The story of my life ; or, The sunshine and shadow of seventy years / by Mary A. Livermore ... with hitherto unrecorded incidents and recollections of three years' experience as an army nurse in the great Civil War, and reminiscences of twenty-five years' experiences on the lecture platform ... to which is added six of her most popular lectures ... with portraits and one hundred and twenty engravings from designs by eminent artists ...

A SECRET TOO BIG TO BE KEPT.

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"Oh, no indeed, Pa; Aunt Prudy can't have 'em, we
want 'em ourselves; we should have to be running to the
house half the day if they weren't here."
" That settles it then," said their father; and, turning to
me he added, "these children own these niggers, and
largely control them."
Sitting silent awhile, vigorously puffing away at his
pipe, and blowing out great clouds of pungent tobacco
smoke that nearly choked me, for I was not used to it, he
suddenly burst out, "I've got a secret that's too big to
keep alone, and I've come to share it with you; your
mother's known it for a month. Do you want to hear it?"
Away went books, slates, copy-books, chairs, everything,
as the children clustered around him, full of eager curiosity.
" Well," he continued, " Aunt 'Tilda, and Uncle John, and
all the children, and Grandma, and Aunt Susy, with her
boy and girl, are coming here Christmas to stay for ten
days or a fortnight!"
A shout of unutterable delight that ran up among the
rafters, and almost lifted the roof, greeted this announcement.
"Goodness gracious!" said Dick; "that's the jolliest
news I've heard for a year. Nine of 'em! Nine of 'em,
girls! Hurrah!" and then the talk ran wild.
"We'll have a big dinner party every day, and invite
the Goodes, and the Herricks, and the Baskervilles, and the
Fields, and the Lewises, and everybody round for twentyfive miles! We'll have dances and masquerades, and whist
parties, as well as dinner parties; and everything good to
eat and drink,-ice cream and cake, egg-nog and punch,
toddy and flip, venison and oysters, candy and sweetmeats,
and everything else to be had!" And Mr. Henderson
rattled on with the children as if he were a lad of eighteen,