care that pressed upon my thoughts the last thing at night, and woke
in the morning with a dreary sense of pain and pressure, of
something which weighed me to the earth.'

Mary Russell Mitford was born on the 16th of December 1787. She was
the only child of her parents, who were well connected; her mother
was an heiress. Her father belonged to the Mitfords of the North.
She describes herself as 'a puny child, with an affluence of curls
which made her look as if she were twin sister to her own great
doll.' She could read at three years old; she learnt the Percy
ballads by heart almost before she could read. Long after, she used
to describe how she first studied her beloved ballads in the
breakfast-room lined with books, warmly spread with its Turkey
carpet, with its bright fire, easy chairs, and the windows opening
to a garden full of flowers,--stocks, honeysuckles, and pinks. It
is touching to note how, all through her difficult life, her path
was (literally) lined with flowers, and how the love of them
comforted and cheered her from the first to the very last. In her
saddest hours, the passing fragrance and beauty of her favourite
geraniums cheered and revived her. Even when her mother died she
found comfort in the plants they had tended together, and at the
very last breaks into delighted descriptions of them.

She was sent to school in the year 1798 to No. 22 Hans Place, to a
Mrs. St. Quintin's. It seems to have been an excellent
establishment. Mary learnt the harp and astronomy; her taste for
literature was encouraged. The young ladies, attired as
shepherdesses, were also taught to skip through many mazy movements,
but she never distinguished herself as a shepherdess. She had
greater success in her literary efforts, and her composition 'on