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222
A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
202
Life
to
me,
as
I
looked
forward,
was
a
bright
blank
of
mystery,
like
the
broad
Western
tracts
of
our
continent,
which
in
the
atlases
of
those
days
bore
the
title
of
"Unexplored
Regions."
It
was
to
be
penetrated,
struggled
through;
and
its
difficulties
were
not
greatly
dreaded,
for
I
had
not
lost
"The
dream
of
Doing,--
The
first
bound
in
the
pursuing."
I
knew
that
there
was
no
joy
like
the
joy
of
pressing
forward.
XII.
FROM
THE
MERRIMACK
TO
THE
MISSISSIPPI.
THE
years
between
1835
and
1845,
which
nearly
cover
the
time
I
lived
at
Lowell,
seem
to
me,
as
I
look
back
at
them,
singularly
interesting
years.
People
were
guessing
and
experimenting
and
wondering
and
prophesying
about
a
great
many
things,--about
almost
everything.
We
were
only
beginning
to
get
accustomed
to
steamboats
and
railroads.
To
travel
by
either
was
scarcely
less
an
adventure
to
us
younger
ones
than
going
up
in
a
balloon.
Phrenology
was
much
talked
about;
and
numerous
"professors"
of
it
came
around
lecturing,
and
examining
heads,
and
making
charts
of
cranial
"bumps."
This
was
profitable
business
to
them
for
a
while,
as
almost
everybody
who
invested
in
a
"character"
received
a
good
one;
while
many
very
commonplace
people
were
flattered
into
the
belief
that
they
were
geniuses,
or
might
be
if
they
chose.
Mesmerism
followed
close
upon
phrenology;
and
this
too
had
its
lecturers,
who
entertained
the
stronger
portion
of
their
audiences
by
showing
them
how
easily
the
weaker
ones
could
be
brought
under
an
uncanny
influence.
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