very fond of learning by heart anything that took her fancy, and
would memorize, apparently without effort, verses that were read to
her. A telling instance of this early love of poetry may be cited,
when on one occasion, while she was yet a tiny child of four, a
friend of her father's, who was going to a distant city, asked her
what he could bring her as a present, and she replied, "Verses,
please."

At twelve years of age she was writing fairly creditable poems, but
was afraid to offer them for publication, lest in after years she
might regret their almost inevitable crudity. So she did not publish
anything until after her school days were ended.

Her education was neither extensive nor elaborate, and embraced
neither High School nor College. A nursery governess for two years
at home, three years at an Indian day school half a mile from her
home, and two years in the central school of the City of Brantford
was the extent of her educational training. But besides this she
acquired a wide general knowledge, having been, through childhood
and early girlhood, a great reader, especially of poetry. Before
she was twelve years old she had read every line of Scott's poems,
every line of Longfellow, much of Byron, Shakespeare, and such books
as Addison's "Spectator," Foster's Essays and Owen Meredith.

The first periodicals to accept her poems and place them before
the public were "Gems of Poetry," a small magazine published in
New York, and "The Week," established by the late Professor Goldwin
Smith, of Toronto, the "New York Independent," and "Toronto Saturday
Night." Since then she has contributed to "The Athenaeum," "The
Academy," "Black and White," "The Pall Mall Gazette," "The Daily