"

"What did she teach them, Aunt Esther?" inquired Ida; "only the
elementary branches, I suppose?"

"Reading, writing, and spelling," replied mamma; "arithmetic and
grammar, geography, sewing and knitting."

"And how much did she make?" I inquired, being of a practical turn of
mind at that moment.

"She was paid by the week," said mamma, "and received the same salary
as the majority of school-mistresses in those primeval days;
seventy-five cents and her board. She 'boarded around,' as the phrase
was, among her pupils. This may seem very little to you, but you must
remember that in those days a good milch cow cost only ten dollars, and
everything else was proportionately cheap.

"The next two winters, sister Arminda was in school herself, and the
following year, when she was fifteen, she was married to our handsome
cousin Lovel, Uncle Benjamin's son."

Another exclamation of amazement from the little group, and a chorus
of--

"Married at fifteen! How surprising! And did she make a pretty bride?"

"She was a very handsome girl," replied mamma, and made a striking
contrast to her blonde brothers and sisters, for she had a rich
brunette complexion, large, dark-blue eyes, glossy dark hair, and set
roses in her cheeks, which, even now that she is a great-grandmother
have not entirely faded. She was womanly far beyond her years; not so
romantic, perhaps, as sister Margaret and I were at her age, but that
she possessed talent, enterprise, and ambition, is shown by the success
of her school, established at an age when most girls are contentedly
dressing their dolls.

"Sister Arminda is a woman of superior character, and a devoted wife
and mother. She has had many severe trials to contend with during her
long married life. Her heart has known bitter sorrow, for of her
family of eleven beautiful children only four are now living; but she
has borne all these afflictions with enduring heroism. The devotion of
herself and her husband is something people of the world would consider
quite Arcadian in these days of matrimonial infelicity, for until your
Aunt Arminda paid me that visit three years ago, she had never, since
her marriage, left her husband two successive nights."

CHAPTER XVIII.

Visitors--A Sunday Drive--Croton lake by Daylight--A Sail--A Sudden
Squall--Anxiety about our Fate--Miraculous Escape from Drowning--Arrival
of a Pretty Cousin--A Child Poetess.

_August 4_.

A gap in my journal o