At last the frosts and storms of November came and threw a chilling barrier between the living and the dead, and we went there no more.
During all this time I kept up my lessons at the parsonage and made rapid progress.

I surprised even my teacher, who thought me capable of doing anything.

I learned to drive, and to leap a fence and ditch on horseback.

I taxed every power, hoping some day to hear my father say: "Well, a girl is as good as a boy, after all." But he never said it.
When the doctor came over to spend the evening with us, I would whisper in his ear: "Tell my father how fast I get on," and he would tell him, and was lavish in his praises.

But my father only paced the room, sighed, and showed that he wished I were a boy; and I, not knowing why he felt thus, would hide my tears of vexation on the doctor's shoulder.
Soon after this I began to study Latin, Greek, and mathematics with a class of boys in the Academy, many of whom were much older than I.For three years one boy kept his place at the head of the class, and I always stood next.