The Days of a Man 1:1858 



assured my sister Lucia that when I grew up I 

 would marry her. 



One of my youthful duties was to help sew strips 

 of cloth together for rag carpets which were woven 

 in a loom, the same the women of the family some- 

 times used for the making of homespun cloth. 

 Where each strip was of a solid color we planned 

 distinct patterns, the different shades and widths 

 alternating regularly; in inventing such designs I 

 acquired some little skill. When the colors were 

 broken, the result was called *'hit or miss." 

 The old Among my earliest memories is that of a large, 

 dock old-fashioned timepiece which inoffensively attended 

 to its own business when "the folks" were there, 

 but had a distressing and eerie way of pounding out 

 the slow minutes whenever I was left to myself. 

 The psychological effect of a big clock on young 

 boys has perhaps never been fully appreciated, for 

 as soon as they are alone the thing seems to devote 

 special attention to them, ticking off the time with 

 exasperating leisure and an insistent loudness which 

 it never otherwise possesses. 



As a boy of seven or eight I used to amuse myself 

 by walking along the rail fence which bounded the 

 farm, meanwhile imagining various historical epi- 

 sodes. Each rail, for instance, would represent the 

 career, easy or difficult, of some king or other. A 

 little later I occasionally worked out on European 

 maps visionary campaigns in which I imagined one 

 nation after another fighting to correct its frontier; 

 in these conflicts, my hero (usually named David 

 Emanuel Starr) always had the proper idea as to 

 national boundaries! This particular fantasy, how- 

 ever, soon merged itself into my later and really 



C 14 3 



