Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books by Horatia K. F. Eden
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grave by the hand of one who, more fortunate than myself, had the
chance of visiting the spot. I think that the point which children will be most anxious to know about Mrs. Ewing is how she wrote her stories. Did she evolve the plots and characters entirely out of her own mind, or were they in any way suggested by the occurrences and people around her? The best plan of answering such questions will be for me to give a list of her stories in succession as they were written, and to tell, as far as I can, what gave rise to them in my sister's mind; in doing this we shall find that an outline biography of her will naturally follow. Nearly all her writings first appeared in the pages of _Aunt Judy's Magazine_, and as we realize this fact we shall see how close her connection with it was, and cease to wonder that the Magazine should end after her death. Those who lived with my sister have no difficulty in tracing likenesses between some of the characters in her books, and many whom she met in real life; but let me say, once for all, that she never drew "portraits" of people, and even if some of us now and then caught glimpses of ourselves under the clothing she had robed us in, we only felt ashamed to think how unlike we really were to the glorified beings whom she put before the public. Still less did she ever do with her pen, what an artistic family of children used to threaten to do with their pencils when they were vexed with each other, namely, to "draw you ugly." It was one of the strongest features in my sister's character that she |
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