June.–A lot of us went down to Sucker Brook this afternoon. Abbie Clark was one and she told us some games to play sitting down on the grass. We played “Simon says thumbs up” and then we pulled the leaves off from daisies and said,
“Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief,
Doctor, lawyer, merchant, chief,”
to see which we would marry. The last leaf tells the story. Anna’s came “rich man” every time and she thinks it is true because Eugene Stone has asked to marry her and he is quite well off. She is 13 and he is 17. He is going now to his home in St. Paul, Minn., but he is coming back for her some day. Tom Eddy is going to be groomsman and Emma Wheeler bridesmaid. They have all the arrangements made. She has not shown any of Eugene Stone’s notes to Grandmother yet for she does not think k is worth while. Anna broke the seal on Tom Eddy’s page in her mystic book, although he wrote on it, “Not to be opened until December 8, 1859.” He says:
“Dear Anna,–I hope that in a few years I will see you and Stone living on the banks of the Mississippi, in a little cottage, as snug as a bug in a rug, living in peace, so that I can come and see you and have a good time.–Yours,
Thos. C. Eddy.”
Anna says if she does marry Eugene Stone and he forgets, after two or three years to be as polite to her as he is now she shall look up at him with her sweetest smile and say, “Miss Anna, won’t you have a little more sugar in your tea?” When I went to school this morning Juliet Ripley asked, “Where do you think Anna Richards is now? Up in a cherry tree in Dr Cheney’s garden.” Anna loves cherries. We could see her from the chapel window.
June 7.–Alice Jewett took Anna all through their new house to-day which is being built and then they went over to Mr Noah T. Clarke’s partly finished house and went all through that. A dog came out of Cat Alley and barked at them and scared Anna awfully. She said she almost had a conniption fit but Emma kept hold of her. She is so afraid of thunder and lightning and dogs.
Old Friend Burling brought Grandfather a specimen of his handwriting to-day to keep. It is beautifully written, like copper plate. This is the verse he wrote and Grandfather gave it to me to paste in my book of extracts:
DIVINE LOVE.
Could we with ink the ocean fill,
Was the whole earth of parchment made,
Was every single stick a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade;
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could that scroll contain the whole
Though stretched from sky to sky.
Transcribed by William S. Burling, Canandaigua, 1859, in the 83rd year of his age.