April.–Anna wanted me to help her write a composition last night, and we decided to write on “Old Journals,” so we got hers and mine both out and made selections and then she copied them. When we were on our way to school this morning we met Mr E. M. Morse and Anna asked him if he did not want to read her composition that Carrie wrote for her. He made a very long face and pretented to be much shocked, but said he would like to read it, so he took it and also her album, which she asked him to write in. At night, on his way home, he stopped at our door and left them both. When she looked in her album, she found this was what he had written :
“Anna, when you have grown old and wear spectacles and a cap, remember the boyish young man who saw your fine talents in 1859 and was certain you would add culture to nature and become the pride of Canandaigua. Do not forget also that no one deserves praise for anything done by others and that your progress in wisdom and goodness will be watched by no one more anxiously than by your true friend, E. M. MORSE.”
I think she might as well told Mr Morse that the old journals were as much hers as mine; but I think she likes to make out she is not as good as she is. Sarah Foster helped us to do our arithmetic examples to-day. She is splendid in mathematics.
Much to our surprise Bridget Flynn, who has lived with us so long, is married. We didn’t know she thought of such a thing, but she has gone. Anna and I have learned how to make rice and cornstarch puddings. We have a new girl in Bridget’s place but I don’t think she will do. Grandmother asked her today if she seasoned the gravy and she said, either she did or she didn’t, she couldn’t tell which. Grandfather says he thinks she is a little lacking in the “upper story.”