Our home life was simple enough. We went early to bed and were up with the lark. I was arrayed in a pinafore and wore a frill—which I abhorred—and took but little pleasure in my personal appearance—a very great mistake, happily avoided by the present generation. We children had each a little bed of garden ground which we cultivated to the best of our power. Ours was really a case of plain living and high thinking. Of an evening the room was dimly lighted by means of a dip candle which constantly required snuffing. To write with we had the ordinary goose-quill. The room, rarely used, in which we received company was called the parlour. Goloshes had not then come into use, and women wore in muddy weather pattens or clogs. The simple necessaries of life were very dear, and tea and coffee and sugar were sold at what would now be deemed an exorbitant price. Postage was prohibitory, and when any one went to town he was laden with letters. As little light as possible was admitted into the house in order to save the window-tax. The farmer was generally arrayed in a blue coat and yellow brass buttons. The gentleman had a frilled shirt and wore Hessian boots. I never saw a magazine of the fashions; nowadays they are to be met with everywhere. Yet we were never dull, and in the circle in which I moved we never heard of the need of change. People were content to live and die in the village without going half-a-dozen miles away, with the exception of the farmers, who might drive to the nearest market town, transact their business, dine at the ordinary, and then, after a smoke and a glass of brandy and water and a chat with their fellow-farmers, return home. Of the rush and roar of modern life, with its restlessness and eagerness for something new and sensational, we had not the remotest idea. CHAPTER V. OUT ON THE WORLD.