very impressive sight. By that time, I was old enough to take some 

 interest in politics and to be very anxious over the result of the election. 

 My opinions were, of course, those of my family. 



The spectacular event of our long stay in Philadelphia was the great 

 fire of January 1869. Uncle, blind and nearly helpless, was the only man 

 in the house that night, for the butler and coachman had their own 

 houses. The fire was only a block away from us, at the corner of 9th 

 and Chestnut Streets, where a great marble building, housing three 

 large shops, was burned out and completely gutted. The burning build- 

 ing extended along 9th Street to Sansom Street and from the latter to 

 our stable was a row of groggeries, which would have burned like tinder, 

 had they once been set on fire. There was thus a real reason for appre- 

 hension and I was terror-stricken and, though I said nothing, my 

 Mother's keen eye penetrated my reserve. Uncle had the maids busy in 

 making and serving coffee to the firemen, who came to the kitchen in 

 squads, drenched and weary men, to whom the hot coffee was like new 

 life. To insure respectful treatment to the servants, he remained in the 

 kitchen all night and my Mother with him. The picture of these two, 

 who loved each other so deeply and said so little about it, seated before 

 the kitchen fire, the firemen streaming in and out, has remained one of 

 my clearest memories. 



My Mother went out hardly at all during that winter, for the theatre 

 was taboo and, as she had no musical ear, she cared nothing for concerts. 

 Of one public entertainment which she attended, however, I retain a 

 very distinct recollection, and that was of the evening when she went to 

 hear Charles Dickens read. I well remember her disappointment over 

 his appearance, saying that he was overloaded with rings and chains 

 and wore a velvet coat! It is strange that I should remember this, when 

 the name of Dickens meant so litde to me, as I did not begin to read him 

 till some years later. 



Something may here be said about the Philadelphia of 1868. The city 

 was already very large and a great centre of manufacturing and, like 

 most American cities, its growth had been very rapid. Water supply, of 

 an inferior sort, sewers and gas there already were, but the paving was 

 atrocious, rough cobblestones^ in the streets and, generally speaking, 



1 The very meaning of "cobblestone" would seem to have been lost in this country and 

 a pavement of smooth granite blocks is usually said to be one of cobblestones. Properly 

 speaking, a cobblestone was a large, rounded and water-worn pebble, eight inches or more 

 in long diameter; the name was derived from the use made of such lapstones by cobblers 

 and shoemakers for beating leather. 



