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222
A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
18
Uncles,
aunts,
and
cousins
were
plentiful
in
the
family,
but
they
did
not
live
near
enough
for
us
to
see
them
very
often,
excepting
one
aunt,
my
father's
sister,
for
whom
I
was
named.
She
was
fair,
with
large,
clear
eyes
that
seemed
to
look
far
into
one's
heart,
with
an
expression
at
once
penetrating
and
benignant.
To
my
childish
imagination
she
was
an
embodiment
of
serene
and
lofty
goodness.
I
wished
and
hoped
that
by
bearing
her
baptismal
name
I
might
become
like
her;
and
when
I
found
out
its
signification
(I
learned
that
"Lucy"
means
"with
light"),
I
wished
it
more
earnestly
still.
For
her
beautiful
character
was
just
such
an
illumination
to
my
young
life
as
I
should
most
desire
mine
to
be
to
the
lives
of
others.
My
aunt,
like
my
father,
was
always
studying
something.
Some
map
or
book
always
lay
open
before
her,
when
I
went
to
visit
her,
in
her
picturesque
old
house,
with
its
sloping
roof
and
tall
well-sweep.
And
she
always
brought
out
some
book
or
picture
for
me
from
her
quaint
old-fashioned
chest
of
drawers.
I
still
possess
the
"Children
in
the
Wood,"
which
she
gave
me,
as
a
keepsake,
when
I
was
about
ten
years
old.
Our
relatives
form
the
natural
setting
of
our
childhood.
We
understand
ourselves
best
and
are
best
understood
by
others
through
the
persons
who
came
nearest
to
us
in
our
earliest
years.
Those
larger
planets
held
our
little
one
to
its
orbit,
and
lent
it
their
brightness.
Happy
indeed
is
the
infancy
which
is
surrounded
only
by
the
loving
and
the
good!
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