The Harvest of Years

Among my earliest recollections these three words have a place, coming to my ears as the presages of a reprimand. I had made a frantic effort to lift my baby-brother from his cr...

The old adage of a poor beginning makes a good ending, may have been true in my case; certain it is that my sorest mishaps, or those I had least strength to bear, came between m...

Some people believe in predestination (or "fore-ordering," as Aunt Ruth used to call it), and some do not. I never knew what I believed about events and their happening, but it...

We could not object to the stay of our cousin, and she planned to remain indefinitely. I always smiled at the relationship, and I don't know exactly how near it was, but this I...

Gloriously beautiful was the morning of August twenty-first. We were up early, for the old stage would not wait for us, and we had much to do just at the last moment. I say we,...

The details of our stay in Chicago as a whole would be uninteresting, and I would not weary the reader with them. Hal improved so rapidly that on the fourth day after our arriva...

The fall is a busy time in a farmer's household--with the gathering of grain, clearing up of fields, and making all due preparations for the coming winter; and it is beautiful a...

Many thoughts filled my mind after what Clara had said, and I thought much of her beautiful faith as to her husband and his waiting for her; of her trust in his coming, and of t...

"Emily will help me!" Oh, how those words haunted me! I would help her; yes, if I could, but when should I ever stop making blunders, when should I lose the impetuous nature tha...

Father was consulted regarding the coming of Matthias Jones, and he thought it would be a good plan, for our farming people had often cause to hire help, and it had always been...

February first brought Matthias Jones. Father met him at the village, and our curiosity which was aroused regarding this new comer, was thoroughly gratified at his appearance. A...

I could not believe what Mr. Benton said of Matthias, and did not refrain from speaking of it to Clara, whose opinions were golden to me, and her reply was perfectly in accordan...

"It is made of pieces of old flannel and carpet that Phebe got hold of somehow. We cut them bias and sewed them on through the middle, the foundation being a canvas bag, leaving...

It would be now only a few days to Mr. Benton's return, and I dreaded it, never thinking of him without a shudder passing over me; Aunt Hildy would have called it "nervous creep...

As soon as I could control my voice I said, "I cannot tell you why I cry so bitterly. I felt so strangely when I read this terrible letter, which Matthias had picked up in the r...

I think we must all have dreamed of the lovely face over among the pillows in Mr. Goodwin's west room, for we were hardly seated at the breakfast table ere Ben said:

I like to drift with the days, and scan them one by one, but as I recall all that I have written, I say to myself: "Emily must take some long step now, else the tale of her life...

Louis' birthday came on the 24th of June, and it seemed very appropriate to me that this should be the day of our wedding, and, as I said to him; the day named itself, and it al...

I could hardly see where we had room for all the gifts that came to us, for Clara's part of the house was well filled, and Aunt Hildy's belongings took nearly all the upstairs r...

The pictures Louis painted were not on canvas, but living, breathing entities, and my heart rejoiced as the years rolled over us that the brush he wielded with such consummate s...

How the days of this year flew past us, we were borne along swiftly on their wings, and every week was filled to overflowing with pleasant care and work. John was called in the...

"Appearances is often deceitful, Emily; I haint long to stay, neither has the saint among us. Her eyes have a strange look in them nowadays, and the veins in the lids show dread...

It was the spring of 1862, when "Aunt Hildy's Plot" was the scene of happy labor. Uncle Dayton made the survey of the land and a map of it. All the children knew the boundaries...