Emily of New Moon

plays cards with Caroline. I talk to her a great deal because she says it amuses her and I have told her a great many things but I have never told her that I write poetry. If I did I know she would make me recite it to her and I feel she is not the right person to recite your poetry to. And I do not talk about you or Mother to her, though she tries to make me. I told her all about Lofty John and his bush and going to Father Cassidy. She chuckled over that and said she always liked to talk to the Catholic Priests because they were the only men in the world a woman could talk to for more than ten minutes without other women saying she was throwing herself at their heads.

“Aunt Nancy says a great many things like that. She and Caroline talk a great deal to each other about things that happened in the Priest and Murray families. I like to sit and listen. They don’t stop just as things are getting interesting the way Aunt Elizabeth and Aunt Laura do. A good many things I don’t understand but I will remember them and will find out about them sometime. I have written descriptions of Aunt Nancy and Caroline in my Jimmy-book. I keep the book hid behind the wardrobe in my room because I found Caroline rummidging in my trunk one day. I must not call Aunt Nancy Great-Aunt. She says it makes her feel like Methoosaleh. She tells me all about the men who were in love with her. It seems to me they all behaved pretty much the same. I don’t think that was exciting but she says it was. She tells me about all the parties and dances they used to have here long ago. Wyther Grange is bigger than New Moon and the furniture is much handsomer but it is harder to feel acquainted with it.

“There are many interesting things in this house. I love to look at them. There is a Jakobite glass on a stand in the parlor. It was a glass an old ansester of the Priests had long ago in Scotland and it has a thistle and a rose on it and they used it to drink Prince Charlie’s health with and for no other purpose. It is a very valewable airloom and Aunt Nancy prizes it highly. And she has a pickled snake in a big glass jar in the china cabinet. It is hideous but fascinating. I shiver when I see it but yet I go to look at it every day. Something seems to drag me to it. Aunt Nancy has a bureau in her room with glass knobs and a vase shaped like a green fish sitting up on end and a Chinese draggon with a curly tail, and a case of sweet little stuffed humming birds and a sandglass for boiling eggs by and a framed wreath made out of the hair of all the dead Priests and lots of old dagerrotipes. But the thing I like the best of all is a great silvery shining ball hanging from the lamp in the parlour. It reflects everything like a little fairy world. Aunt Nancy calls it a gazing-ball, and says that when she is dead I am to have it. I wish she hadn’t said that because I want the ball so much that I can’t help wondering when she will die and that makes me feel wicked. I am to have the chessy-cat door knocker and her gold earrings, too. These are Murray airlooms. Aunt Nancy says the Priest airlooms must go to the Priests. I will like the chessy-cat but I don’t want the earrings. I’d rather not have people notice my ears.

“I have to sleep alone. I feel frightened but I think if I could get over being frightened I’d like it. I don’t mind the swallows now. It’s just being alone so far away from anyone. But it is lovely to be able to stretch out your legs just as you like and not have anybody scold you for skwirming. And when I wake up in the night and think of a splendid line of poetry (because the things that you think of like that always seem the best) I can get right out of bed and write it right down in my Jimmy-book. I couldn’t do that at home and then by morning I’d likely forget it. I thought of such a nice line last night. ‘Lilies lifted pearly chaluses (a chalus is a kind of cup only more poetical) where bees were drowned in sweetness’ and I felt happy because I was sure they were two better lines than any I had composed yet.

“I am allowed to go into the kitchen and help Caroline cook. Caroline is a good cook but sometimes she makes a mistake and this vexes Aunt Nancy because she likes nice things to eat. The other day Caroline made the barley soup far too thick and when Aunt Nancy looked at her plate she said ‘Lord, is this a dinner or a poltis?’ Caroline said ‘It is good enough for a Priest and what is good enough for a Priest is good enough for a Murray,’ and Aunt Nancy said ‘Woman, the Priests eat of the crumbs that fall from the Murrays’ tables,” and Caroline was so mad she cried. And Aunt Nancy said to me ‘Emily, never marry a Priest’⁠—just like Old Kelly, when I have no notion of marrying one of them. I don’t like any of them I’ve seen very much but they seem to me a good deal like other people. Jim is the best of them but impident.

“I like the Wyther Grange breakfasts better than the New Moon breakfasts. We have toast and bacon and marmalade⁠—nicer than porridge.

“Sunday is more amusing here than at New Moon but not so holy. Nice