10
	   Mary Bilton�s Birthday.
and Eliza.             Stayed till 12, as usual.
  A good part of this day, I have been thinking
of the fact that it is the anniversary of Mary
Bilton�s birthday.       (It�s strange and yet fami-
liar to find myself writing that name again.)
She must now be thirty-five or thirty-six �
I think the latter, though I used to willingly
cheat myself into belief in the minor age,
she abetting; both of us preferring to suppose her only
one year older than I.           Now, after ten
years � eleven � have passed, when it�s
all dead and buried, what does she ap-
pear to have been to my present judgment?
and how am I affected by her memory?
I think I�ll put it down.
  She was a very lovely girl, certainly.   I remem-
ber my sister Naomi using those words,
describing her, after our John Street party,
which introduced her to our folks.   She had
beautiful silky-brown hair (I have a little
braid of it, now, done up in a true-lover�s knot)
� almost invariably worn in smooth and soft, 
plain braids (what was then called Madonna
fashion) though I recollect her appearing
on rare occasions in ringlets.     Her eyes were
gray-blue, of no unusual size, earnest and
grave enough on occasion and sometimes merry,