CHAPTER VII

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_AUNT BELINDA._

OF course the change in our circumstances soon became known to all our acquaintances in the little place, and it was no small part of our misfortunes to hear the remarks and condolences and the "I told you so's" of the less considerate part of them. I had my share of this part of our troubles at school. There were a few girls who had always accused Jeanne and myself of "feeling above them," as I dare say we did, and from them I had to hear such remarks as "Pride must have a fall," and they "guessed some folks wouldn't hold up their heads quite so high nowadays." In this last supposition they were mistaken, however, at least so far as I was concerned, for I held my head higher than ever. As for Ruth, her happy disposition never led her to think whether any one was above or below her, which was much the better for her.

But there were only a few who were thus ungenerous. Most of my school-mates pitied me quite as much as was good for me, and applauded to my heart's content my resolution to make the best of matters. Miss Tempy gave me as much of her time as possible, and only two or three girls murmured when she passed over their work or lessons for the sake of mine. I was not wanting on my own part, knowing that this summer's schooling might be the last I should ever have, and I applied myself with all my might to the mysteries of square root and Murray's "Prosody," thinking all the time how I should make the rules and explanations clear if I had to teach them. I really think I learned more in this one summer than I had done in two years before. I finished the famous flounce which, as I said, contained specimens of all the stitches known to Miss Tempy; and what she did not know in that line was not worth considering. I learned to darn linen and muslin so as to make them even better than new, and I copied out in a little blank-book which I made for the purpose all those wonderful recipes for domestic medicine and sick-cookery for which Miss Tempy was famous, and which she had inherited from her grandmother.

The summer had passed away. Our school and Jeanne's were both out, and Jeanne had come home for good, when something happened which made a great change in my prospects.

In the first part of these memoirs—if they are worthy of so grand a name—I mentioned the fact that one of my maternal uncles married a rich widow in Boston, where he shortly afterward died. None of us had ever seen Mrs. Belinda Evans, but some letters had passed, and some small presents been interchanged, as opportunity occurred. We knew that Aunt Belinda was a strictly religious woman, a great theologian, that she lived in the best society in Boston, and was very accomplished, according to the notions of those days.

There hung in our best room a framed and glazed piece of embroidery of the kind commonly known as a mourning-piece, which had been executed by Aunt Belinda and sent to my mother on the occasion of my grandfather's death—I suppose as an appropriate expression of sympathy. In the centre of this picture—for such it was—stood a monument of elaborate design, worked in white silk and decorated with a gilt inscription. The monument stood on a green cross-stitch bank variegated with certain red, blue, and yellow dots which were held to represent flowers growing in the grass. The picture was exceedingly regular in its composition. On one side of the tomb approached a train of five little boys all dressed alike in black coats, and with crape streamers standing straight out from their hats. On the other side were five girls regularly graduated in size from a grown woman down to a very little girl, also dressed in black. Each of the little boys carried a basket of flowers and a white handkerchief which he applied to his face, yet in such a way as to reveal his features and two carefully worked tears, one to each eye. Each girl also bore a handkerchief, a pair of tears, and a wreath of flowers, except the eldest, who, with bare arms, which formed a regular curve from the shoulder to the wrist, was applying her wreath to the monument, apparently expecting it to adhere by virtue of some property of stickiness belonging to either itself or the marble.

This work of art was very much admired by most of our neighbours and visitors, but my mother was rather non-committal on the subject, and Jeanne criticised the production in a manner wholly irreverent. However, it was admitted on all hands that my aunt Belinda was a most accomplished woman and had shown great sympathy by the present of this mourning-piece, and mother sent her in return some hanks of her fine linen sewing-thread, for the perfection of which she was justly renowned.

On one of his visits to Boston, which he paid every year, our old neighbour Mr. Hyde made the acquaintance of Mrs. Belinda Evans, and after that the exchanges I have mentioned took place with tolerable regularity. Mr. Hyde always spoke in terms of the highest praise of my aunt, and of the education she had given to her step-daughter and to two young nieces who now lived with her. He went to Boston, as usual, this fall, and on his return, he brought back a letter from Aunt Belinda, in which, after certain phrases of condolence on our altered fortunes and moralizings on the transitory nature of all earthly prosperity, Mrs. Belinda made a very important proposition: no less than that she should take me into her family for two or three years and give me such an education as would "fit me for any station in lite, whether I was to reside in the wilds of Vermont or the still more remote and dangerous recesses of the so-called Genesee country, or to shine in Boston society where was to be found as much of mental cultivation mingled with true religion as this continent afforded." Such were her words. She would, she said, take upon herself the whole charge of my clothes and maintenance, with the hope that my gratitude and the usefulness of my after life would more than repay her for her expense and trouble; and she closed with certain religious phrases which I will not repeat.

This letter set our family circle into a considerable agitation. Father, whose chief grief in the change he was about to make was on account of the prospects of his children, was for closing with the offer at once, saying that it was a very liberal one on the part of my aunt—which was quite true—and that I should probably never have such another chance of acquiring an excellent education. Jeanne, on the other hand, was against the plan from the beginning, but her objections, I must say, were not very reasonable, inasmuch as they were grounded on the mourning-piece aforesaid, and on her general impression that my aunt was "a poky kind of woman." My mother wavered. She did not like the idea of parting with me for two or three years, and to such a distance; for practically Boston was farther from Vermont in those days than it is now from London. On the other hand, she was very desirous that I should have such an education as my aunt described—such as her own had been; and of this she saw no chance in any other way than that my aunt proposed. We all felt that it was generous in Aunt Belinda to step forward to our assistance in the time of our distress, as we had no claim on her.

Miss Tempy Hutchinson had a plan of her own to offer—namely, that I should remain with her on the same terms which my aunt offered. But this was considered out of the question, since my father could not afford to pay for my schooling, and neither could he be willing to let Miss Temperance take such a burden on herself, since she had already the care of a widowed and helpless mother. Moreover, I believe mother secretly thought that had already pretty well exhausted Miss Tempy's capacities in the way of book-learning; and to conclude, I fancy we were all a little dazzled by the very idea of an education in Boston under the auspices of a lady so rich and so much looked up to as my aunt Belinda.

Mother asked Mr. and Mrs. Hyde to tea and questioned them very closely about my aunt, but the report was all in her favour. Mr. Hyde enlarged upon her acquirements in English and French, in history and geography and music, and, above all, in theology. He had never met with a woman so capable of appreciating the works of Doctor Hopkins and Doctor Edwards, to say nothing of the English divines, or one more free from errors and prejudices. He believed that no child could wish for more in the line of educational privileges than to be placed under the care of Mrs. Evans; and as he had just been appointed to a professorship at Cambridge, his opinion was certainly entitled to consideration. Mrs. Hyde, on her part, enlarged on my aunt's fine house, her Turkey carpets and imported furniture, her cashmere and Canton crape shawls, and her India satin and French silks, and also on her liberality to ministers and their wives and her intimate acquaintance with Mrs. Vice President Adams and other distinguished people. Mrs. Evans, she said, could paint pictures on satin, paper, or velvet, do every known kind of needle-work, and play on the spinet and harpsichord. (Pianos had hardly begun to come into use even abroad.)

It was necessary that the matter should be decided immediately, in order that I might travel to Boston under the escort of Mr. and Mrs. Hyde, who were to go thither in three weeks again, leaving Jenny and their house under the care of a sister. Besides that, our own moving must take place in a month's time. After much discussion and a very determined opposition on the part of old Rose, and one less loud but equally decided from Jeanne, it was concluded that Aunt Belinda's offer should be accepted, and mother at once began to have me got ready.

I hardly know whether I was most troubled or pleased when I knew I was to go away from home for three years. It would be a dreadful thing not to see mother or Jeanne or any of my own family for so long, but then there was the thought of beholding Boston and all its wonders, of my aunt Belinda's fine house, and, above all, her library, containing, according to Mrs. Hyde, two or three times as many books as Mr. Henderson possessed. I supposed that my cousins would probably consider me a little ignoramus, but then came the consoling thought that at least I had been well drilled in grammar and could work satin- and cross-stitch as well as my aunt herself, or better, and that what else I did not know I could undoubtedly learn; for a want of confidence in my own powers was not one of my troubles in those days. And then, with such an education as my aunt meant to give me, what might I not be able to accomplish in future for the good of my family? I might help Ezra to go to college, and educate Ruth and Harry, and support father and mother when they grew old. I might have a boarding-school of my own, perhaps, and teach young ladies in my turn. Nay, I might—so high did my fancy soar—I might even write a book like Mrs. Hannah More, whose "Sacred Dramas" my old friend Mr. Clapp had just given me for a parting present. I must say, in justice to myself, that my castles in the air were of a very unselfish kind, and built far less for my own advantage than for that of my family. I remember being very much hurt by a remark of Tom's—who, poor fellow! had always a knack of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and place—that I might think myself lucky in getting rid of all the fuss and trouble of moving, whereas it was one of my principal causes of grief that I should not be at hand to lighten the labours of my mother and sister.

"I shall feel just as mean as can be," said I to Jeanne one day, "to think that I am having a good time in Boston while you are having such a hard one up in Castle Hill."

"I wouldn't be too sure of that, Olive," answered Jeanne, gravely. "I dare say you may have your share of trouble. You will be in a new place, among strangers, and you will find Aunt Belinda a very different person from mother, or I am much mistaken."

"She may be different from mother and yet be good," said I, sententiously. "Good people are not all alike."

"Of course; I know that," answered Jeanne; "but it is not always easy to get used to new ways. I remember, though I was such a little child, how strange this house seemed to me when I came here from the nunnery. However, I don't want to discourage you, Olive; only I do hope, dear, you will have a good time."

"But you don't expect it," said I, rather vexed.

"Well, no, not just at first. As I said, you will find Boston ways and Aunt Belinda's ways very different from ours; and unless you are more careful than you are at home, you will always be making mistakes and getting corrected and found fault with, or perhaps laughed at, which, you know, you like least of all."

"I believe you think I am a wild Indian!" said I, pettishly.

"If you were a wild Indian, you would be in less danger, because they always watch to see what other people do, and so save themselves from awkward mistakes," said Jeanne; "but you are rather apt to take it for granted that you understand, when you don't, and that you can do a thing the first time you try as well as if you had practiced it all your life."

I was just about to vindicate myself from this charge rather sharply, when I remembered the spinning-lesson, and was silent. Jeanne also seemed to think she had said enough, and changed the subject by informing me that I was wanted to rip mother's second-best black silk, which was to be made over for me, and by telling me that my new dresses were all to be long gowns—two pieces of news with which I was much delighted. But as I carefully ripped the black bilk I pondered Jeanne's words, and arrived at two wholesome and just conclusions—namely, that I "was" rather too apt to take up new things as if I knew all about them, and also that I would keep my wits about me and try, by carefully observing the ways of my aunt and my cousins, to avoid making myself ridiculous.

Never did any time pass so quickly as those two weeks. I could hardly believe it when the last Sunday came—my very last Sunday in that dear old house and in the corner seat at church, which I had occupied ever since I could remember. I was to leave Lee on Tuesday, and expected to arrive at Aunt Belinda's house on Friday, stopping on the road to visit some friends of Mr. Hyde's. As long as I live I shall never forget that sweet and sorrowful Lord's day. I had spent the evening before alone with mother, and had promised her that I would try to be a good girl and please Aunt Belinda in all things, that I would never forget to read my Bible and say my prayers every day, and, above all, that I would keep in mind that I had a Father in heaven who loved me, and who desired me to love him and serve him here that I might be happy with him in heaven. Mother impressed it upon me that heaven was my real home, to which I could look forward with joy and hope whatever might be my troubles here, and she solemnly charged me to be prepared to meet her there. I was always a religiously disposed child, I think, but certainly the eternal world never seemed so real and so near to me as it did that night.

"Do you think I shall have a great many troubles, mother?" I asked, remembering my conversation with Jeanne.

"I presume you will have your full share," answered mother, smoothing my hair as my head lay on her knee. "Your disposition is not calculated to slip through the world as easily as some other people's—that of Ruth, for instance."

"I know I am touchy," said I, humbly; "and Ezra says I think too much about my own dignity and consequence."

"That is true, but not the whole truth," said my mother; "you do think rather more of yourself and your own dignity, but you have also naturally quick perceptions and sensitive feelings."

I began to be a little uplifted, but mother quickly brought me down again:

"Now, these quick perceptions and sensitive feelings are excellent gifts if you apply them to their right use, letting them make you observant and careful of the feelings and desires of others, and

## particularly in not giving needless offence to their prejudices. But

if you turn them upon yourself; as it were, and let them keep you constantly spying out the weaknesses and faults of others, and watching for slights and offences toward yourself, they are worse than useless."

"Jeanne thinks Aunt Belinda's ways are so different from ours that I shall not know how to behave," said I, after a little silent pondering of my mother's words. "She says I must watch and see what my cousins do and how they act."

"That is a very good rule," said my mother, sighing a little, as I thought; "but I hope my little Olive will not be found deficient in real good manners, though she may be in some customs to which she is unused. There are three good rules which my grandmother once gave me when I was going to Hartford on a visit—the first time I had ever been out from under my mother's wing:

"'If you do not know what to do, ask; If you cannot ask, watch and see what other people do; If you can find out in neither of these ways, do nothing.'"

"Mother," said I, after another little silence, "if I am very unhappy indeed at Aunt Belinda's, need I stay there?"

"We will see about that," said mother. "You must not conclude that you are going to be very unhappy indeed because you are home-sick at first, or because Aunt Belinda finds fault or your cousins laugh at you. But I wish you to write to me by every opportunity—at least as often as once every month—and tell me everything you can think of, without any reserve, and by that means I can judge whether you are doing well."

"It will seem so formal and cold to write," said I. "If only there was somebody I could go to every day!"

"I hope Aunt Belinda will be that some one," said my mother; "but at any rate, Olive, you have one such Friend always at hand, and this, my love, is what I want to impress specially upon your mind—that you are to carry all your troubles and cares to your heavenly Father and ask him to help and guide and comfort you. Don't think that anything is too little to put into your prayers: that is a great mistake."

"But suppose my troubles are my own fault?" said I.

"A great many of them very probably will be so, unless you are more unlike other people than I suppose," answered mother; "but that need make no difference. We should be badly off indeed if our sins and mistakes were to drive us away from our heavenly Father."

Many other things my mother said to me which I cannot set down here, and she ended by giving me a beautiful new Bible of my own with my name marked on the cover in gilt letters, and "The Pilgrim's Progress,"—a

## book I had long desired to possess.

I cannot pretend to describe the next day, nor that which followed. I had bid good-bye to all my school-mates the day before, but they almost all came for a last word; and then there were our friends and neighbours, Mr. Henderson and Miss Tempy. Many were the kind words and the little keepsakes I received from one and another, especially from my minister and my teacher, the former giving me a copy of Mrs. Hannah More's "Practical Piety,"—and an excellent book it is—and the latter a wonderful house-wife stitched in compartments and filled with skeins of different sizes and colours in silk, thread, and floss, together with a pair of scissors and a strawberry emery which had been my admiration for a long time.

On Monday came the final bustle of packing and taking leave for ever of my old home. I had found good homes for my two kittens, and father delighted me by saying he meant to carry old Tabby to Vermont with him, as well as my own pet cow Snowball, so my mind was at ease about these two favourites. All my other possessions which I could not carry with me I left to mother and Jeanne, to be disposed of as they thought best, only stipulating that none of my books should be left behind or given away.

Tuesday morning came, and with it Mr. Hyde's carriage, in which we were to travel. My little black trunk, which, I suppose, would occupy about a quarter of the space taken up by an average modern trunk, was strapped on with the rest of the baggage. Ruth, who seemed to have just realized that I was going away, was crying bitterly. Mother was pale as death, though she did not shed a tear, but father's voice broke down when he would have bid me good-bye; and holding me close clasped in his arms for a moment, he put me into the carriage without a word.

As Mr. Hyde was adjusting something about the harness, Ezra came to the side where I sat.

"Mother says you must be sure to write to Aunt Roxana at Nantucket," said he, putting into my hand a pretty little new pocket-book. "She has begun a letter which you can finish. It has the direction on the outside, and is in the inside pocket of this book, where I have put a little money for you. Don't spend it foolishly, but keep it against a time of need. Good-bye."

And in a moment we were on our way and had turned the corner, so that I could not even see our house by looking back. I have never seen it since.

Mr. and Mrs. Hyde were very kind to me. They let me cry without taking any particular notice of me; and when I began to recover my composure, they diverted me from my grief by directing my attention to various matters along the road. The morning was beautiful, the two horses went along at a good pace, and before I knew it I was really enjoying the journey.

We stopped the first night at a tavern—a circumstance which I remember from the fact that when I arose in the morning I could not make up my mind as to whether or not I ought to make up my bed. After some consideration, I decided that I ought, because whenever Miss Tempy had spent a night at our house she had always put her room in order in the morning; but after the deed was accomplished I considered further that a tavern was different from a private house, and that doubtless the chambermaid would put on clean sheets before the bed was used again. So I proceeded to tumble it up again; and, after all, I was pursued all day by misgivings lest I had done the wrong thing, and thereby let the people of the house know that I had never stayed at a tavern before. What harm I thought it would do if they did know I cannot now say, but the whole transaction was a good specimen of the way I used to torment myself about trifles in those days.

The second night was spent at the house of an elderly clergyman, an uncle of Mrs. Hyde's, who had two orphan grand-daughters about my own age. I had seen one of these girls before, when she came with her grandmother to Mrs. Hyde's, and they both made me very welcome, as did their father and mother. Mr. Edwards was a very handsome old man, of polished and kind manners, and his wife was a busy, bustling but lady-like and kind-hearted woman. When Mrs. Hyde said at the table that I was to be left with Mrs. Belinda Evans for two or three years, I saw a look pass between the two old people which I could not understand. It seemed to me to express both surprise and pity.

"Why did your grandfather and grandmother look at each other so when Mrs. Hyde said I was going to live with Aunt Belinda?" I asked of Priscilla Edwards after tea.

Priscilla and Drusilla exchanged glances in their turn, and Priscy said, rather dubiously,—

"I suppose they were sorry you had to go away from your mother, because, you know, if any one is ever so good, yet nobody can be like one's own mother."

"Unless it should be one's grandmother," added Drucy. "Come and see our rabbits, Olive. We have got six little rabbits, and one of them is black as a coal. We call him Charcoal."

The rabbits and Drucy's promise to give me a pair when I went home to Vermont diverted my mind from the subject, as I suppose the girls intended it should, but that glance often recurred to my mind afterward.

I seem to remember every incident of that afternoon and evening—all the more distinctly because it was the last really pleasant day I was destined to spend in a long time. We looked over all the girls' books, of which they had a great many for that time, and I told them of my own. We went to walk in the pasture—Mrs. Edwards considerately taking off my neat riding-suit and dressing me in an old frock of Drusilla's—where we gathered pretty leaves and mosses and waded in the brook, and "made believe" all sorts of adventures; and after supper we told each other stories till bed-time. We parted with mutual regret, and I have never seen them since, but I have always remembered the whole family with great affection.

We had made our calculation's to arrive in Boston on Friday—a point which Rose had not failed to bring forward among her other arguments against my journey. It was rather late on Friday afternoon when we arrived at my aunt's house, which was situated at the north end of the city, in what was then the fashionable quarter of the town. Her house was by far the handsomest I had ever seen; but my courage had been sinking lower and lower, and it was with anything but a light heart that I saw Mr. Hyde leaving me at last quite alone among strangers.

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