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A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
121
Filled
up
with
these
things,
the
little
one-windowed
sitting-room
easily
caught
the
home
feeling,
and
gave
it
back
to
us.
Inanimate
Objects
do
gather
into
themselves
something
of
the
character
of
those
who
live
among
them,
through
association;
and
this
alone
makes
heirlooms
valuable.
They
are
family
treasures,
because
they
are
part
of
the
family
life,
full
of
memories
and
inspirations.
Bought
or
sold,
they
are
nothing
but
old
furniture.
Nobody
can
buy
the
old
associations;
and
nobody
who
has
really
felt
how
everything
that
has
been
in
a
home
makes
part
of
it,
can
willingly
bargain
away
the
old
things.
My
mother
never
thought
of
disposing
of
her
best
furniture,
whatever
her
need.
It
traveled
with
her
in
every
change
of
her
abiding-place,
as
long
as
she
lived,
so
that
to
us
children
home
seemed
to
accompany
her
wherever
she
went.
And,
remaining
yet
in
the
family,
it
often
brings
back
to
me
pleasant
reminders
of
my
childhood.
No
other
Bible
seems
quite
so
sacred
to
me
as
the
old
Family
Bible,
out
of
which
my
father
used
to
read
when
we
were
all
gathered
around
him
for
worship.
To
turn
its
leaves
and
look
at
its
pictures
was
one
of
our
few
Sabbath-day
indulgences;
and
I
cannot
touch
it
now
except
with
feelings
of
profound
reverence.
For
the
first
time
in
our
lives,
my
little
sister
and
I
became
pupils
in
a
grammar
school
for
both
girls
and
boys,
taught
by
a
man.
I
was
put
with
her
into
the
sixth
class,
but
was
sent
the
very
next
day
into
the
first.
I
did
not
belong
in
either,
but
somewhere
between.
And
I
was
very
uncomfortable
in
my
promotion,
for
though
the
reading
and
spelling
and
grammar
and
geography
were
perfectly
easy,
I
had
never
studied
any
thing
but
mental
arithmetic,
and
did
not
know
how
to
"do
a
sum."
We
had
to
show,
when
called
up
to
recite,
a
slateful
of
sums,
"done"
and
"proved."
No
explanations
were
ever
asked
of
us.
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