“Shall I tell you about myself? Well, I was very happy as a child, roamin’ among the berry pastures, goin’ to the deestrict school, and helpin’ Mother about the house. Mother was a great-hearted, good woman, and Father was an honest, hard-working man. I never thought that I should be a public singer, and sit in the gallery, and sing _countre_ in the ‘Easter Anthem.’ I never thought I should sing before the great Daniel Webster, on Independence Day. “It all came about in this way. Old Schoolmaster Mason opened a singin’ school in the vestry of the church, and asked me to attend. I always loved music, and I did not go to the school but a little while, before I found that I could sing _countre_. Even in a new piece that I had never seen, if I only had the words before me, I could make up a _countre_ to the singing of the air. “I learned to sing low tones that the people thought were wonderful. It used sometimes to trouble me because they seemed to think more about _how_ I sang, than _what_ I sang. “There was a young man in the neighborhood, at the time, named Peter Rugg. He is dead now. He used to listen to the _countre_ at the singin’ school as though he was spellbound. One night, after I had been singin’, he came to me, and asked leave to see me home. He was fine-looking, with curly hair and a high forehead, and he tried to sing tenor. I liked him, and, after a time, he used to visit me often, and one night he said,— “‘Hannah, if I ever should save money enough to marry anybody, it would be you; you do sing _countre_ so solemn.’ “I felt that he paid to me the greatest compliment that could be paid to a woman, and says I, says I,— “‘Peter, if I were ever to leave my home, I should want to jine my lot with yourn, you do sing so high.’ “I was kind of modest, and I didn’t wish to say any more than he did, but I really did love him, and I would have been glad to have married him. “Well, one winter, all the country round was thrown into a state of great fright, by a report that some woodchoppers had seen a catamount in the woods. Soon after this, sheep and pigs began to disappear, and the loss was laid to the catamount. There used to be catamounts in New England, and in the great woods, along the Pocassett coast, one would be seen occasionally. “The excitement grew. A great many people began to think that they had seen the catamount, though whether there was one, at that time, in Massachusetts, no one can say. “One day, when the people were all excited about the catamount, Peter Rugg took tea at our house, and went with me in the evenin’ to the singin’ school. I sang my best that night, and Peter was so pleased that he said to me: ‘Hannah, whatever may happen, I will always be true to you.’ I was very happy, and we left the vestry to walk home.