The Project Gutenberg EBook of Clemence, by Retta Babcock

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Title: Clemence
The Schoolmistress of Waveland

Author: Retta Babcock

Release Date: March 4, 2006 [EBook #17913]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CLEMENCE ***

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CLEMENCE,

THE

Schoolmistress of Waveland,

BY RETTA B. BABCOCK,

AUTHOR OF "GRAHAM LODGE; OR, LAURA CLIFFORD'S LIFE ROMANCE."

* * * * *

Not many friends my life has made;
Few have I loved, and few are they
Who in my hand their hearts have laid;
And these are women. I am gray,
But never have I been betrayed.

J. G. HOLLAND.

* * * * *

CLEVELAND, OHIO:

PRINTED BY THE LEADER PRINTING COMPANY, NO. 142 SUPERIOR STREET.

1870.

PREFACE.

The favor with which a generous public received a former volume of the
writer's, induced her, after a lapse of nearly two years, to essay
another effort of a similar nature.

In the present work, _facts_ were chosen for a basis, as calculated to
interest, where the wildest dream of the novelist would pall upon the
satiated mind. It has been remarked, in a homely phrase by another, that
"what comes from the heart, reaches the heart," and if the present
fruits of long and unremitting mental labor, sustained often amid such
trial and discouragements, as seldom fall to the lot of mortal to bear,
should find sympathy and appreciation with the mass of readers, the aim
of the writer will have been fully accomplished.

CLEMENCE,

THE

SCHOOLMISTRESS OF WAVELAND.

CHAPTER I.

"Dearest mother, do not grieve for me, it breaks my heart."

The sweet, sad voice of the speaker quivered with unshed tears, as she
knelt before the grief-bowed figure on the sofa, and took one of the
little, shrunken, tear-wet hands in both her own, with the devotion of a
lover.

"Have you not o