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A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
158
It
was
hard
to
leave
the
dear
little
fellow
I
had
taught
to
walk
and
to
talk,
but
I
knew
he
would
not
be
inconsolable.
So
I
only
said
"I
must
go,"--and
turned
my
back
upon
the
sea,
and
my
face
to
the
banks
of
the
Merrimack.
When
I
returned
I
found
that
I
enjoyed
even
the
familiar,
unremitting
clatter
of
the
mill,
because
it
indicated
that
something
was
going
on.
I
liked
to
feel
the
people
around
me,
even
those
whom
I
did
not
know,
as
a
wave
may
like
to
feel
the
surrounding
waves
urging
it
forward,
with
or
against
its
own
will.
I
felt
that
I
belonged
to
the
world,
that
there
was
something
for
me
to
do
in
it,
though
I
had
not
yet
found
out
what.
Something
to
do;
it
might
be
very
little,
but
still
it
would
be
my
own
work.
And
then
there
was
the
better
something
which
I
had
almost
forgotten--to
be!
Underneath
my
dull
thoughts
the
old
aspirations
were
smouldering,
the
old
ideals
rose
and
beckoned
to
me
through
the
rekindling
light.
It
was
always
aspiration
rather
than
ambition
by
which
I
felt
myself
stirred.
I
did
not
care
to
outstrip
others,
and
become
what
is
called
"distinguished,"
were
that
a
possibility,
so
much
as
I
longed
to
answer
the
Voice
that
invited,
ever
receding,
up
to
invisible
heights,
however
unattainable
they
might
seem.
I
was
conscious
of
a
desire
that
others
should
feel
something
coming
to
them
out
of
my
life
like
the
breath
of
flowers,
the
whisper
of
the
winds,
the
warmth
of
the
sunshine,
and
the
depth
of
the
sky.
That,
I
felt,
did
not
require
great
gifts
or
a
fine
education.
We
might
all
be
that
to
each
other.
And
there
was
no
opportunity
for
vanity
or
pride
in
receiving
a
beautiful
influence,
and
giving
it
out
again.
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