Farmington

If we scholars did not grow up to be exemplary men and women, it surely was not the fault of our teachers or our parents,—or of the schoolbook publishers.

I was very young when I first began to wonder why the world was so unreasonable; and now I am growing old, and it is not a whit more sensible than it used to be. Still, as a chi...

I remember that we boys used to argue as to which was better, summer or winter. Each season had its special charms, and each was welcome after the other one had run its course....

I can never see Farmington except through my boyhood’s eyes, and no doubt the town and its people were not at all the same to the men and the women that they were to me. Every o...

Somehow I can identify my present self only with the boy who went to the Academy on the hill. Back of this, all seems a vision and a dream; and the little child from whom I grew...

Farmington was a very godly place; so, at least, her people thought. Among the many well-known attractions of the town, its religious privileges stood easily at the head. A litt...

In the last chapter I intended to write about the district school; but I lingered so long over old remembrances that I could not get to school in time, so now I will go straight...

Like everything else in my early life, my Aunt Mary is a memory that is shrouded in mist. I have no idea when I first heard of her or first saw her, but both events were while I...

Our house stood a short distance beyond the town, and on the other side of the creek that ran my father’s mill. This little stream came down out of the hills from somewhere a lo...

My greatest regret at growing old was the fact that I must give up playing ball. Even while I could still play, I began to think how soon it would be when I could no longer take...

I was very small when I began to fish,—so small and young that I cannot remember when it was. In fact, my first fishing comes to me now, not as a distant recollection, but only...

If I had only known, when I opened the long-closed door of the past, how fondly I should linger around the old familiar haunts, I am sure that I never should have taken a look b...

My father was a great believer in education,—that is, in the learning that is found in books. He was doubtful of any other sort, if indeed he believed there could be any other s...

My earliest recollections that I can feel quite sure are real are about my family and home. My father was a miller, and had a little grist-mill by the side of the creek, just in...

School had at least two days that made us as happy as children could well be. One was the first day of the term, and the other was the last. Anxious days and weeks and much nerv...

It was when I began to go to the district school that I first heard of Ferman Henry and his house. Just after we had waded through the little stream that ran across the road, we...

As I look back upon my childhood, it seems as if the world were an illusion and as if everything were magic that passed before my eyes. True, we children learned our lessons in...

I forgot to mention that my name is John Smith. Of course this is a very plebeian name, but I am in no way responsible for it. As long as I can remember, I answered to the call...

In those few rare days all thoughts of restraint were thrown away. For months we had been compelled to get up at a certain time in the morning, do our tasks, and then go to scho...

In Farmington the girls were of small account. Of course we had to tolerate them, for all of us had sisters, and then, too, we were told that we ought to treat them more kindly...

I begin this story with the personal pronoun. To begin it in any other way would be only a commonplace assumption of a modesty that I do not really have. It is most natural that...

When the church services were ended, we children stayed for Sunday-school. There was never anything especially alluring in Sunday-school; still it was far better than the church...

Directly in the shelter of the church was the burying-ground. It had first been laid out at the corner of the road, on one side of the great building; but slowly and surely it c...