She went to a dame's school three months every year. Samuel Wales
carted half a cord of wood to pay for her schooling, and she learned
to write and read in the New England Primer. Next to her, on the split
log bench, sat a little girl named Hannah French. The two became fast
friends. Hannah was an only child, pretty and delicate, and very much
petted by her parents. No long hard tasks were set those soft little
fingers, even in those old days when children worked as well as their
elders. Ann admired and loved Hannah, because she had what she,
herself, had not; and Hannah loved and pitied Ann because she had not
what she had. It was a sweet little friendship, and would not have
been, if Ann had not been free from envy and Hannah humble and
pitying.

When Ann told her what a long stint she had to do before school,
Hannah would shed sympathizing tears.

Ann, after a solemn promise of secrecy, told her about the indentures
one day. Hannah listened with round, serious eyes; her brown hair was
combed smoothly down over her ears. She was a veritable little Puritan
damsel herself.

"If I could only get the papers, I wouldn't have to mind her, and work
so hard," said Ann.

Hannah's eyes grew rounder. "Why, it would be sinful to take them!"
said she.

Ann's cheeks blazed under her wondering gaze, and she said no more.

When she was about eleven years old, one icy January day, Hannah