ets,
accompanied with brief sketches of their lives, a volume about
two-thirds the size of Dana's 'Household Book of Poetry,' a copy of
Cowper, whose poems mother particularly liked, especially 'The Task'; a
small, unbound copy of Byron's 'Corsair,' and a volume of English
songs, a collection that I have never since seen. This list refers,
you know, to our first years in the woods, and everything that I have
mentioned was read aloud to us by mother.

"On Sundays we had a change of literature. Father, although not what
would be called a religious man, as he was not a member of any church,
had a great respect for the observance of the Sabbath, and unlike his
less scrupulous neighbors, rested from work on that day. The morning
was devoted to reading the Bible, and in the evening father would sing
with his splendid voice, 'God of Israel,' the 'Rock of Ages,' and other
fine old psalm tunes. One hymn of which he was especially fond, I
remember commenced,

"'The day is past and gone,
The evening shades appear;
Oh, may we all remember well
The day of Death draws near.'

"This he used to sing with great expression of devotion.

"I have often wished that I had had the advantage of living in New York
when a child, but I would not now exchange a city education for the
sweet memory of our quiet evenings at home, and the sphere of
intelligence and affection in which I was nurtured."

Mamma paused a moment, then continued:

"These books that I have mentioned were not new to mother: she had read
and knew them almost by heart long before she commenced reading them to
us, and her mind was an inexhaustible source of knowledge. Although
her school-days were limited, she was not ignorant of the common
branches. She had studied, she told me, the 'Ladies' Lexicon,' from
which she had obtained a very thorough knowledge of English grammar.
She wrote a trim hand, she had a practical knowledge of arithmetic, and
geography had claimed a portion of her time in school; but what she had
learnt there was but a commencement. She must subsequently have
studied astronomy, for she taught me without books to recognize the
planets and trace the constellations, and at any hour of the night she
could tell the time by looking at the position of the stars. She had
the talent for dates that you have inherited, Marguerite, and was
authority for the neighborhood upon all disputed points in politics
since the days of Washington; indee