illness, and
to which she devoted her thoughts and energies, her endowments and
attainments, as well as her prodigal devotion and love.

The success of "The Seven Little Sisters" was a great pleasure to
her, partly because her dear mother and friends were so thoroughly
satisfied with it. Her mother always wished that Jane would give
her time more exclusively to writing, especially as new outlines of
literary work were constantly aroused in her active brain. She wrote
several stories which were careful studies in natural science, and
which appeared in some of the magazines. I am sure they would be well
worth collecting. She had her plan of "Each and All" long in her mind
before elaborating, and it crystallized by actual contact with the
needs and the intellectual instincts of her little classes. In fact
all her books grew, like a plant, from within outwards; they were born
in the nursery of the schoolroom, and nurtured by the suggestions of
the children's interest, thus blooming in the garden of a true and
natural education. The last book she wrote, "Ten Boys Who Lived on the
Road from Long Ago to Now," she had had in her mind for years. This
little book she dedicated to a son of her sister Margaret. I am sure
she gave me an outline of the plan fully ten years before she wrote
it out. The subject of her mental work lay in her mind, growing,
gathering to itself nourishment, and organizing itself consciously
or unconsciously by all the forces of her unresting brain and all
the channels of her study, until it sprung from her pen complete at
a stroke. She wrote good English, of course, and would never
sentimentalize, but went directly at the pith of the matter; and, if
she had few thoughts on a subject, she made but few words. I don't
think she did much by way of revising or recasting after her thought
was once committed to paper. I think she wrote it as she would
have said it, always with an imaginary child before her, to whose
intelligence and sympathy it was addressed. Her habit of mind was to
complete a thought before any attempt to convey it to others. This
made her a very helpful and clear teacher and leader. She seemed
always to have considered carefully anything she talked about, and
gave her opinion with a deliberation and clear conviction which
affected others as a verdict, and made her an oracle to a great
many kinds of people. All her plans were thoroughly shaped before
execution; all her work was true, finished