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 WISE AND RESOLUTE FATHER, 7

79

families, who observed the day in their own homes, and in-.
vited guests to join them.
The Thanksgiving. after I had graduated from the Hancock School one of my father's brothers from Ohio happened
to be with us, and three or four of my oldest cousins had
accompanied him. It was known to all present -that I was
to continue in school, and that my father had procured me
private instruction in Latin, to which Greek might be added
by and by, - a proceeding highly disapproved, especially by
the women of the company. They thought my father could
ill afford the expense, that the fact that I had received a
medal at graduation from the public school demonstrated
that my education was sufficient for all necessary purposes,
and above all, they lacked language to express their poor
opinion of a girl who was so unlike her associates, that she
desired or was willing to study Latin or Greek. The higher
education of girls was an advance for which the general
public was not then prepared.
After the dinner was over, and there wvas a little lull in
the small talk that had prevailed, an attack was begun upon
my father.
"11Was it your desire that Mary should study Latin? " one
asked.
"I1 desired it as soon as I discovered that she wished to
do so, " replied my father.
"11Do you think it will enable her to get a better living?
Why Mhould she study Latin? "
"I1 think there is no doubt but she will get a living if she
has her health."
"11Do you think it will help her to be a better woman?"