I had the unusual and qualified privilege of watching my daughter's development from ten to twenty-one, at a distance of four thousand miles, by means of the written word.

I wrote myself as provocatively as possible; I sought for every string, but the vibration that came back across the seas to me was always other than the one I looked for, and sometimes there was none.

Nevertheless, Mrs.Farnham wrote me that Cecily very much valued my communications.

Once when I had described an unusual excursion in a native state, I learned that she had read my letter aloud to the sewing circle.

After that I abandoned description, and confined myself to such intimate personal details as no sewing circle could find amusing.