The rosebuds that bloom on thy fat little cheek,—
And thy round head so stuffed full of Latin and Greek,
Arithmetic and Geology.
‘I send you a character-teller, my love,
’Tis little and poor, but it may
My kindness, affection, etcetera, prove,
And show you, my dear little Dolly, I strove
To make mine a happy birthday.’
What the ‘character-teller’ may have been it is difficult even to conjecture. Since Laura was four years her junior, the Latin, Greek and Geology were of course meant in the symbolical sense, standing for learning in general.
One more apparently early effort remains; not this time versification, but a birthday letter to Laura, inscribed, ‘To my dear Lady Emma, from her affectionate Tosti.’ Why Lady Emma?—and why Tosti? In these three effusions the handwritings are curiously unlike one another, though all are childish. One is large and unformed; another is small and cramped; the third is neat and of a copperplate description. It may be that her writing was long before it crystallized into any definite shape; often the case with many-sided people. But for the juvenile handwriting, it would be almost impossible to believe that the following middle-aged production was not written in later years. Children were, however, in those days taught to express themselves like grown people; and no doubt she counted that she had accomplished her task well.