24 ELIZABETH GARY AGASSIZ 



I always think of you, mon ami, when we meet to- 

 gether on Sunday evenings and miss your face and 

 your voice very much indeed, and very, very often 

 when Mary and I learn something that is new and 

 pretty, I think of you, and wonder whether you will 

 be too wise to enjoy our uncultivated music when you 

 return. But no! I will not believe any such thing. I 

 am sure it will at least have the power of association 

 hke the violet, and that you will value it, if it is only 

 for being home music. 



And now I must ask a thousand pardons of you 

 for boring you with such a long epistle; but somehow 

 or other I have been going on w^ithout much think- 

 ing, and having a hundred things to say to you, till 

 I really have inflicted upon you much more than I 

 meant to when I began, and can only beg that if you 

 find it stupid, you will not consider yourself at all 

 obliged to read the whole. 



Your affectionate cousin, 



Lizzie Gary 



Our next reminiscence of Mrs. Agassiz's youth is supplied 

 by Miss Gary. 



One of my earliest recollections of my sister Lizzie 

 is of a dancing party given by my father for his elder 

 daughters. I was eight or nine years old, and this was 

 the first ball I had ever seen, a simple affair compared 

 to the splendid balls of today, but to me it seemed 

 sumptuous. The flowers came from the greenhouses 

 at Brookline and made our small rooms very pretty, 

 and they looked to me very spacious with the 



