and became president of the first temperance society formed
in this country. As a result, wine was excluded from his table. This
privation gave me no trouble, but my brothers felt it, especially the
eldest, who had passed some years in Europe, where the use of wine was,
as it still is, universal. I was walking with my father one evening when
we met my two younger brothers, each with a cigar in his mouth. My
father was much troubled, and said, "Boys, you must give this up, and I
will give it up, too. From this time I forbid you to smoke, and I will
join you in relinquishing the habit." I am afraid that this sacrifice on
my father's part did not have the desired effect, but am quite certain
that he never witnessed the infringement of his command.

At the time of which I speak, my father's family all lived in our
immediate neighborhood. He had considerably distanced his brothers in
fortune, and had built for himself the beautiful house of which I have
already spoken. In the same street with us lived my music-loving uncle,
Henry, somewhat given to good cheer, and of a genial disposition. In a
house nearer to us resided my grandfather, Samuel Ward, with an
unmarried daughter and three bachelor sons, John, Richard, and William.
The outings of my young girlhood were confined to this family circle. I
went to school, indeed, but never to dancing-school, a sober little
dancing-master giving us lessons at home. I used to hear, with some
envy, of Monsieur Charnaud's classes and of his "publics," where my
schoolfellows disported themselves in their best clothes. My grandfather
was a stately old gentleman, a good deal more than six feet in height,
very mild in manner, and fond of a game of whist. With us children he
used to play a very simple game called "Tom, come tickle me." Cards were
not allowed in my father's house, and my brothers used to resort to the
grand-paternal mansion when they desired this diversion.

The eldest of my father's unmarried brothers was my uncle John, a man
more tolerant than my father, and full of kindly forethought for his
nieces and nephews. In his youth he had sustained an injury which
deprived him of speech for more than a year. His friends feared that he
would never speak again, but his mother, trying one day to render him
some small assistance, did not succeed to her mind, and said, "I am a
poor, awkward old woman." "No, you are not!" he exclaimed, and at once
recovered his power of speech. He was an