fair writer and speller and, like her father very fond of reading. She
learned to cook and sew, make butter and cheese, spin and weave, and
was very domestic in all her tastes. The Reads and Anthonys were near
neighbors, and although differing widely in religious belief, a subject
of much prominence in those days, they were on terms of intimate
friendship even before the ties were made still closer by marriage
between the two families.

Both Anthonys and Laphams were Quakers as far back as the sect was in
existence. Both were families of wealth and influence, and when
Humphrey and Hannah were married she received from her parents a house
and thirty acres of land, which were entailed on her children. Silver
spoons are still in the family, which were part of her dowry more than
a century ago. Hannah Lapham Anthony was a most saintly woman and,
because of her beautiful religious character was made an elder and
given an exalted position on the "high seat."[1]

[Illustration: HOME OF LUCY READ, ADAMS, MASS.]

She was a very handsome brunette and was noted for the beauty and
elegance of her Quaker attire, her bonnets always being made in New
York. Humphrey never attained the "high seat;" he was too worldly. His
ambition was constantly to add more to his broad acres, to take a
bigger drove of cattle to Boston than any of his neighbors, and to get
a higher price for his own than any other Berkshire cheese would bring.
He had a number of farms and a hundred cows, while his wife made the
best cheese and was the finest housekeeper in all that part of the
country. The fame of her coffee and biscuits, apple dumplings and
chicken dinners, spread far and wide. Their kitchen was forty feet
long. One end was used for the dining-room, with the table seating