“MY MOTHER”
“Your mother? Why, I thought you had been a boat-builder for half a century! How old is she?”
“She is eighty-eight, and still enjoys good health. If I have one thing more than another to be thankful for, it is her care in childhood and her advice and sympathy through life. How often have I thought of her wisdom when I have seen mothers from Europe (where they were satisfied to be peasants), seek to outshine all their neighbors after they have been in America a few years, and so bring financial ruin to their husbands or even goad them into crime, and curse their children with contempt for honest labor in positions for which they are fitted, and a foolish desire to keep up appearances, even by living beyond their means and by seeking positions they cannot fill properly.”