308 DAYS OUT OF DOORS. 



and the suggestive ah ! all forewarn me of an attack upon 

 my fire. If an angel from heaven were to place the hick- 

 ory in order and every nickering flame was the perfection 

 of grace, it would avail nothing. There would be instant 

 interference from the first mortal who happened in. Of 

 course, I wish each one of my friends to consider himself 

 the exception that proves the rule ; at the same time, I 

 would have all my readers, who know me not, understand 

 that there are no exceptions. 



The pretty, fan-like screens for the face that I have 

 mentioned have ever interested me more than all else 

 about the hearth. It requires some effort to realize that 

 your great-grandmother was once a girl, but it is true, and 

 what might not these neatly decorated bits of board, which 

 shielded her pretty but not painted face what might 

 they not tell us, could they but speak ! How steadily have 

 bright eyes gazed upon them that dared not look up; 

 how stealthily have they glanced aside, meeting other eyes, 

 yet shielded from all the company. Can it be possible 

 that in a quiet way there was a mild form of flirtation 

 even among the early Quakers ? These screens hint at it ; 

 and we do know that they were always widely awake to 

 all the world's real worth witty, fond of literature, nor 

 accounted it vanity to see themselves in print. It is emi- 

 nently appropriate to take up the volumes of the " Evening 

 Fireside," published eighty years ago, and read the pithy 

 prose and dainty verses of many a young Friend. Indeed, 

 at least one of the contributors to this earliest of literary 

 weeklies has sat before my fire and held these screens, 

 listening, as I do now, to the moaning of the wind in the 

 chimney, singing then as now, as her poetry shows, a 

 melancholy song of long ago. But how different her 

 " long ago " from mine ! I think of the time when this 

 country was young, as long ago ; and my great-grand- 

 mother then was recalling the stories she had heard of her 



