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 ...

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THE STORY OF MY LIFE.

genuine interest in translating the brief exercises in the
Latin Reader, and soon mastered ten pages in the time formerly occupied in learning one. Mr. Henderson watched
his son with ever-increasing pleasure, and seemed once more
like his old self, before death had cast its shadow over him.
Often, as he passed me, with his face illuminated, he would
smile and say, " We'll have that boy in Yale yet!" He became Dick's inseparable companion; helped him in his studies, and shared his pursuits. We were compelled to banish
them both from the schoolroom on account of their noisy
disturbance, and from thence they migrated to the musicroom, their high-pitched voices and shouts of laughter floating down to us from their place of retreat.
For three or four years Dick had importuned his father
to give the servants a "corn-shucking" party. He had
never been absolutely refused, but his petition was evaded,
and a decisive answer to the boy's request postponed. He
was very much attached to the servants, and they gave him
a love that was deeper and stronger than that for their own
kith and kin. So, when Uncles Henson and Isham, and
Aunts Aggy and Phenie began again to agitate the subject
of the "corn-shucking," and to glowingly recount its delights, Dick, realizing that a new day had dawned in his
sky, half promised them on the spot the coveted gratification.
"I'll ask Pa about it, Mammy," he said to Aunt Aggy,
" an' this time I reckon you'll git it."
And, sure enough, when he proffered his request on this
occasion, it was granted instanter, without hesitation or debate.
"Yes," said Mr. Henderson, "tell Uncle Henson to go
ahead with the 'corn-shucking,' and I'll furnish the supper."
"Who shall they invite?" asked Dick. "They mustn't