An Old-Fashioned Girl
by
Louisa May Alcott
Web-Books.Com
An Old-Fashioned Girl
Preface .........................................................................................................................................3
1. Polly Arrives ............................................................................................................................4
2. New Fashions .......................................................................................................................14
3. Polly's Troubles ....................................................................................................................24
4. Little Things...........................................................................................................................33
5. Scrapes ..................................................................................................................................44
6. Grandma ................................................................................................................................55
7. Good-By.................................................................................................................................76
8. Six Years Afterward ..............................................................................................................87
9. Lessons .................................................................................................................................99
10. Brothers And Sisters ........................................................................................................109
11. Needles And Tongues ......................................................................................................123
12. Forbidden Fruit .................................................................................................................134
13. The Sunny Side .................................................................................................................147
14. Nipped In The Bud ............................................................................................................160
15. Breakers Ahead ................................................................................................................171
16. A Dress Parade .................................................................................................................183
17. Playing Grandmother .......................................................................................................191
18. The Woman Who Did Not Dare ........................................................................................204
19. Tom's Success ...............................................................................................................213
Preface
AS a preface is the only place where an author can with propriety explain a purpose or apologize for shortcomings, I venture to avail myself of the privilege to make a statement for the benefit of my readers.
As the first part of 'An Old-Fashioned Girl' was written in 1869, the demand for a sequel, in beseeching little letters that made refusal impossible, rendered it necessary to carry my heroine boldly forward some six or seven years into the future. The domestic nature of the story makes this audacious proceeding possible; while the lively fancies of my young readers will supply all deficiencies, and overlook all discrepancies.
This explanation will, I trust, relieve those well-regulated minds, who cannot conceive of such literary lawlessness, from the bewilderment which they suffered when the same experiment was tried in a former book.
The 'Old-Fashioned Girl' is not intended as a perfect model, but as a possible improvement upon [Page] the Girl of the Period, who seems sorrowfully ignorant or ashamed of the good old fashions which make woman truly
