The Project Gutenberg EBook of 'Lena Rivers, by Mary J. Holmes

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Title: 'Lena Rivers

Author: Mary J. Holmes

Release Date: July 7, 2004 [EBook #12835]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 'LENA RIVERS ***

Produced by Al Haines

'LENA RIVERS,

BY

MRS. MARY J. HOLMES.

AUTHOR OF

"TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE," "ENGLISH ORPHANS," "DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT,"
"MARIAN GRAY," "ETHELYN'S MISTAKE," "CAMERON PRIDE," "EDNA BROWNING,"
"WEST LAWN," "EDITH LYLE," ETC., ETC.

MDCCCXCVII.

PREFACE.

If it be true, as some have said, that a _secret_ is safer in a
_preface_ than elsewhere, it would be worse than folly for me to
waste the "midnight oil," in the manufacture of an article which no
one would read, and which would serve no purpose, save the adding of
a page or so to a volume perhaps already too large. But I do not
think so. I wot of a few who, with a horror of anything savoring of
_humbug_, wade industriously through a preface, be it never so
lengthy, hoping therein to find the _moral_, without which the story
would, of course, be valueless. To such I would say, seek no
further, for though I claim for "'Lena Rivers," a moral--yes, half a
dozen morals, if you please--I shall not put them in the preface, as
I prefer having them sought after, for what I have written I wish to
have read.

Reared among the rugged hills of the Bay State, and for a time
constantly associated with a class of people known the wide world
over as _Yankees_, it is no more than natural that I should often
write of the places and scenes with which I have been the most
familiar. In my delineations of New England character I have aimed
to copy from memory, and in no one instance, I believe, have I
overdrawn the pictures; for among the New England mountains there
lives many a "Grandma Nichols," a "Joel Slocum," or a "Nancy
Scovandyke," while the wide world holds more than one '_Lena_, with
her high temper, extreme beauty, and rare combination of those
qualities which make the female character so lovely.

Nearly the same remarks will also apply to my portraitures of
Kentucky life and character, for it has bee