"I never spent
such melancholy weeks in my life; in the midst of it, however, I made
fun for the rest, as I believe I should do in a dungeon." It was so in
the present case. She relieved the weariness of many an anxious hour by
"making fun for the rest." As an illustration, one evening at Dorset,
while sitting at the parlor-table with her children and a young
friend who was visiting her, she seized a pencil and wrote for their
entertainment a ludicrous version of the Chicago affair in two parts.
The paper which was preserved by her young friend, illustrates also
another trait which she thus describes at the close of a frolicsome
letter to Miss E. A. Warner: "It is one of the peculiar peculiarities
of this woman that she usually carries on, when she wants to hide her
feelins." Part I. begins thus:

Where are the Prentisses? Gone to Chicago,
Gone bag and baggage, the whole crew and cargo.
Well, they _would_ go, now let's talk 'em over,
And see what compensation we can discover.

They are all "talked over" and then in Part II. the scene changes to
Chicago itself:

Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rye,
Here's the tribe of Prentisses just agoing by;
Dr. Prentiss he,
Mrs. Prentiss she,
And a lot of young ones that all begin with P.
Well, let us view them with our eyes,
And then begin to criticise.
And first the doctor, what of him?

The doctor having been fully discussed, the criticism proceeds:

Now for his wife; well, who would guess
She had set up as authoress!
Why, she looks just like all of us,
Instead of being in a muss
Like other literary folks.
They say she likes her little jokes,
As well as those who've less to say
Of stepping on the heavenward way.

Mrs. P. having been disposed of:

Next comes Miss P.; how she will make
The hearts of all the students quake!
She'll wind them round her fingers' ends,
And find in them one hundred friends.
They'll sit on benches in a row
And watch her come, and watch her go;
But they'll be safe, the precious rogues,
Since she don't care for theologues.

The other children next pass in review and the whole closes with the
remark:

Time, and Time only, will make clear
Why the poor geese came cackling here.

_To a young Friend, New York, Nov., 1871._

My heart is as young and fresh as any girl's, and I am _almost_ as
prone to make idols out of those I love, as I ever was; and this is