“I was born into my home that I may write my books; my poor little books, my little, weak, crooked-backed children! Would Fredrika Bremer have written her books without her exceptional home-training, or Sara Coleridge, or any other of the lesser lights shine as they do shine, if the spark had not been blown upon by the breath of their home-fires? When I am sorry sometimes that I can not do what I would and go where I would, I think that I have not gathered together all the fragments that are around loose between the plank walk and the soldiers’ monument! Said mother, ‘How do you make a book? Do you take a little from this book and a little from that?’”
“What did you say?” asked Dine.
“Oh, I said that I took a tone from her voice, an expression from father’s eyes, a curl from your head, a word from Gus’s lips, a laugh from Sue Greyson, a sigh from Dr. Lake, an apple blossom from Mr. Bird’s orchard, a spray of golden rod from the wayside, a chat from loungers in the Park, a wise saying from Miss Jewett—”
“That’s rather a conglomeration,” said Dinah.
“That is life, as I see it and live it.”
“What do you take from yourself?” asked Mr. Hammerton.
“I have all my life from the time that I cried over my first lie and prayed that I might have curly hair, to the present moment, when I am glad and sorry about a thousand things.”
“What did mother say?”
“She said that any one could write a book, then.”
“Let her try, then! It’s awful hard about the grammar and spelling and the beginning a chapter and ending it and introducing people!”