Miss Alcott revised her journals at different times during her later life, striking out what was too personal for other eyes than her own, and destroying a great deal which would doubtless have proved very interesting.

The small number of letters given will undoubtedly be a disappointment. Miss Alcott wished to have most of her letters destroyed, and her sister respected her wishes. She was not a voluminous correspondent; she did not encourage many intimacies, and she seldom wrote letters except to her family, unless in reference to some purpose she had strongly at heart. Writing was her constant occupation, and she was not tempted to indulge in it as a recreation. Her letters are brief, and strictly to the point, but always characteristic in feeling and expression; and, even at the risk of the repetition of matter contained in her journals or her books, I shall give copious extracts from such as have come into my hands.

E. D. C.
Jamaica Plain, Mass., 1889.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

Page
Introduction[iii]
Chapter.
I.Genealogy and Parentage[11]
II.Childhood[16]
III.Fruitlands[32]
IV.The Sentimental Period[56]
V.Authorship[75]
VI.The Year of Good Luck[110]
VII."Hospital Sketches"[136]
VIII.Europe, and "Little Women"[170]
IX.Europe[204]
X.Family Changes[263]
XI.Last Years[329]
XII.Conclusion[387]

ILLUSTRATIONS.

Page
Portrait of Miss Alcott[Frontispiece]
Photogravure by A. W. Elson & Co., from a photograph byNotman (negative destroyed), taken in 1883. The facsimileof her writing is an extract from a letter to herpublisher, written from her hospital retreat a few weeksprevious to her death.
Orchard House ("Apple Slump"), Concord,Mass., the Home of the Alcotts, 1858 to1878[93]
Engraved by John Andrew & Son Co., from a photograph.
Portrait of Miss Alcott[140]
Photogravure by A. W. Elson & Co., from a photographtaken just previous to her going to Washington as a hospitalnurse, in 1862.
Fac-simile of Miss Alcott's Writing[362]
Extract from a letter to her publisher, January, 1886.
Fac-simile of Preface to the New Edition of"A Modern Mephistopheles," now firstprinted[380]

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT.

CHAPTER I.

GENEALOGY AND PARENTAGE.