My father must have been quite advanced in years before he wholly gave up his ambitions to do something in life besides grinding the farmers’ corn. Indeed, I am not sure that he ever gave them up; but doubtless, as the task seemed more hopeless and the chain grew stronger, he slowly looked to his children to satisfy the dreams that life once held out to him; and so this thought mingled with the rest in his strong endeavor that we should all have the best education he could get for us, so that we need not be millers as he had been. Well, none of us are millers! The old family is scattered far and wide; the last member of the little band long since passed down the narrow road, and out between the great high hills into the far-off land of freedom and opportunity of which my father dreamed. But I should be glad to believe to-day that a single one over whom he watched with such jealous care ever gave as much real service to the world as this simple, kindly man whose name was heard scarcely farther than the water that splashed and tumbled on the turning wheel. I started bravely to tell about my life,—to write my story as it seems to me; and here I am halting and rambling like a garrulous old man over the feelings and remembrances of long ago. By a strange trick of memory I seem to stand for a few moments out in the old front yard, a little barefoot child. The long summer twilight has grown dim, and the quiet country evening is at hand. Beyond the black trees I hear the falling water spilling over the wooden dam; and farther on, around the edges of the pond, the hoarse croak of the frogs sounds clear and harsh in the still night air. Above the little porch that shelters the front door is my father’s study window. I look in and see him sitting at his desk with his shaded lamp; before him is his everlasting book, and his pale face and long white hair bend over the infatuating pages with all the confidence and trust of a little child. For a simple child he always was, from the time when he first saw the light until his friends and comrades lowered him into the sandy loam of the old churchyard. I see him through the little panes of glass, as he bends above the book. The chapter is finished and he wakens from his reverie into the world in which he lives and works; he takes off his iron-framed spectacles, lays down his book, comes downstairs and calls me away from my companions with the old story that it is time to come into the house and get my lessons. For the hundredth time I protest that I want to play,—to finish my unending game; and again he tells me no, that John Stuart Mill began studying Greek when he was only three years old. And with heavy heart and muttered imprecations on John Stuart Mill, I am taken away from my companions and my play, and set down beside my father with my book. I can feel even now my sorrow and despair, as I leave my playmates and turn the stupid leaves. But I would give all that I possess to-day to