Excerpt from Sketches of Childhood and Girlhood: Chicago, 1847-1864 After over three quarters of a century with the Gulf forever widening, vision to me is not remote only the points Of View are changed. The interest is as poignant today as in those far Off yesterdays, and this I can promise you - a truthful sum mary in accurate detail of those first experiences and lessons-which will show simply the inevitable expression Of inborn qualities and tastes - the result Of heritage and the product. Of environment, and of that age. It is_ curious to Observe under what impulses youth or middle age or Old age expresses itself, and I do not wish in what follows to write under impulses any more than I wish to be judged by errors in dates or by seeming contradictions. One is too apt to Offer paradoxes because Sophisticated; but if enthusiasm undertakes to grapple with the simple events of a simple life enthusiasm will be rewarded. It is a pity to travel the path Of life without that companion to light up so many intangible and irremediable Obscurities; to create a beautiful atmosphere and enshrine harmoniously the commonest associations of common every-day life. Someone has Said that the Unknown is a nut to crack, for in it may lie the secret of the Universe! About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.