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222
A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
77
Our
republicanism
was
fresh
and
wide-awake.
The
edge
of
George
Washington's
little
hatchet
had
not
yet
been
worn
down
to
its
latter-day
dullness;
it
flashed
keenly
on
our
young
eyes
and
ears
in
the
reading
books,
and
through
Fourth
of
July
speeches.
The
Father
of
his
Country
had
been
dead
only
a
little
more
than
a
quarter
of
a
century,
and
General
Lafayette
was
still
alive;
he
had,
indeed,
passed
through
our
town
but
a
few
years
before,
and
had
been
publicly
welcomed
under
our
own
elms
and
lindens.
Even
babies
echoed
the
names
of
our
two
heroes
in
their
prattle.
We
had
great
"training
days,"
when
drum
and
fife
took
our
ears
by
storm;
When
the
militia
and
the
Light
Infantry
mustered
and
marched
through
the
streets
to
the
Common
with
boys
and
girls
at
their
heels,--such
girls
as
could
get
their
mother's
consent,
or
the
courage
to
run
off
without
it.(We
never
could.)But
we
always
managed
to
get
a
good
look
at
the
show
in
one
way
or
another.
"Old
Election,"
"'Lection
Day"
we
called
it,
a
lost
holiday
now,
was
a
general
training
day,
and
it
came
at
our
most
delightful
season,
the
last
of
May.
Lilacs
and
tulips
were
in
bloom,
then;
and
it
was
a
picturesque
fashion
of
the
time
for
little
girls
whose
parents
had
no
flower-gardens
to
go
around
begging
a
bunch
of
lilacs,
or
a
tulip
or
two.
My
mother
always
made
"'Lection
cake"
for
us
on
that
day.
It
was
nothing
but
a
kind
of
sweetened
bread
with
a
shine
of
egg-and-molasses
on
top;
but
we
thought
it
delicious.
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