The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Life of Nancy, by Sarah Orne Jewett

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Title: The Life of Nancy

Author: Sarah Orne Jewett

Release Date: March 2, 2010 [EBook #31473]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIFE OF NANCY ***

Produced by James Adcock. Special thanks to The Internet
Archive: American Libraries.

[Illustration: "The Old Captains"]

THE LIFE OF NANCY

BY SARAH ORNE JEWETT

BOSTON AND NEW YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

The Riverside Press Cambridge

COPYRIGHT, 1890 AND 1895, BY SARAH ORNE JEWETT

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CONTENTS

THE LIFE OF NANCY

FAME'S LITTLE DAY

A WAR DEBT

THE HILTONS' HOLIDAY

THE ONLY ROSE

A SECOND SPRING

LITTLE FRENCH MARY

THE GUESTS OF MRS. TIMMS

A NEIGHBOR'S LANDMARK

ALL MY SAD CAPTAINS

A WINTER COURTSHIP

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THE LIFE OF NANCY.

I.

The wooded hills and pastures of eastern Massachusetts are so close to
Boston that from upper windows of the city, looking westward, you can
see the tops of pine-trees and orchard-boughs on the high horizon.
There is a rustic environment on the landward side; there are old
farmhouses at the back of Milton Hill and beyond Belmont which look as
unchanged by the besieging suburbs of a great city as if they were
forty miles from even its borders. Now and then, in Boston streets,
you can see an old farmer in his sleigh or farm wagon as if you saw
him in a Berkshire village. He seems neither to look up at the towers
nor down at any fashionable citizens, but goes his way alike
unconscious of seeing or being seen.

On a certain day a man came driving along Beacon Street, who looked
bent in the shoulders, as if his worn fur cap were too heavy for head
and shoulders both. This type of the ancient New England farmer in
winter twitched the reins occasionally, like an old woman, to urge the
steady white horse that plodded along as unmindful of his master's
suggestions as of the silver-mounted harnesses that passed them by.
Both horse and driver appeared to be conscious of sufficient wisdom,
and even worth, for the duties of life; but all this placidity and
self-assura