Month: July 2010

From Ailenroc’s Book, by Cornelia Alexander

“Miss Sims and Miss Nellie Sims, and Miss Horn and Miss Mary Ann Horn, and Miss Hendon, all must come to Mr. J. R. Coleman’s on the twenty-fifth day of December, to a quilting. Be sure to came, and don’t fail to bring your needles with you.”

So read an invitation received by my mother, and including the whole family except my father and brother, who pretended to be very angry over the slight.

I had never been to a big quilting, and, of course, looked forward to the day with great anticipations. I was surprised that my sisters cared so little for the invitation and indulged in so much laughter concerning it.

We had not been living in the country long, and the Colemans were among our first acquaintances. They were “good livers”—a good, old-fashioned family—and, while not going in for style at all, lived well in a rough manner.

Mrs. Coleman was uneducated, but she had a brother who had been off to school, and who, I thought, was an exception. Viewed in the calm light of riper years, his face was very foolish. His forehead and chin retreated from a large nose, and his pale hair and light blue eyes gave him a washed-out appearance; but I thought him charming. He seemed to be quite literary, and I loved books better than anything; so, of course, we were congenial spirits. He was twenty, I was fifteen, and I had no hesitation in appropriating his visits to myself. In the foolishness of my foolish heart, I no doubt put on airs. Indeed, my brother often assured me that I needed taking down a peg. Alas! The taking down came soon enough. Read More