University of Virginia Library

PREFACE.

Out of a simple woman's heart these rivulets of rhyme have run. They may not be great, nor broad, nor deep. She trusts that they are pure. She wrote these verses often in sorrow, perplexity and distress. She publishes them in the hope that they may be souvenirs of the years and the scenes which cannot die out of the memory of this generation. She lays this simple offering on the altar of our common country's literature. She will feel rewarded if though these buds and flowers be not

very beautiful, they give to any soul the perfume of simple truthfulness and genuine feeling. “Homely” was once an endearing epithet, reminding the heart of its most sacred earthly associations. In this sense, the writer will be gratified to have her poems pronounced “homely.”