t in Congress from
1817 to 1825. He was a "Jeffersonian Democrat" and a personal friend
and political supporter of John Quincy Adams. He married Margaret, the
daughter of Major Peter Crane. Mrs. Fuller was as gentle and
unobtrusive as her stalwart husband was forceful and uncompliant. She
effaced herself even in her own home, was seen and not heard, though
apparently not very conspicuously seen. She had eight children, of
whom Margaret was the first, and when this busy mother escaped from
the care of the household, it was to take refuge in her flower garden.
A "fair blossom of the white amaranth," Margaret calls this mother.
The child's nature took something from both of her parents, and was
both strong and tender.

Her father assumed the entire charge of Margaret's education, setting
her studying Latin at the age of six, not an unusual feat in that day
for a boy, but hitherto unheard of for a girl. Her lessons were
recited at night, after Mr. Fuller returned from his office in Boston,
often at a late hour. "High-pressure," says Col. Higginson, "is bad
enough for an imaginative and excitable child, but high-pressure by
candle-light is ruinous; yet that was the life she lived." The effect
of these night lessons was to leave the child's brain both tired and
excited and in no condition to sleep. It was considered singular that
she was never ready for bed. She was hustled off to toss on her
pillow, to see horrid visions, to have nightmare, and sometimes to
walk in her sleep. Terrible morning headaches followed, and Margaret
was considered a delicate child. One would like to know what Latin at
six would have done for her, without those recitations by
candle-light.

Mr. Fuller did not consider it important that a child should have
juvenile books and Margaret's light reading consisted of Shakspere,
Cervantes, and Moliere. She gives an interesting account of her
discovery of Shakspere at the age of eight. Foraging for entertainment
on a dismal winter Sunday afternoon, she took down a volume of
Shakspere and was soon lost in the adventures and misadventures of
Romeo and Juliet. Two hours passed, when the child's exceeding quiet
attracted attention. "That is no book for Sunday," said her father,
"put it away." Margaret obeyed, but soon took the book again to follow
the fortunes of her lovers further. This was a fatal indiscretion; the
forbidden volume was again taken from her and she was sent to bed as a
punishment for disobed