4 THE TEXAN HUNTRESS. 837 



dig up hill — moles, and all low beasts and reptiles climb 

 towards the apex. Aspiration has no wings ! — It climbs ! — 

 it does not soar ! — all that even Shakspeare says is, that 



' Aspiration hreedeth wings !' 



We must cultivate the facility — the habit of going up will 

 soon accustom us to new ideas and modes of thought that 

 had never been suggested — but I wander! The relation 

 which I intended to give you is a very simple one. You 

 asked me how we should work ? I will tell you how I have 

 worked, and why ? 



"I was poor as strength always is! The knaves starve 

 wisdom because it is child-like ! I was a daughter of New 

 England — I was proud and self-reliant — I determined very 

 early in my life that I would support myself ! My parents, 

 from whom my plan met but little sympathy, of course opposed 

 violently my purpose to go to some great cotton mill, and 

 work there for my own support. They were poor, too, but 

 proud of an ancestral position ; they could and would not resign 

 it, as they supposed, to ignoble associations ! We had a long 

 and bitter struggle — the amount of which was, that I learned 

 to hate most heartily their cowardly apprehension of the 

 * say-so' of the world ! I carried my point, and must acknowl- 

 edge that, for one day, my romantic delusion with regard 

 to the general idea of associated labor in public mills and 

 manufactories, was nearly kept up — but the filth and want 

 of ventilation first shocked me. 



"In a few hours after the excitement of my new posi- 

 tion had passed, I began to feel myself stifled — my mouth 

 was dry and my lungs suffered from the cotton-lint, which 

 filled the air in infinite particles. I nearly fainted when we 

 were turned loose late in the evening, and the sensation was 

 little decreased when I returned to my room in one of the 

 regular boarding houses. It was an affair of seven by six, 

 without a pretence of ventilation, and contained two beds. 



9-7 



