oked and
behaved,--I somehow felt unable to do it,--with the crowning incident of
the great basketful of berries he had purchased at half a dollar a
quart, and that without even asking the price, I think I never knew my
dear mother to be so delighted at any event in the quiet history of our
little family. Ah, what a happy breakfast it was that we sat down to
that morning! I could not repeat the exultations expressed on all hands
over my success. My mother seemed so supremely gratified at the prospect
now opening before us, that her delight was a bountiful reward for me.
She had never manifested so much cheerfulness since we lost our father.
Fred insisted on continuing his calculations of what our profits would
be; but though he brought out great results on paper, for he was
remarkably expert at figures, yet, even with my constitutional
enthusiasm, I refused to be unduly set up by his extravagant
anticipations. It seemed with him to be as great a happiness to merely
calculate the profit as it was for me to produce it.

I know that all these are very trifling matters, at least to others, and
that, if the gentler hearts are kind enough to become interested in
them, there must be many others that will pass them by as uneventful and
dull. Yet the life that all these are living is made up of incidents,
which, if they would but reflect upon them, are not more exciting. But
they were great affairs to us. They developed the prominent fact, that
it was possible for a woman, when favorably situated, to become a
successful fruit-grower, and that a new door could be opened through
which she might be emancipated from perpetual bondage to the needle,
without violating the conventional proprieties of the sex. This was the
problem which my imperfect labors were solving for us. All aspirants may
not be required to pass through the same experience, while some may be
compelled to encounter even a greater diversity than I did.

Thus far my first day's picking had been very encouraging. As in a great
city there are a thousand daily wants, so thousands are kept continually
employed in ministering to them. When the supply of strawberries begins,
the public require it to be maintained. The picking of the day is mostly
eaten up before bedtime, and hence the grower must gather daily
reinforcements from his vines to meet the public demand. The fruit
ripens with a continuous rapidity. The hot sun of a cloudless day brings
it to perfection with won