lies on the other side of silence"* George Eliot From Laura's letter - Jan. 6. "Jesus, thou present Savior Thou hast known the depths of all sorrow! thou hast entered the black darkness where God is not, and hast uttered the cry of the forsaken. Come Lord and gather of the fruits of thy travail and thy pleading stretch forth thine hand thou who art mighty to save to the uttermost and rescue this lost one She is clothed *from Middlemarch by George Eliot MEMORANDA. around with thick darkness the fetters of her sin are upon her and she cannot stir to come to thee: she can only feel that her heart is hard and she is helpless. She cries to thee _ thy weak creature _.. Savior, it is a blind cry to thee Hear it! Pierce the darkness| Look upon her with thy face of love and sorrow that thou didst turn on him who denied thee ; and melt her hard heart. See Lord - bring her as they of old brought the sick and helpless, and thou didst heal them: I bear her on my arms and carry her before thee. Fear and trembling have taken hold in her: but she trembles only at the pain & death of the body: breathe upon her thy life-giving spirit, and put a new fear within - the fear of her sin. Make her dread to keep the accursed thing within her soul: make her feel the presence of the living God who beholds all the past, to whom the darkness is as noonday __ Savior there is yet time _ time to snatch this poor soul from everlasting darkness. I believe _ I believe in thyMEMORANDA. inifinite love. What is my love or my pleading? It is quenched in thine, I can only clasp her in my weak arms and urge her with my weak pity _ Thou _ thou wilt breathe on the dead soul and it shall arise from the unanswering sleep of death Yea, Lord, I see thee coming through the darkness coming, like the morning with healing on thy wings. The marks of thy agony are upon thee _ I see. I see thou art able and willing to save _ thou wilt not let her perish forever. Come mighty Savior! let the dead hear thy voice! let the eyes of the blind be opened! let her see that God encumpasses her! let her tremble at nothing but at the sin that cuts her off from him. Melt the hard heart; unseal the closed lips; make her cry with her whole soul, 'Father I have sinned'" From Adam Bede - May 8!MEMORANDA. 'Dagmar. ____ The beautiful princess Dagmar The "darling queen" lay dead With lilies on her bosom And roses round her head. Cold and fair and silent Upon her bier she lay And weeping lords and gentlemen Were bearing her away 1 When down the city causeway 4 The king came riding fast 2 Whereon the mourners passed 3 In bitter grief and raging woe The dead heart in her bosom Leapt up his voice to hear The dead life opened softly She rose upon the bier Straight to her husband's smitten soul A smile of Heaven she sent A word of love and pleading Then back to death she went. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + To die a double dying Oh! fate be spared to me! When death has kissed my eyelids And life has set me free. Thou, dearest, do not call me! Do not utter a word; Let not my peace be broken My hard-worn slumber stirred. Leave it for one Voice, dearer, Dearer even than thine When the resurrection morning On Heaven and Earth shall shine Mrs. O.S.F.Dart 1158 East Jersey St Elizabeth, N.J. To send its trumpet clangor Thro' star, and sod, and sky And call His dead, where'er their bed, To the life that cannot die. Rose Terry Cooke 1- 36732. H. 2- 36776 3- 36799 4- 36851 5- 36884 Bloat ... 6- 36945 7- 36951 - ... 846 (170 Elm St)At our house - Monday _ Jan 8. Miss Emma Monk Miss Susis Flagler Miss E.L. Hastings Miss Katie Doyle Miss Mary Reilly Miss Babe Reilly Dear Sister, Please commence my letter and write a little for me. It will take me so long to write it alone, and I want to send it tomorrow, I won't call you names again for a long time, AggieDear Miss Bromley __ Please excuse for not returning earlier but I copied until supper __ then as it so bad walking Mrs N said John might take it down as soon as he finishes supper _ I nevercould make out an analysis like this _ It is awfully hard __ - Jennie - P.S. I am beginning to think that John had something better for his supper than we did --
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Creator: Bromley, Frances M.
Date: 1875
Text: __ I“? l‘_!‘|“||‘l|||_ _6307 "41_s5" U 122 _ 112 _ _l_ v___1‘!__I‘___‘ M \)‘_‘q ‘U _buﬁ_W'\l“‘H\\}\“Dn‘ ‘ ‘ “J- "“‘ > .:ll'!}| I1, m\vH‘m _ _ V1 4_ ‘ “ ““‘ V \;__t: ““‘lrF“‘\‘ Q \§E_~Ef__3WWmM Pumﬁ luwh Wzgwﬁw : _ _'_>\“ I i‘_‘)v' )_ _ . _ “ ‘ “W I i _§s____:_29wM__ "hr" _ "3 _ _ U ‘:_ __m __ m_1 _ > _\M_§_$_&_18mﬂw mzgwﬁw WYHHNW Emmy” mggmﬂw ~ v _\__5_>E___ m7_H_ﬂ% m4Hm§m18mW_w mGB‘_m__m mgmnm mlgmﬂw \_ _ ‘KM __\Ns7_2;_ "...
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I‘ ‘V I L y Fm‘ ~W AW _ 7 ’ 9|‘ ‘ V‘ B V \ I‘ } \} ‘_'“m_'{.v.”H ’ ‘\\ ‘I’? ‘J, lbhmwlu‘ Mm‘ ﬁlm H§‘w hi“ “Lh_l’m’”’ _;_‘_W_h\i__ wk r ~ _ L __ _ y V Fannie M. Bromley, Cohoes, New YorkHappy New Year. From Mother. "What matters a little pain outside? Go in and rest from it."I am crucified with Christ nevertheless. I live, yet not I but Christ liveth in me. Galatian's 2.20s V ¢ K 1 I L l l On matter not above speciﬁed, same rate ;i ~73 411 mnestic jgustage. On all LETTERStl1l'O1igl1OUt the Unitco State 3 cts. for each halfounce OI‘ fraction thcrcoﬁ DROP or liooixi. LETTERS! 2 cts. p_erhalf<>m1¢ wfléere there 1S ct free carnefs delivery; othe . 0 ccs, lct. POSTAL CARDS. 1 ct. VALUABLE LE'rTERs_niay be registered by the payment of a 1'_CglStI‘3t101'1 fee of 15 cts. MONEY can be sent with absolute safety by mail, by procuring :1 Money Order. The fees are: on orders n0t1excee§i‘ii;:V$1O, 5 ‘cts.; §l$'O to $130, I 1pO ctsé to $.n; E-<Z\.—Cl'§. ; $30 to $40, 20 cts.; C40 to , “ 3 cts. PRINTED Booxs. in one package, to one ad- i dress. 2 cisfbfor eacl;2 ounces or fraction thereof, no over s, I On '1‘I<Ai\'siEi\:'1‘ NE\VSI’1\I’ERS, or other PRINTED ‘l\'lAT'I‘ER (Books excepted), and on Circulars, Ilaaiinphlgelts, tBofl< l\’l21I€:1f1SCI‘lpES aiild Proof'Sheetsi i aps, . ee 1 usic, romos, mgravings an 1;h0to%raphs, 1 cgnior each 2 ounces or fractio t ereo , not over s. 1 Seeds. Cuttings, Bulbs, &c., 1 ct. for 2»ounces and fraction OF1 Ounce, not over 4 lbs. Samples of i\lerchzmdi."-.e (except Liquids), Ores &c., Flexible Patterns, Paper Envelopes and l3lanl<s, $2 cts. for each 2 ounces, iiot over J2 ounces. All Transient Hatter, except duly certiﬁed Letters of Soldiers and Sailors, iniist be prepaid y stamps. '1‘ “KO 5 Lettei‘s_ 1 ; i l l l --- l l l a l I l i I gnreign ignatagc. On ],E'l"1‘El<S TO (§Ri;,\'r Bm'1u\m 1\I\‘D 1121;- Li»\:<n.—For every half ounce or ﬁ'aCtion thereof, (3 cts., if prepaid ; ifnot prepaid, (3 cts. extra will be collected in Great Britain. and G cts. in the United States. O D l To tne GERz\1Ai\‘ ST‘-\TES,-—-FOX‘ every half ¥ uuce or fraction tliereof,’\7'i:1'N. German Unio ,... J ~ \' 0 - l1rect,6 cts.; closed lnihl, via England, 7 ets A nrepayment optional. ‘ l l To FRANCE (payment compulsory), 1O cts. for each hall” ounce or fraction thereof, direct mail; 4 cts. (open mail) by England. Fully prepaid, via England, one-third ounce, 1O cts. ; one-third to one-hallounce, 16 cts.; one-halfto two-thirds ounce, 20 cts. ; two-thirds to one ounce, 26 cts. To the DOAIINION or CANADA, Nov.»\ SCO~ l Tm, NF.WFou1\'DLAN1), &e., per half ounce, any distance, 6 ets., ifprepaid; ifnot paid, 10 cts. W, ,_.,.._,-,,_ , **Jl ‘ ' 7_* i . 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Cleveland, Ohio . . . . .. $§1IIIl Indianapolis, Ind. . . . . 812 . . . . . . . 852 Memphis, Tenn . . . . .. New Orleans, '51 I I I I U.T.. Cal... '\ ILES. 144 1s<s 231 42:; 815 89?; 744 581 604 V1522 12:9 1628 396 1483 1420 88 431 1 9 34 356 2464 3302 1391 1(‘89 47 13 9] 7 226 15 20 160 ] 2 TIME. RS. OU 0301 10 18 47 36 :11 l | 23 27 120 £4 41 (15 80 19 82 56 4; 17 E ($1 45 64 10 i 51] 1 é I i 4 ‘l TIME WHEN ‘ 12 o‘c1.ocI< AT NEW YORK. "2 i o 0 0 0 1 j§r1m:1paI , 1/14125 : sa Q ~ "1‘m~:n< DISTANCF. FROM NEW Yonx, \vn‘1x THE DXFFERIZNCE IN II. 12 11 11 11 11 11 11 .11 11 10 11 11 10 11 12 10 10 11 11 12 11 9 8 10 10 10 -*1 1 =1 M. 1 45) 50 40 36 6 18 30 23 36 11 14 56 0 1 56 32 55 36 15 46 '38 46 3'7 55 43 31 147 < <3 v , ./- 1,1~_,... s. 6 1>.:\i. = 38 .»\.M. 0 KL :4 24 22 2 4: Kl 16 “ , 0 (K 54 :1 , L4 58 54 4: ‘ 4 “ l s 1 J 0 2 Kl 1 4.4 P.M. 4 A.M. 0 ii 25 (K 0 O P. . 1 . O 19 0 u l 4 (L CH "/ I???‘ _.._ l 1 l 1 45 32 53 , C l 1. January 1. Friday. The Overture. After which the curtain rises upon a [home] scene. I am rich in beautiful things to think of, how that I have little still minutes to take[.] I come to my possessions, joyfully. "What matters a little pain outside? Go in and rest from it." This always. Everything in the little home today has been full. There has been that little tender feeling that it is so good for me to have, and the longing and the clinging that keep me tender. Isaiah again begins the year for me. "For my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed."2. January 2 Saturday. Contains more particulars. My hours for things are lost in the havent's where eighteen bells ring a day. I am utterly unconscious of any necessity of beginning operations before 10:30. It turns out that I don't. [...] some as other times approach! We mark this day with a list of arrivals. My sister marshals herself home elated. It is not at all clear to her that it isn't wo well to come now as before. We make a wonderful expedition down street in an intruding snowstorm. We expend with an eye to earning more. My hair gets cut with an eye to growing some more. The evening means a great deal of talking. Some people catch it.3. January 3 Sunday. Talks of something that's greater than living. There was the early morning and mother could go. I can't find words to tell how nice it was to me all the way. I entered with all my soul into the curch service. It was a new coming to Jesus. An entering into the temple. I knew that I had been reached, reached as I have not been since the trouble. How the words sweep over me yet! "O to throw my soul's deep meaning into future years." There came afterwards the dear, dear visit at Aunt Mary's. And after all these sad months, away from her. 4. January 4. Monday. Calls to old haunts. There was a girl went out of the dear ways looking back. There's so much that the hills cannot hide. Farther back in the day to the point where it first commenced I see the boy face bending over me to say "good bye." This is when I began to understand that it was coming. Eight years ago over the [...] road on a journey. Now I have the whole story. Emma was at the cars to meet me. Satie on the way. It is very nice to be cared for just as they care for me. The visiting part isn't the least bit of a bore. 5. January 6. Wednesday. Takes up little threads. Do I not know that they are tender ones. That they take hold very close to the girl that was? Think of me going up the hill, of the dear visit with Mrs. Ball and the Judge. Just this little part of it must never be dropped out of my story. There won't be many more entries in any earthly record book that shall tell this. In the school there was not a vestige of old me. I have completely and [oncely] dropped out, just as I shall from life by and by. After dark Satie and I left Mary Jones and the pleasant afternoon for meeting tonight. I could talk and sing , and I wanted so much to hear Satie. [Page torn]6. January 5. Tuesday. Renews the olden times. There are evidences of a protracted state of repose. It follows that breakfast and dinner are separated by fifteen minutes! That I have any end in life is no apparent. I lay around. By and by Mary Jones comes in and we talk up! She says, "Come to tea tomorrow". So we will. We call some and it's nice. I'm glad life and god have done so much for Satie McLean. The bright little woman in the new little home. Satie's walk and mine in the old streets had in it not a word of seven years. It was as near like the little nights after prayer meeting as [page torn]7. January 7. Thursday. Awakes me to a realizing sense. A very emphatic call will be given in detail elsewhere. These pages do not admit of it! They speak mostly of a start. By a remarkable developing of causes real and assumed we are called upon to put in practice what I've been brought up to "midnight trains". So much to gain a point! Add to this a walk up one of [Eugh] B's hills to get a man, to bring him where trunks are, to be moved on. But we have spirits not easily daunted, and we find the waiting, a pleasant entertainment. Ah! Castleton, in the night and snow. Life makes us come to you. Can you be drearier? 8. January 8 Friday. Gives me the idea! I comprehend at once about what I have got to come to! I can get a great deal in a taste. All the joy there is in holding a girl down tight and making her stay is mine to the full. How thankful I ought to be for blessings like these! The new objects of interest consist chiefly of a young miss and a long table. The latter does not please us. The all say, "Is this the way its going to be all the time?" At night Ida comes and we're all glad to see the dear face, growing to me so dear. Slowly I unpack, one by one the little things are all taken out and put away for twenty-five weeks.9. January 9 Saturday. Makes me greatly amazed! I ought to be. Will work enough to do, to keep in motion quicker heads and hands than mine. I sit down perfectly demure throughout and are the whole day go, without are feeble effort, one gasping at it on its last namings. Not a mouse to stand as a witness that my mountain labored! I've no fault to find with the weather. There's plenty of snow and plenty of sleighs and horses and sleigh-bells. The Seminary puts on a brighter face, its halls ring again with laughs, and we wear the new threads [page torn] One meeting [sing] at for me in the week of prayer.10. January 10. Sunday. Finds me and leaves me asking. We still sit at the long table. The feeling is a general one that we are all visiting and to be as stiff as pokers is the order observed. But place Mrs. Stiles motherly providing and genuine smile by Mrs. Hawkins angularities and you have a south hillside by a projecting wall. I feel a deeper pain down where the sorry places are that I often know. That I could hurt anyone so they would cry as Satie did last night seems incomprehensible to me. She knows partly how unconsciously it was done. She knows a little how much I prize the loss that she has given me all these years. [page torn]11. January 11. Monday. Takes life up bravely. The descent from Patmore and poetry is abrupt, not to say precipitous down to these prospects! And what is the outlook? A few straggling blossoms holding up their heads around old Salmagundi. Gray wastes where no seeds have sprouted. Overhead time marked cedar festoons the last reminder of Alumnae doings. We look for multitudes and find ten or fifteen. I feel as if I was a general in a lost cause, a party to a conflict of valor against numbers! Something betokens that the old Spartan spirit is not yet frozen in my veins! The manner in which I emptied my bedroom of its furniture carried its associations and all into a dark closet. 12. January 12. Tuesday. Finds a few things to do. I install myself in the new methods of proceedings flanked by the comforting assurance that I can stand it! What will sleeping in a dark closet be like. My "Summer in a Garden", will be "My Winter in a Clothes press". Yes, I'm "among by books". The sages of every country were there who poured over dusty volumes. What an advantage is mine who am poured among them! What a change has come to me. Nothing is in any way as it was before the curtain dropped. Does 18. Two different lives in the same home, with the same work to do! No, not that. The ripples. Move over the surface. It is the silences below that are the same. 13. January 13. Wednesday. Is introduced as chilly. I am about to chronicle the assertions of the oldest inhabitants the voices of seers to to be lightly listened to, or idly regarded. It relates solely to weather, and is strong in the belief that this is the coldest winter since thirty, or thirty-one, two there, years ago. That we've not had it all yet. To be a correct themometer one has only to teach in Normal Hall! Poor Salamagundi blazes and raves, and flames and smokes in his efforts. I never saw a more pitiable case of love's labor lost. I can't say. Blessed are those whol have noble striven and noble failed in his case. I long for balmy breezes, blowing soft o'er [Aylen's] isle. 14. January 14. Thursday. Whirls me away. I am devoutly thankful that whirling is the word to use. As I feel to-day I stand ready to be suddenly twitched and whirled around, faster than a spindle and pretty quick dropped into ma's big clothes basket and informed that the big wheel that mowed me, had sent my girls through Conant's questions and Dana's [nine] from seven!and June 25 was upon me! To-day commenced it. Snatching me up in a tightening grip I began the going roung with agilit. My heart bounces up in a new kind of a beat, but I climb stairs and rest and whew as if I was regardless of cost. In little free minutes Thomas a Kempis brings [me] impulses to suffer and work. 15. January 15. Friday. Has a new ring. Aye, a sound of something coming for two complete days that is not Normal stairs or Mary do this, and Electra do that and Katie "rise", and Julia "that will do"!Yes, I think twill do, it will all do! and I sit down in a certain rocking chair and try to find out how comfortable a person Fannie is to live with! I don't take much comfort in anything I think [page torn]16. January 16. Saturday. Means business. One blessing graces the new administration, a later breakfast. Who can rationale the satisfaction of that extra seven minutes nap? The order of the day calls upon me for a marshaling of forces considerable summoning of will. It only remains for me to add that I begin a report campaign! The sleighing improves [torn page]17. January 17. Sunday. Rests me. God does not let us be whirled always around in the life march, even though we may want to skip hard days and hard things by being hurled quickly beyond them. He, with a perfect knowledge of our needs, calls us to rest places, and quiet levels with light upon them. The wheels all seem to stop and all day long I seem not wanting, or getting ready but stopping, standing just still and feel the full rest of it. As good as we ever get here. As free from the worries as it is possible to be! Mr. Woodruffs sermons are a desert [dream] to me. He rants and gets into them and sends them forth as if they had power to live. But yet, I don't feel sorry when I go to church. I think Jesus had rather that I go when I can. 18. January 18 Monday. Makes it necessary to give me prolonged discipline. It isn't at all difficult for me to take in fully my next assertion. That being campelled to let a precious evening vanish in talk is trying. I recall dismally the work I'd laid out. We are in weather that makes fearful [...]. The stillest grimmest kind of cold. My mood has [...] the puttin in one, not an inch to retreat, nor much of the tender drawing toward.19. January 19 Tuesday. Partakes of consternation in which I am not included. We have come to the most exciting chapter. The scene. The parlor. The aggrieved, our Mr. Hyde. The details are indeed of an unexpected character. Figures. Misses Todd and Grinnell Brown and Ten Broeck, and the hired man! My part of it began when Ida came to tell me the story crying as we never heard her cry before. She leaves me feeling so much better with me glad that she was willing to take the course she has taken in repenting. There's a world of [cosines] in my room when I put the curtains down and go into the long evening. 20. January 20. Wednesday. Is not jubilant. The storm does not abate and Normal Hall is cold. This weather and ten windows are too much for Salamagundi. I don't like a small school and ours is an utter weariness to me. Only the afternoons [fan] the feeble [flame] that gives me breath. I wish doves would fly to Normal windows! [Mip] T.B. is tired and sorry. Last night worries her and she is also troubled with a great Noyes. We are all so sorry that the thing happened last night. We all owe Mr. Hyde so much. [Mip] Grinnell [knows], she says that if it should get home twould kill her mother and her father would go raving mad! 21. January 21. Thursday. Takes milder forms. The possibilities are in our favor. It does not snow less, but we get used to such things, and so improve on them. There comes something almost like enthusiasm and I rise to meet it contending for every inch of ground between me and this! The days I dread are the days when my heart goes out of the work and the empty seats inspire me with wretchedness. Even the man of sorrows was followed by multitudes. Why don't I do more evenings? Won't somebody tell? I'm behind in everything and to get up spirit enough to get up and do things is one of my last outs...22. January 22 Friday Brings a joy that was almost perfect. We were glad to hear about a double sleigh coming over and a lecture to be given in Middletown and some girls to go! Glad indeed were we to have it a part of our [...] with the beautiful [...] fallen snow, the jungle of the hills, the mild weather, the ready fun of the girls, brimming full around us, the little gentlemanly attentions of Mr. Hyde and the trot, trot of the good time we were carrying fifteen miles. It seemed so new and strange to have this whole journey so complete! We found a hotel where the landlord had gone away the boy hadn't tended to nothing! Scenes from the life of Dr. Carpenter were enacted, with great spirit, and the [...], drama. "Yes, there's a fire here."23. January 23. Saturday. Means poke. This it seems to me suggests almost as much as Grace Greenwood's verb to flop. For all I know I might have flopped too. The most important part of me laid and slept away. While it lasted it might have been [restricted] everlasting bliss. Everlasting bliss, cut short. After that I got up! Ida is in great trouble and I give her my morning. [page torn] 24. January 24. Sunday. Goes on with the chapter. The sick part of things is the important part. That's all we take time to think of. I make a powerful effort, and rally most of us off to church. Our speaker is an exchange bearing aloft the noble name of Milton Tator. Mips H. says," has there ever such a vision of the ridiculous with [page torn]25. January 25. Monday. Thinks I need a further discipline. I leave Mount Parnassus with regret. Snowdrifts, continually piling, are foes to the school interests of Vermont. The path which leads to Normal portals shows no fair days, "here and there a traveler". Every trace of me vanishes in the accumulated masses, and I pour forth into three! I feel more like teaching in that little east room than any where else. The past is a spur, when I'm there. Satie is sick again and I rebel and rebel, but all to no purpose. The outlook shows a prolongation. 26. January 26 Thursday. Shows me prospects of a continued discipline. I fight at the very thought. I raise up an [...] insurrection down in my heart, but there's nothing to do pretty soon but to quill the internal elements and face the fate! Darling is so sick, and I give myself up to her, and summon to my aid every available help. I dread so to think of the days that lie between us, and the better times, the well times when we shall enjoy so much! I am given an opportunity to develop any slumbering talent for nursing. I shall need to know all that can be learned about it, probably. 27. January 27. Wednesday. Lights up. There's spells of brightening in the middle of eveything, and I'm thoroughly ready for it, if I ever was. I flatter myself that Satie is improving and with this gleam, nothing else seems quite so forlorn. The many steps between Normal Hall and the sick girl tire me. It's like "ever climbing up the climbing Wave". I think the morning part of school isn't quite so like making me desparate as it was some time ago. Jessie Hawkins and Mary Northrop bring balm in place of bitter herbs, not an abundance, but enough to make me inclined to live out my days. What makes me constricted to care?28. January 28. Thursday. Sings carnage. I don't care much whether the carnage comes singing or skipping or stalking in noiselessly, just the courage part of it, the part that will not let me be utterly despairing is the part that I'm glad of. Satie keeps telling me that she is better, and I get up a great deal of hope and say "I think she is". She has kept a little in her stomach and can move about more easily today. Poor little sick girlie! Work goes on. Whatever the status of other things, that calls for just so much, and I keep giving and giving. Greek stops. That has to stop there days when I live fully up to my strength. I give it up as cheerfully as I can, fondly dreaming of more next year. 29. January 29. Friday. Has to go chasing about for endurance. It is a pitiable sight. One can't gaze upon martyrs every day. Alas, not. I hereby present myself as a spectacle calculated to move obdurate hearts. My hopes of Satie's speedy recovery had mounted to an unusual height, when in the middle of the second class the soothing message comes that Mip Rising has fainted and my presence upstairs is desirable! I find her worse than she has been at all and in a storm of fears I send for Dr. Sanford. His [...] verdict promises no speedy respite. He bestows upon the disease the cheering name of spinal fever. My bed is at once moved out and the siege begins!30. January 30 Saturday. Gets where the dark is and the sorry. These are cheering pages. How comforting they would be to an invalid! What an addition to the literature of the desponding! Such chroniclings of love rising triumphant over little frowning worlds of a brass will conquering and defying fate, or a patience that is not afraid to walk alone. Let the heroic records stand to be read by "some forlorn and shipwrecked brother". More now is hereby transcribed. I go sorrowing these days for appreciation. Isn't this high moral courage? It comes over me that I ought to have a little tonight, but as you will readily guess it don't come. Jean [Bigelow] comes to me to increase the number of drops in the shower. "Sobbing, throbbing in its falling by the sandy, lonesomes shore". At the close we all go to "Uncle Tom's Cabin". Alas, that we did. 31. Sunday. February 1. Faces a frowning world. It is a growing habit with us, who tiptoe down in order from the [...]to put the last finishing touches to our [toilets] some minutes after the last bell has ceased its vibrations. If at this stage we find ourselves possessed of indomitable courage and not too shabby habituents we move down to the great congregation. Every eye upon us, every seat facing the door. To our excited minds each gaze is a frown and we seat ourselves, feeling that the meek ought to be blessed! The day for the rest part is full of the things that shall live forevermore. We may in the reach of the coming days forget the quiet Sundays of this year, some of them, but that which is awakened in us shall live. At the Prince's touch it shall rise and be perfected evermore. 32. February 1 Monday. Carries me out doors, a wee while. I like to say February first. Its nearer the regions of long mornings and dinners not under the lamplight. Then I think how nice March will be and April 1, so near the blessed summer. Before I stop the faroff look I find an almost dreary pain as I feel with all the rest that the midsummer cannot bring so much without calling from me, much. Some of the year's dearest and nearest I want to have about me always. But it's early to begin this kind of talk. The records calls for an evening at Fred Atwood's. A being whewed up in a good, old wind, and back in a worse one, and sitting down and eating apples in between. [Nip] Hastings was a valuable acquisition. She could do the talking and I was glad not to put in much. I fretted about leaving my girls long.33. February 2. Thursday. Brights and darks alternate. Anything like a bright even with a dark tied to it comes in as hopeful as the sounding tread of a victorious army to the waiting prisoners inside the city. My girl keeps me pretty busy but she won't let me get blue, and takes my bathing, ventilating and suggesting as if I was her most reliable medical adviser! Dr. S. brings a few languid smiles. Says we can give her these things and hope they'll bring out the best results (not the smiles). The man referred to has great faith in his doses. I dread next week. Lately there's something nice to call out the best dreads I can summon! Again allow me to commend to a low spirited world your high born courage. 34. Wednesday. February 3. Floats me about. My catch words do not of late convey any ideas of fixedness! I am a span floating or a spindle whirling or aspick whewing, or a piece of endurance chasing about! I believe in great accuracy of statement and I therefore choose to place before my readers the truest types of my very remarkable career! It will now be very wry to perceive that I float not idly on undisturbed waters, but with a craft on waters that rise and dash and hurl and toss! My rounds from Normaldom to [lowerdom] are not less frequent. No elevators have been as yet constructed. Some of me will [gee] out somewhere, or else [...] goes unpunished! [Miss] Hastings takes me apart and raves and storms and besieches, that I bring to the rescue any remnants of discretion I may ever have perceived and forbear!35. Thursday. February 4. Hopes so. Yes, she hopes so and the day hopes so. While there's life in this sence. Has it occurred to me before this to announce that with several other cares I am the great American mover of exhibitions. And one is pending! I am called upon to report a most interesting interview between our young man and a Colonel of [P...] [...] renown. The latter in search of a teacher, the former anxious to give [him] [one]. I, the appealed to, Grit, alias [st...] is the demand! I sweep Mary Conley with rapid strides into this open field. Is it time for her biography? I am ready to add in its chapters that just her freshness and feeling her readiness to make the best of everything, and her hopings against hope, these we need in our Seminary, even though the girl that adds these to our storehouse of [...] [...]has few dresses, and fewer pennies, and as the girls all said tonight at payers "We shall miss Mary". 36. Friday. February 5. Knows depths. This has been such a funny day all through. It wasn't all depths. Why should I call the whole day by a name that means only a little while? The first thing on the carpet was Julia's dawning. This was creative of good spirits. The only worry was Satie's eyes, which is a worry in the sence of what may be rather than what is now. The fixing to go to [Poultney] was a great event calling into activity the whole house. The surprising part was Satie's going. When she arrived at the hotel where we were some minutes before her, she was a curiosity of collections, a walking sample room. The [putting] of her together betokens [...] doings. No other fingers were equal! The little incidents while there, the long dreary ride home will not be productive of much good cheer when I shall read this years from now!37. Saturday. February 6. Lets down bars. Satie pronounces herself better today and opens her eyes where the blinds are not shut and betakes herself to number twenty. Poor child. How dare she say she's got a pain or has a vestige of an ache about her after her rashness in giving to Poultney under Miss Hastings impressive forbiddings. She intends to prove that going cured her. I have my doubts about it, [...] able ones, but I'm open to conviction! I am taken into an open mouth and ground fine. This rehearsal business is an exhausting process. But I live and as I remarked am in fine pieces, very small. Then upstairs in a whew, a bed to take down and reinstate in a dark closet, sweeping, dusting manifold, also dressing, then a Philosophy class, and after that not death, not [...], but a sleep, and blessed be, my lot, and so say I!38. Sunday. February 7. Paves places for my feet. The dear Sunday places. What could I be or do with these taken from me? I can imagine nothing more dreadful, and with these give nothing more peaceful and soul-reviewing! Julia was here to go to church with us and as Ida said it seemed like old times. Then Julia and Satie each had her own dear hour in my room. I love these quiet girl talks. The rest of the day is full of Mr. Johnson. He comes in imminent peril of losing both ears and perhaps a foot for two, but his reception must be refreshing to his spirit. Mr. H. almost jumps our of himself in his efforts and a bevy of very fresh ladies swirls blushing honors thick upon him! Our Sunday dinner was very chatty and cheery. The evening sermon was very nice. Mr. Johnson's subject was the lessons of the past and future! I remember that it helped me and suggested much for me to think of. 39. Monday. February 8. Suggests hot water. The kind of water I know most about these days in metaphorical entirety. This suggests me of Filton's brilliances in his cross examination. "The only water he ever was in with Victoria Woodhull was the hot water he has been in ever since!" My existence was lit up with preparations for the evening and the rushing through a momentous programme, at said evening. "What did they do it for? To [rouse] the people!" One individual, me, comes upstairs so much arroused that she hasn't anything more to say. A secret profound. the captain general of all creation, where we are has taken it upon himself to fall in love with Miss Todd and calls her to a tete-a-tete. The first. 40. Tuesday. February 9. Makes it not hard to decide "who must be grim"! The four ones and the other are before the dreaded, and dreadful. Two men with but a single thought. Two hearts that beat as one! Mr. Conant with his tendency to satire. Mr. Judah [D...] with his tendency to flatness. Dr. French is a mountain, and Everest, to three poor little peaks, Hooker and Tom! Perhaps Chin and here might suggest more. The inevitable is forced upon the four and me, amid much quaking. As for me I [mark]. The play knows no sun, it has a darkness, where I take my seat and wait for it to grow lighter. Sad sorry news from dear Aunt Mary. The very name calls up for me the hardest life I know, yet ever full of tenderest things. 41. Wednesday. February 10. Is ready for discussion. What fell to me of the day seem to be nerve filaments a good deal agitated. The three when fate has chosen as the arbiters of the impending have dreadful looking heads. Some comments. The announcement that certifs will be granted to all, evokes little demonstration. The four feel sorry to be subjects of compassion and they do right to be sorry. The evening called the four ones and the other to be the raised platform. Figurative uplifting was not a part of it. Mary [...] has brought her prophecies time and I'm ready to wish a speedy fulfillment of all her dreams. Julia comes home and takes off the flowers, laying them away forever, turning quickly over a leaf. That will never be lived again. 42. Thursday. February 11. Compliments of the Graduating Classes in the Seminary Parlors. From 8 to 10. The etherial regions also send compliments. Also from 8 to 10. Very decided! [...] people have been spending the day writing regrets. A few. What have not [Brilions] dared, with a high sense of an awful duty struggled upward "through heaps of snow." My recollections seam largely of attempts to get [Mip] Hastings down, missing in the meantime Mr. Hyde's address. We all appeared in state to do [Mip] Miller honor and the other four. Some of the girls looked very lovely and my eyes followed them for I do love pretty things. 43. Friday. February 12. Pushes into worries. The way there is so plain that a way faring men though a fool need not ever . I never lose the path. And [blacked out] [blacked out] [Mip] Hastings not finding me at dinner comes up stairs to me excited on the subject proclaims me sick and thoroughly incompetent to judge as to what ought to be done to me. It always delights me to be set aside as incapable! I might have said to start with that [Mip] Julia Miller gets off. We are all to it. Her indignation on the subject of the Rutland Globe knows no bounds. It don't pay to graduate, she plainly sees. 44. Saturday. February 13. Means a number of things. It chiefly means that I amounted to nothing. Any body could do that. [blacked out] [blacked out] once I [...] to see myself do. Imagine anything in this line making me cry. Don't never tell! The bulletins announce amazing truths. Tell about cold weather, coldest in no knowing how many years. I who have no fires to make, no snow to walk in, no hair to be blown, bear it with a most resigned spirit! My soul today isn't anywhere near here. It's soared where skies are blue, blue enough . Well.45. Sunday. January 31. Is restful. My Sundays are very dear to me. They are full of quiet sunny places, where I learn of the home that is far off and remember that I can [...] here but a night! I live and think so much of the time as if I were to live here always. I am glad of the times when God makes me think of Him. I am able to record that I attended church, that Mr. Hyde ushered us in that I walked with Ida, that everybody that ever goes was there in the same places, that it was comfortable in church, nothing lacking save a footstool. I am not able to record that anybody brought us one [blacked out] [blacked out]46. Monday. February 15. Suggests something that is not reclining. Life is real. Life is earnest. Not in a poem today but in fact and atmosphere. To be falling asleep in a half dream and suddenly be shaken up to life and a seat behind a desk is good earnest prose and no mistake. It's the kind of doings that make people heroes in the strife! Don't put me and this together! I am [Mip] Hasting's favorite phantom! She chases me. All I hear is exercise and ventilate! Alas for maiden! When I've exercised and ventilated then she smells gas. She is a searcher out of gas in any form by long smelling! [blacked out] [blacked out]47. Tuesday. February 16. Attempts. The girl thinks that she will do a great deal but she don't. She Worries. She forgets and frets. She sees herself in the midst of things she ought to help and [sure] of them she does help and the rests torture her. Things make her ask questions. Getting girls to bed, keeping down noises in study hours, studying how to [...], what to [repress] and what to encourage in girls, call for great and sublime parts. Miss Hastings makes me dizzy, with oughts and musts! As for day duties they will not let me think that work is disolution, that plodding may not be divine. There are [...] that mean halos for me. 48. Wednesday. February 17. Compares notes. [Mip] H's ideas of what men ought not to do are of the awful sort. Having driven Gibson out of the kitchen latterly she goes back and says, "What did he do?" Again, "What did he do?" Solemnly "Kitty did he take hold of you?" That a gentleman has "fondled" strikes him [...] her list and into hopelessness. If any glory [...] upon my head it is that no man has looked upon me or called here! My attempt at exercise was followed by a siege. I came back to a dreadful night in which my back threatens. I should think it did. I forget that there ever was a time whein it didn't ache, that there ever was for me, such a thing as lying still. Sue's birthday.49. Thursday. February 18. Amounts to about how much. In order to be of much consequence it is somewhat necessary that I should stay up after I get up! I go around cautiously for fear [Mip] H. will hear me or smell me. I wonder if this is "a part of my disease" too. My next persecution is on the subject of medical advice. Answer. I will. If another spinal column should grow in my back, parallel to the first and both should set up to ache, I don't believe I'd mention it. I can set up a claim to a nineteenth century martyr, not by being sick, but by being cured! [blacked out] [blacked out]50. Friday. February 19. Do take a chair. That's the way people talk to you when your back aches. You needn't expect to be allowed to act rationally. People whose backs never ache lay out the straight and narrow path. My land is wrapped in seeming shadow, out there are valleys full of flowers and a river the streams whereof shall make glad! I think of these valleys and that river might like this when everything stops and work drops from my hands. I feel like resting a long time before I can [blacked out] [blacked out] I call to my relief Dr. Woodward. Yes.51. Saturday. February 20. A desirable existence. Easily pictured consists chiefly of a maiden and a day. The two antagonistic. The girl excited, full of plans and plannings, the day in it no strength for her, nothing but lie there, one side and suffer for me! The aching back gives its pilions protests, and the snow comes down in generous columns. It is never all dark at once, and Rhoda's coming lighted up the world for me, some. My thought rests itself in thinking of the metal that can [...] endure. [blacked out] The last thing to record Mr. Hyde's compliments and a dish of pop-corn.52. Sunday. February 21. Just lets it touch her as it comes. A complete lying still just describes it. Work was before and behind, but not in it. There was something of the joy she never knew of old because she came closer to know! Something brought tenderly back the brightest Sundays and then the girl wanted mother! How near we are coming to the long days and the brighter sun. Are the days taking anything from me that I shall miss by and by? Satie was with me her part of the day, and [blacked out]. The prayer hour was full and the night brought dreams that shall be fulfilled, somewhere! Somehow!53. Monday. February 22. Life is deaf. It was a day when it was nice to be a little girl. Nice to think of hands that were soft and tender in the long ago, and to creep under the growing shadows of old caresses. If I wasn't born into the day with a tendency to drag around instead of to hold my head up like a woman or a mountain, I might possibly make it seem as if there was such a thing as living in strength and toward a triumph. I stole way back along the years that [...] has been dumb, and thought if I could only know that the dear love was safe with Him who would gather how often ! ------------- --------------------------------------------------------------. School was not easy. Thirteen years. 54. Tuesday. February 23. Calls for a little more powder. Ther professor told at the table about a man in Salem whom his wife playfully pushed off a step, causing an artery to burst, causing immediate death. [Mip] Hastings says his system was not in a proper condition. I have only mentally to add, He didn't ventilate! Coming out of the supper room, alas how benighted! The dinner room the professor invites [Mip] Rising to ride home with him! When I mention it to [Mip] H. she says, "The dear, little man." I am happy to state that I now am alone. This has a connection with the whole of it! Keep the central thought Prayers upstairs in Normal Hall for the Institution, complete meets with general favor. I sit up very straight behind Mr. Hyde. My bundle from home comes this morning. Bless them all. 57. Friday. February 26. Calls, "Rouse up, sirs. Give your brains a racking." A wind announces the termination of the thaw, ratified by a protracted rain storm. If time and we can do all things there will sometime be a warming up. Lies will be said about dampers and gas. The race will be more generally diffused. I teach under perpetual protest days like this when a [lounge] constantly looms up before me. Mr. H. takes his trip home and [Mip] J.B. is this time the honored accompaniment. I long to ask her. Did she turn around. I have more experience with History cards, and in the meantime a talk [blacked out] [blacked out] [blacked out]58. Saturday. February 27. Expects something more than stupidity. You'll hear of me dying some day of expecting. The kind of work to be done Saturdays piles up, and don't get done, but keep expecting. I lie down on the lounge and shut my eyes, and come to the very comfortable conclusion that I have reached a place where anything besides stagnation is impossible for an indefinite period. Matt takes me to ride and it snows in my face. I come home unbundle and then [Mip] H. says I must come in there. I do a minute and then I plan how I'll get back and hit upon a plan, which works. Very well! In the evening we find the head of our table in a worshipful silence! [blacked out] [blacked out]59. Sunday. February 28. Connects itself with solitude. I am happy to recount among my chivalrous deeds that my self as an individual once more went up to the house of the Lord. It's two Sundays since I've been seen there. The subject upon which we were addressed was the duty of having family prayers. I came home with a savage wind ready to devour me, and for the rest of the day the world outside lay as in a calm and none of its waves rolled back upon me. Emerson's words rang out full and clear. There is in them the sermonds to be sublime. His essay on Friendship holds me. "Give" he says, "the diamond it's ages to grow nor attempt to accelerate the growths of the eternal." 60. February 29.63. Wednesday. March 3. Gives us a new snowstorm. This chiefly. Venturing out as I do with [Mip] J. I am seen returning before a long tarry resembling a goose. This hapened after most everything else had. It might have occurred to you that several portions of the day had to do with holding him rule over wayward [childlessed]! I will add that in order to be "absolutely honest" (Prof. Hart.) I must not omit to say that a large part of the day was spent in thinking and being very sorry that such was the case. Odyssey came in at an hour some might call late! The Beecher case comes in all the time!64. Thursday. March 4. Changes things. That is instead of going through a ceaseless circuit I get out of the curve and shoot off. Our horse didn't look at in that light. He was not a star actor. You'd look for some snow but you wouldn't believe how much. My visit to the house of mourning fitted the day and the hour. I felt like creeping under the shadow of a trouble greater than any of mine. It was good to think of the eternal peace into which another soul had drifted, placing it alongside of the worry and the weary of this part. Mrs. Chatman sees only the short gates and the loneliness. 65. Friday. March 5. Calls me again to be tender and to minister. I awoke, dreading. Couldn't tell exactly what, nor what for. The part I must someway go through seemed a desert to cross, but the minutes fore me through and I was on the other side, before I knew. [Mip] Len [Barrick] seems very sick and I am glad to go in her room and sit and do for her. I follow her eyes with a great sorry and wish the eyes she aches to see were where mine are! It isn't nice to be sick here. I have Satie to nurse up too. She's tired and half sick. 66. Saturday. March 6. Shakes off "dull sloth". This Saturday differs slightly from l

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