However, what interested me now was to hear from my grandmother that the lady at the White House had not only been very beautiful, but had been clever enough to write a book. As to her looks, my grandmother said that she and her husband made such a fine pair that even people that met them often turned and looked after them. They were both very tall, he being six feet three inches, and she being six feet; and they looked so stately that people made their admiration heard. My grandmother said that they were so fond of each other that they always walked arm-in-arm, as when lovers; and for this reason they were admired by those who would otherwise have frowned on their rich clothes and proud grace. But one day, when they had returned from riding, he, in assisting her from her horse, squeezed her breast, and this accident somehow caused her death. Such was my grandmother's account of former occupants of the White House. When I told these things to "Trousers," saying that we ought not to have robbed that orchard, he claimed that we had a right to the apples, because my grandmother used to live there. It was a great consolation to hear this, but still, I claimed the only right, and trusted that he would not lead others there on the sly. But what I mean to say is this--the wonderful effect it had on me, young as I was, to hear that a relative of mine, however distant, had written a book! My feelings will be understood by all those who remember what books were to them as children. To children books do not reach millions, nor thousands; and when they have a book they think it is the first and last copy, and never dream that there are thousands more. It would be very hard to describe a child's opinion of a book, but there are thousands of grown people who are as innocent of the business side of literature, and who are still children in their knowledge of books. In fact, speaking of my own experience, I did not know until three or four years ago but what books must be published on their merit, and could not be published otherwise. I did not know, what I know so well now, that any person with money can publish a book, and that merit has little to do with it before publication, however much it may assist it after. Even now, speaking as the author of five books, I am still being surprised at the business side of literature. I find that books are pleasant things to brood on in an egg state, but that they are no sooner hatched and begin to move than they fill one with disgust and disappointment; and the author feels like the hen that without knowing hatched a brood of ducklings and, to her disgust, saw them run into the water.