The Seven Little Sisters Who Live on the Round Ball That Floats in the Air | Page 3

an Eden which love has
girdled, when Gemila, Agoonack, and the others shall have won them
to a knowledge of the brotherhood of man and the fatherhood of God.
I would like to bring before young people who have read her books
some qualities of her mind and character which made her the rare
woman, teacher, and writer that she was. I knew her from early
girlhood. We went to the same schools, in more and more intimate
companionship, from the time we were twelve until we were twenty
years of age; and our lives and hearts were "grappled" to each other
"with links of steel" ever after. She was a precocious child, early
matured, and strong in intellectual and emotional experiences. She had
a remarkably clear mind, orderly and logical in its processes, and loved
to take up hard problems. She studied all her life with great joy and

earnestness, rarely, if ever, baffled in her persistent learning except by
ill-health. She went on at a great pace in mathematics for a young girl;
every step seemed easy to her. She took everything severe that she
could get a chance at, in the course or out of it,--surveying, navigation,
mechanics, mathematical astronomy, and conic sections, as well as the
ordinary course in mathematics; the calculus she had worked through at
sixteen under a very able and exact teacher, and took her diploma from
W.H. Wells, a master who allowed nothing to go slipshod. She was
absorbed in studies of this kind, and took no especial interest in
composition or literature beyond what was required, and what was the
natural outcome of a literary atmosphere and inherited culture; that is,
her mind was passively rather than actively engaged in such directions,
until later. At the normal school she led a class which has had a proud
intellectual record as teachers and workers. She was the easy victor in
every contest; with an inclusive grasp, an incisive analysis, instant
generalization, a very tenacious and ready memory, and unusual talent
for every effort of study, she took and held the first place as a matter of
course until she graduated, when she gave the valedictory address. This
valedictory was a prophetic note in the line of her future expression; for
it gave a graphic illustration of the art of teaching geography, to the
consideration of which she had been led by Miss Crocker's logical,
suggestive, and masterly presentation of the subject in the school
course. Her ability and steadiness of working power, as well as
singleness of aim, attracted the attention of Horace Mann, who was
about forming the nucleus of Antioch College; and he succeeded in
gaining her as one of his promised New England recruits. She had
attended very little to Latin, and went to work at once to prepare for the
classical requirements of a college examination. This she did with such
phenomenal rapidity that in six weeks she had fitted herself for what
was probably equivalent to a Harvard entrance examination in Latin.
She went to Antioch, and taught, as well as studied for a while, until
her health gave way entirely; and she was prostrate for years with brain
and spine disorders. Of course this put an end to her college career; and
on her recovery she opened her little school in her own house, which
she held together until her final illness, and to which she devoted her
thoughts and energies, her endowments and attainments, as well as her
prodigal devotion and love.

The success of "The Seven Little Sisters" was a great pleasure to her,
partly because her dear mother and friends were so thoroughly satisfied
with it. Her mother always wished that Jane would give her time more
exclusively to writing, especially as new outlines of literary work were
constantly aroused in her active brain. She wrote several stories which
were careful studies in natural science, and which appeared in some of
the magazines. I am sure they would be well worth collecting. She had
her plan of "Each and All" long in her mind before elaborating, and it
crystallized by actual contact with the needs and the intellectual
instincts of her little classes. In fact all her books grew, like a plant,
from within outwards; they were born in the nursery of the schoolroom,
and nurtured by the suggestions of the children's interest, thus
blooming in the garden of a true and natural education. The last book
she wrote, "Ten Boys Who Lived on the Road from Long Ago to
Now," she had had in her mind for years. This little book she dedicated
to a son of her sister Margaret. I am sure she gave me an outline of the
plan fully ten years before she wrote it out. The subject of her mental