This same Mary Goodwin laughed one day during prayers when Miss Pierce exclaimed “Mary Goodwin, Mary Goodwin you will be cast into outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth!” To which Mary replied, “Then I suppose those who have no teeth will have to gum it!” Miss Pierce’s house was built for six hundred dollars. Mr. John P. Brace’s father was the writing master and was always called “Daddy Brace.” LETTER FROM MRS. ANNA M. RICHARDS. ORANGE, N. J. March 18, 1902 I received your letter last evening and hasten to comply with your request that I should write down some of my “personal memories” of Miss Mary Pierce. The remembrance of our intercourse with her is so fresh and so delightful that it is hard for me to realize that it continued less than three years, and that nearly forty years have passed since that time. I well remember the charming circles she used to gather round her tea-table—the repast very simple—a plate of shaved, smoked beef, some preserves and a basket of cake—but the conversation, a veritable “feast of reason.” One of her pupils, Mrs. Whiting (the mother of Miss Lizzie Whiting,) once said to me that she thought Miss Pierce was a marked instance of the mellowing power of age, for the girls used to be very much afraid of Miss Mary’s black eyes. She dined with us one Thanksgiving, her last Thanksgiving day on earth. Her conversation was most interesting, dealing largely with the past. I wish I had taken it down at the time. One thing I distinctly recall. At one time she said her sister, the principal of the school, was so discouraged with their prospects, that she felt they must probably go elsewhere—but opening her Bible, the first words that met her eye were, “Trust in the Lord, and do good, so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.” This she accepted as a word of promise to them, and a direction to them to remain in Litchfield. It was Miss Pierce’s custom to close her house in the Fall for the winter, but at the time of which I speak, she was staying at home, busily engaged she told me looking over old papers. She died in New Haven I think the following June. I remember her speaking once of Dr. Beecher’s preaching, that when he came to Litchfield from Easthampton, the images in his sermons were drawn largely from the sea, but that soon the everlasting hills furnished them, and that after he went to Boston, she heard him talk, almost with a shock, about getting up steam. As you doubtless know, the lot on which the Parsonage stands was given to the Society by Miss Pierce. I remember thinking at the time how hard it must be for her to give up the beautiful clump of trees, standing upon it almost a little grove, as I picture them, which it was necessary to cut down. I fear these few reminiscences will be very