A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)

X. MILL-GIRLS' MAGAZINES THERE was a passage from Cowper that my sister used to quote to us, because, she said, she often repeated it to herself, and found that it did her good:-- "In such a world, so thorny, and where none Finds happiness unblighted, or if found, Without some thistly sorrow at its side, It seems the part of wisdom, and no sin Against the law of love, to measure lots With less distinguished than ourselves, that thus We may with patience bear our moderate ills, And sympathize with others, suffering more." I think she made us feel--she certainly made me feel--that our lot was in many ways an unusually fortunate one, and full of responsibilities. She herself was always thinking what she could do for others, not only immediately about her, but in the farthest corners of the earth. She had her Sabbath-school class, and visited all the children in it: she sat up all night, very often, watching by a sick girl's bed, in the hospital or in some distant boarding-house; she gave money to send to missionaries, or to help build new churches in the city, when she was earning only eight or ten dollars a month clear of her board, and could afford herself but one "best dress," besides her working clothes. That best dress was often nothing but a Merrimack print. But she insisted that it was a great saving of trouble to have just this one, because she was not obliged to think what she should wear if she were invited out to spend an evening. And she kept track of all the great philanthropic movements of the day. She felt deeply the shame and wrong of American slavery, and tried to make her workmates see and feel it too.(Petitions to Congress for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia were circulated nearly every year among the mill-girls, and received thousands of signatures.)