Further to illustrate her personality, I think no one much in her
company at any age could have failed to note an exceedingly lively
tongue and a general air of executive ability.

If I am to be truthful, I must say that I recall few indications of
budding authorship, save an engrossing diary (kept for six months
only), and a devotion to reading.

Her "literary passions" were the _Arabian Nights_, _Scottish Chiefs_,
_Don Quixote_, _Thaddeus of Warsaw_, _Irving's Mahomet_, _Thackeray's
Snobs_, _Undine_, and the _Martyrs of Spain_. These volumes, joined to
an old green Shakespeare and a Plum Pudding edition of Dickens, were
the chief of her diet.

But stay! while I am talking of literary tendencies, I do remember a
certain prize essay entitled "Pictures in the Clouds,"--not so called
because it _took_ the prize, alas! but because it competed for it.

There is also a myth in the household (doubtless invented by my mother)
that my sister learned her letters from the signs in the street, and
taught herself to read when scarcely out of long clothes. This may be
cited as a bit of "corroborative detail," though personally I never
believed in it.

Johnson's Sister,
N. A. S.


Like many who have won success in literature, her taste and aptitude