Memoirs of Anne C.L. Botta,: written by her friends. With selections from her correspondence and from her writings in prose and poetry.

anne G. Z. cotta
Later, she accepted a situation in the family of Mr.
Gardiner, of Shelter Island, N. Y., to teach his three
little daughters. Two of these afterward married,
successively, Professor Horsford of Harvard College.
During the two years she stayed on this island, she
kept a journal which she called "The Diary of a Recluse," an interesting record giving the details of
her daily life on that lonely spot, filled with solid
thoughts and original ideas, although tinged with a
melancholy tendency which was quite natural in one
so sensitive, so eager for knowledge, and so entirely
deprived of association with scholarly and sympathetic minds. She has said, however, that she
considered her solitary life on that island the principal basis for the development of her mental character, as it afforded her extensive and systematic
reading for a thorough self-education.
After leaving the Gardiners, she joined her mother
in Providence, R. I., where she took young ladies
into the family to teach and educate. It was here, in
1843, that I was placed under her charge, and soon I
grew to appreciate her incomparable methods of
teaching, to love her sweet disposition, and to admire
her charming manners. Her acute intellectual insight
into character, and her wisdom in guiding others as
well as herself in the various branches of study, were
remarkable. She inspired her pupils with love for intellectual occupation, strengthened their characters,
and made them eager to improve in every way. Her
intense interest in their advancement became to them
a powerful stimulus. Her strong affection for young
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