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“I did a little work on the Christian Register and then went to the Youth’s Companion, where, for years, I ground out stuff from the latest books and magazines.

“And that’s really all! I own a farm here at Hill, which I don’t carry on—sell the grass standing and the apples on the trees. I love gardens and houses. I wish I could go round planning the resurrection of old houses and pass them over to somebody else and plan more.

“And that’s all! Now I ask you if any newspaper gent, even with a genius for embroidery, could make anything of that? ‘Story? God bless you, sir, I’ve none to tell!’

“Gloomily yours,

“Alice Brown.”

[In pencil]

“I thought I should write about five thousand words, but this is how it pans out!”

And it pans out extremely well, if a newspaper gent with no genius for embroidery, incapable, indeed, of knitting a single sock for a soldier, may express his satisfaction. For a woman of sixty who has no story of her own to tell has certainly a lot of stories to tell of other people. Miss Brown has told them all. A very respectable list of writings will be found at the close of this chapter.