“The fact is, father was very fond of all his children and frolicked and romped with them. All the work there was to do (chores we called it) was to take care of a horse and cow, and in spring make garden, and, after wood-spell, carry in and pile up wood. I remember that we were told if we made the garden so and so, or did this or that, we should go fishing; and we used to go, the whole family of us, to Little Pond or Great Pond, and catch ‘Perchy, roachy, bullhead,’ as we sang it. One afternoon at Little Pond, where father had taken Henry and me in the chaise (‘one-hoss’), we were catching roach when the church-bell rang, and father remembered that it was Preparatory Lecture, and the way we scurried in the old vehicle may be imagined.” Mrs. Stowe writes: “I remember when the wood was all in and piled and the chips swept up, then father tackled the horse into the cart and proclaimed a grand fishing party down to Little Pond; and how we all floated among the lily-pads in our boat, christened ‘The Yellow Perch,’ and every one of us caught a string of fish, which we displayed in triumph on our return.” The father was very wise in directing the homely labors of the household, so that they became occasions of mental stimulus. “I have the image of my father still, as he sat working the apple-peeler. ‘Come, George,’ he said, ‘I’ll tell you what we’ll do to make the evening go off. You and I’ll take turns and see who’ll tell the most out of Scott’s novels’ (for those were the days when the ‘Tales of my Landlord’ and ‘Ivanhoe’ had just appeared); and so they took them novel by novel, reciting scenes and incidents, which kept the eyes of all the children wide open and made the work go on without flagging. “Occasionally he would raise a point of theology on some incident narrated, and ask the opinion of one of his boys and run a sort of tilt with him, taking up the wrong side of the question for the sake of seeing how the youngster could practise his logic. If the party on the other side did not make a fair hit at him, however, he would stop and explain to him what he ought to have said: ‘The argument lies so, my son; do that and you’ll trip me up.’ Much of his teaching to his children was in this informal way.” A kindly country life surrounded the minister’s family, that could not fail of stamping the impress of its plain sincerity upon all who were brought in contact with it. Once a year this came to its climax in the winter’s wood-spell, when all the farmers upon a given day added their contribution to the minister’s wood-pile—a festival of kindness and good cheer. “The kind farmers wanted to see all the children, and we were busy as bees in waiting upon them. The boys heated the flip-irons and passed around the cider and flip, while Aunt Esther and the daughters were as busy in serving the doughnuts, cake, and cheese.”