by special invitation at least once a year. They often made excursions in their own carriages to Squantum Beach in summer, or went in sleighs to some distant hotel for supper in winter. When the sleighing was good, in midwinter, they always went to Newton Upper Falls, and the party assembled at our house in the autumn. No children were invited to these formal gatherings.

"One's treasures always tell such secrets of oneself."

Our parlor, though constantly used, was always kept ready for company. A brass-trimmed iron fire frame surrounded the closed up fire place, behind the air tight stove, but side brackets still held the brass "fire set," shovel, poker, and tongs. The chimney cupboard contained the family daguerreotypes and other relics, among them a colored print of the Burning of the Steamer Lexington.

"Look in the candle stand drawer" was an often repeated direction. This sewing table with hinged drop leaves and two drawers was the orderly receptacle of all sorts of sewing implements and supplies. When my mother was married her "bureau," according to the fashion of the period, was placed in this parlor. The "center table" opened out square, or folded over to one-half its size, and the top turned around over the box which formed the top of the standard.

Some forms of fashionable decoration were not in our rooms. Painting on glass belonged to an earlier period. A printed picture was gummed to a plate of glass, the paper moistened and rubbed off to the thinnest possible film, and then the outlines filled in with a brush so that the vivid colors seemed to be in the glass itself, Large and elabo- · rate designs were cut with small scissors from white paper, which was then placed over a dark background and framed. This work was called papyro. tamia, and included human figures, birds, and flowers. "Skeleton leaves" were made by immersing green leaves in water until the veins and fibrous network could be brushed perfectly clean. When dried, pressed and arranged on a background they were framed as pictures. In spatterwork the design was obtained by laying patterns upon cardboard, and spattering India ink over all the uncovered spaces, producing a white picture upon a gray background. Pressed ferns were often used as patterns.

In our dining room was a well filled bookcase and a table with magazines and newspapers, including a Boston daily, the Massachusetts Ploughman, Dedham Gazette, American Messenger, Child's Paper, and Farmer's Almanac. Godey's Lady's Book, Peterson's Magazine, and Arthur's

Home Magazine were then popular, and the familiar periodicals of the present time were not in existence. Besides law books and many other leather covered volumes, I recall Travels in Africa, Light on the Dark River, Anna Clayton, The Dales in Newport, Watts on the Mind, Paul and Virginia, The Russian Boy, and Peter Parley's Geography, volumes of poetry and essays, and many school text books.

"Some smack of age in you,

Some relish of the saltness of time. "

My father's slant top desk stood in a dining room recess. He used steel pens, but in a drawer were quill pens such as my mother "mended" under Master Whitney's direction in her school days. He used blotting paper, but the once indispensable "sand box" stood in its wonted place. He used gummed envelopes, but the box of wafers was opened now and then. He used red bordered gummed seals on legal documents, but some papers in the pigeon holes bore diamond shaped bits of paper fastened with red wafers.

Within my memory my Grandfather never used the shoemaker's bench and the tools of his trade. The long, low bench with its hollowed seat, the leather apron, lapstone, hammer, lasts, awls, pegs, wax, waxed ends, bristles, rasps, and shears, just

as he last used them, were kept in the unfinished "back chamber," among the large chests which had tills, spring locks and secret drawers.

O

CHAPTER THREE.

"Tempora mutantur."

IFTY years ago, there were no sample cases, drummers, commercial travelers, and canvassers, but men went about peddling all sorts of merchandise. The lightning rod man was ubiquitous. Dunlap, the seedsman, sent out an agent who was regularly entertained at our house on his annual visit. My father sent to the new dealer, Gregory of Marblehead, for seeds and plants mentioned in his catalogues. The tree man, the shoe man, the skein thread peddler, the root-and-herb doctor, the ladder man, and the tin peddler came at regular intervals. In after years we heard of sending for samples, and of orders filled by mail.

Our well kept Dry Goods and Grocery Store at the Corner thrived in a modest way. Mr. Laurence Derby was the first proprietor whom I knew. Mr. Plummer succeeded Mr. Derby. Mr. Lewis Bliss followed Mr. Plummer, and changed the location of the store. At this store eggs and butter were doubtless disposed of "on account." Every family had a garden, and there was no sale for perishable fruit and vegetables.