Annals of our ancestors; one hundred and fifty years of history in the ...

OUR MOTHER, SOPHRONIA KEELER 41
our trundlo-bc'd, where the httle brown-eyed mother told us
Bible stories with such wonderful detail that we thought she
had memorized the text, and I wondered if I should ever be
able to tell them as she did. I have never been able to do so,
and yet I wish I could make her great-grandchildren know
something of her style of story-telling, for it was a striking
gift of this dear ancestor of ours; and so I am of the mind to try.
Imagine us in the trundle-bed and our mother sitting at the
quilting-frames with a candle, or more often two, throwing a
soft yellow light upon the smooth, dark head bent above her
careful needle. Her word-painting, even more plainly than
the picture in the old Bible, made us see, as she related the
story of Daniel and the lions, the rocky, barren den, the bones
remaining from past feasts, the gaping savage beasts, the helpless
Daniel in their midst. We knew the great climax was
coming; soon our mother would slightly raise her voice to re-
peat with what to us was thrilling oratory, and which I re-
member to this day as a grand piece of declamation " : My God
hath sent his aiigel, and hath shut the lions' mouths, that they may
not hurt vie; forasmuch as before him innocency was found in
me; and before thee, king, have I done no hurt."
From her conversation in after years we know that she had,
as she said, "a thirst for knowledge" in those days of scant
opportunity; and that she used every possible advantage
which came to her we also know. Her share of only three
months in school gave her a few fundamentals, and upon these
and the teaching at her mother's knee she built an education,
with the aid of her bright young mind and hunger for knowl-
edge. The teachers of these three-months schools solicited
their pupils, and were paid the paltry sum of "two bits" per
pupil for the three months of instruction. Accuracy and
thoroughness were strong characteristics of hers, and she
studied the primary branches with such diligence that she became
a clear penman, a good and correct reader, quick in mental
arithmetic, and especially fine in geography and spelling; she
was known to the latest day of her life as an accurate speller.
She was so fond of history that as soon as conditions changed
in her life and books had their part she read and studied