—­Now when the little pig has all his materials ready, and sees the great snake come gliding, gliding—­I turn the situation over to the children.  What did he do with the rope, the snare and the horn?  They work it out each in his own way.  There is a mighty wrangling all around the hearth.

One day is never really like another, though it seems so.

Perhaps being used to the sight of the Iroquois at Lake George, makes it impossible for me to imagine what the settlers dread, and that is an attack.  We are shut around by forests.  In primitive life so much time and strength go to the getting of food that we can think of little else.

It is as bad to slave at work as to slave at pleasure.  But God may forgive what people cannot help.

There is a very old woman among the settlers whom they call Granny.  We often sit together.  She cannot get a gourd edge betwixt her nose and chin when she drinks, and has forgotten she ever had teeth.  She does not expect much; but there is one right she contends for, and that is the right of ironing her cap by stretching it over her knee.  When I have lived in this settlement long enough, my nose and chin may come together, and I shall forget my teeth.  But this much I will exact of fate.  My cap shall be ironed.  I will not—­I will not iron it by stretching it over my knee!

Count du Chaumont would be angry if he saw me learning to weave, for instance.  You would not be angry.  That makes a difference between you as men which I feel but cannot explain.

We speak English with our neighbors.  Paul, who is to be an American, must learn his language well.  I have taught him to read and write.  I have taught him the history of his family and of his father’s country.  His head is as high as my breast.  When will my head be as high as his breast?

Skenedonk loves you as a young superior brother.  I have often wondered what he thought about when he went quietly around at your heels.  You told me he had killed and scalped, and in spite of education, was as ready to kill and scalp again as any white man is for war.

I dread him like a toad, and wish him to keep on his side of the walk.  He is always with you, and no doubt silently urges, “Come back to the wigwams that nourished you!”

Am I mistaken?  Are we moving farther and farther apart instead of approaching each other?  Oh, Louis, does this road lead to nothing?

I am glad I gave you that key.  It was given thoughtlessly, when I was in a bubble of joy.  But if you have kept it, it speaks to you every day.

Sophie Saint-Michel told me man sometimes piles all his tokens in a retrospective heap, and says, “Who the deuce gave me this or that?”

Sophie’s father used to be so enraged at his wife and daughter because he could not restore their lost comforts.  But this is really a better disposition than a mean subservience to misfortune.