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222
A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
93
That,
indeed,
was
one
peculiar
attraction
of
the
town
itself;
it
was
old,
and
it
seemed
old,
much
older
than
it
does
now.
There
was
only
one
main
street,
said
to
have
been
the
first
settlers'
cowpath
to
Wenham,
which
might
account
for
its
zigzag
picturesqueness.
All
the
rest
were
courts
or
lanes.
The
town
used
to
wear
a
delightful
air
of
drowsiness,
as
if
she
had
stretched
herself
out
for
an
afternoon
nap,
with
her
head
towards
her
old
mother,
Salem,
and
her
whole
length
reclining
towards
the
sea,
till
she
felt
at
her
feet,
through
her
green
robes,
the
clip
of
the
deep
water
at
the
Farms.
All
her
elder
children
recognized
in
her
quiet
steady-going
ways
a
maternal
unity
and
strength
of
character,
as
of
a
town
that
understood
her
own
plans,
and
had
settled
down
to
peaceful,
permanent
habits.
Her
spirit
was
that
of
most
of
our
Massachusetts
coast-towns.
They
were
transplanted
shoots
of
Old
England.
And
it
was
the
voice
of
a
mother-country
more
ancient
than
their
own,
that
little
children
heard
crooning
across
the
sea
in
their
cradle-hymns
and
nursery-songs.
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