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Lottie and myself were up to a great many mischievous pranks, which caused our friends considerable troublesome times, I fear. I laugh now when I think of them; but I have not seen her in a good many years, and they tell me that she is married and the mother of four children. I can never think of her except as a little fun-loving girl.

When a few years older, my parents removed from Detroit to Grass Lake, on the Central Railroad. There I found myself among strangers, and longed for the friends of my other home. It seemed as if no one would ever understand me as Lottie did, and I missed her sadly. But I was not long left to pine in solitude. Dear Polly Ann Osgood, I soon learned to love her as well. We grew up together like sisters. How many delightful rambles we had about the fields and forests, gathering berries and other fruits, and weaving the sweet wild flowers into garlands to crown our heads; and although I could not hear the warbling of birds, my little friend did, and she tried to make me understand it.

I was always charmed with the scenes of nature, and have been out for hours alone watching with an exultant heart the skimming swallow, the green meadows, the rippling streams, the waving forest. The glad sunshine, the cooling breeze, and the flying clouds were all subjects to me of wonder and delight, and I longed to know more of them and their Author. Who made the beautiful world and who made us?

My young mind was filled with thoughts all unexpressed and inexpressible. Deep, fervent and glowing, I longed to worship something, I knew not who or what. My dear mother was constantly importuned with questions, who made the grass and the flowers and all the living creatures that throng the earth? The sky, with its shifting clouds, its glowing sun, its mild moon, and its myriad stars?

Oh how I yearned for the knowledge to illumine my darkened mind. My mother, as well as she was able, explained to me that One who dwells above made them all; and that I must kneel and raise my eyes, hands and heart in adoration. Oh, I thought "If I could only see him." But since I have been able to read His Holy Word, I have learned more of Him. I have learned to worship Him in spirit and in truth; the only true worship, for He is a Spirit and comprehends the language of the heart though the lips move not.

While dwelling in Grass Lake an event took place that I shall never forget, the remembrance of it even now fills me with horror. My father used sometimes to pour powder upon the hearth to make it flash for my amusement. I think he did not know what a mad-cap I was, or he would hardly have thought it prudent to set me such an example.

One day I was left at home alone, and I got the powder, and sprinkling it about the floor set it on fire. It flashed in earnest, setting fire to everything. I had on a flannel dress, fortunately, or I might have flashed with the rest. But I caught my little dog in my arms, and drew my father's trunk to the door. It was very heavy, and I could not lift it over the sill. So I was obliged to leave it and run more than a quarter of a mile to the house of the nearest neighbor to give the alarm.

When they reached the house the roof had fallen in, and the house with all its contents was consumed. When my mother and father came home, there was no home to receive them. My dear father had taught his foolish little dumb girl a trick that had robbed him of it; though they did not know it then. I could not explain the cause of the fire, and they were so happy to find that I had not also perished in the flames, they thought little of their great loss in the house, though many valuable papers and other articles were destroyed which were never replaced. After I learned to write, however, I gave my mother a faithful account of my part in the affair.

When about twelve years of age I was sent to a common school. I tried as hard as I could to learn, but it was a dry, tedious process, as my teacher was not qualified to instruct the dumb, and I gave it up in despair -sic-; feeling, oh how bitterly, that I was not like the rest and could never hope to acquire as much knowledge.

I had an uncle who wished to take me to the Deaf and Dumb Asylum in New York; but my father's health was fast failing, and as I am an only child, my mother could not endure the thought of separation, and that project was also relinquished. And I, much as I longed for a more enlarged and cultivated sphere, much as I hungered and thirsted for a high knowledge of the world in which I lived, was brought up wild and wayward, with no definite understanding of my relation to the world, or the duties required of me. My young heart was brimful of love and holy aspirations, and I fought and rebelled against the small compass of surrounding circumstances that hedged me about, yet knew not how the evil could be overcome.

About this time it became evident to all -- all but me -- that my father's days on earth were numbered. I had never seen a person die, and death to me was a subject upon which I had never thought. To die! what was it? I saw the change upon his face. I saw the last dying glance of his eyes as the film gathered o'er them. I felt the last grasp of his icy fingers -- then he lay cold and motionless. It was a sight so terrible that I clung frightened to my mother. And yet I could not believe that I must give him up. I believed the change only temporary. It seemed to me that he would rise up again, and speak to us, and live as before. But long hours and days passed away and the change came not. Then they placed his rigid body in a long box, and screwed the lid down tightly, and buried him up in the earth.