The big front door is opened, and the
dismal, creaking sounds come in.
The kind and conscientious new mother, to whom I owe many other gentle
lessons more valuable than this, teaches how necessary to a lady's
education is a neat needle. The girl does not deny this elemental
fact; but her eyes wander away to the cold sky above the Andover
mud, with passionate entreaty. To this day I cannot hear the thick
chu-chunk! of heavy wheels on March mud without a sudden mechanical
echo of that wild, young outcry: "Must I cut out underclothes forever?
Must I go on tucking the broken end of the thread into the nick in the
spool? Is _this_ LIFE?"
I am more than conscious that I could not have been an easy girl to
"bring up," and am sure that for whatever little difficulties beset
the earlier time of my ventures as a writer, no person was in any
fault. They were doubtless good for me, in their way. We all know that
some of the greatest of brain-workers have selected the poorest and
barest of spots in which to study. Luxury and bric-a-brac come to easy
natures or in easy years. The energy that very early learns to conquer
difficulty is always worth its price.
I used, later, to hear in Boston the story of the gentleman who once
took a friend to see the room of his son at Harvard College.
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