At Aunt Henshaw’s, my passion for rummaging drawers and boxes of knickknacks was abundantly gratified.  The old lady fairly over-flowed with the milk of human kindness, and allowed me to put her things in disorder as often as I chose.  There was an album quilt, among her possessions, which I never grew tired of admiring.  The pieces were all of an octagon shape, arranged in little circles of different colors; and in the centre of each circle was a piece of white muslin, on which was written in tiny characters the name of the person who had made the circle, and two lines of poetry.  This album quilt was a good many years old; and had been made by the ladies of the neighborhood, as a tribute of respect to Aunt Henshaw, on account of her many acts of bravery and presence of mind during the trying times of the Revolution.

The old lady was never weary of describing the grand quilting, which took place in an old stone barn on the premises; when they all came at one o’clock, and sitting down to work, scarcely spoke a word until six, when the quilt was triumphantly pronounced to be completed; and taking it from the frame, they proceeded to arrange a large table, set out with strawberries and cream, dough-nuts, chickens, cider, and almost every incongruous eatable that could be mentioned.  Washington was then President, and after drinking his health in cider, coffee, and tea, which last was then a very precious commodity, being served in cups exactly the size of a doll’s set, they all in turn related stories or personal anecdotes of the great General, of whom Aunt Henshaw never spoke without the greatest reverence and enthusiasm.  He died when I was very young, so that I never saw him; but I have visited his tomb, and his residence at Mount Vernon, and have also seen portraits of him that were pronounced to be life-like by those who were intimately acquainted with him.

Aunt Henshaw had actually entertained La Fayette at her house for a whole night, and she showed me the very room he slept in; while Cousin Statia produced an album in which he had written his name.  I always experienced a burning desire to possess some memento of the distinguished men whose names are woven in the annals of our country; and seating myself at the table with the album before me, I spent several hours in trying to copy the illustrious autograph.  But all my efforts were vain; I could produce nothing like it, and was obliged to return the book to its favored owner.

I delighted to spell out the album quilt until I knew almost every line by heart; while the curious medley which these different scraps of poetry presented reminded me very much of a play, in which one person repeats a line, to which another must find a rhyme.  When Aunt Henshaw died, which was just about the time that I was grown up, she left the quilt to me in her will; because, as she said.  I had always been so fond of it.  I still have it carefully packed away, and regard it as quite a treasure.