Section 4 of Daddy Long Legs. Dear Daddy Long Legs, behold me, a sophomore! I came up last Friday. Sorry to leave Lock Willow, but glad to see the campus again. It is a pleasant sensation to come back to something familiar. I'm beginning to feel at home in college and in command of the situation. I'm beginning, in fact, to feel at home in the world, as though I really belonged to it and not just crept in on sufferance. I don't suppose you understand in the least what I'm trying to say. A person important enough to be a trustee can't appreciate the feelings of a person unimportant enough to be a foundling. And now, Daddy, listen to this. Whom do you think I am rooming with? Sally McBride and Julia Rutledge Pendleton. It's the truth. We have a study in three little bedrooms. Voila! Sally and I decided last spring that we should like to room together, and Julia made up her mind to stay with Sally. Why, I can't imagine, for they're not a bit alike. But the Pendletons are naturally conservative and inimical. Fine word, huh? To change. Anyway, here we are. Think of Jerusha Abbott, late at the John Greer Home for Orphans, rooming with a Pendleton. This is a democratic country. Sally's running for class president, and unless all signs fail, she's going to be elected. Such an atmosphere of intrigue. You should see what politicians we are. Oh, I tell you, Daddy, when we women get our rights, you men will have to look alive in order to keep yours. Election comes next Saturday, and we're going to have a torchlight procession in the evening, no matter who wins. I am beginning chemistry. A most unusual study. I've never seen anything like it before. Molecules and atoms are the material employed. But I'll be in a position to discuss them more definitely next month. I'm also taking argumentation and logic. Also, history of the whole world. Also, plays William Shakespeare. Also, French. If this keeps up many years longer, I shall become quite intelligent. I should rather have elected economics than French, but I didn't dare, because I was afraid that unless I re-elected French, the professor would not let me pass. As it was, I just managed to squeeze through the June examination. But I will say that my high school preparation was not very adequate. There's one girl in the class who chatters away in French as fast as she does in English. She went abroad with her parents when she was a child and spent three years in a convent school. You can imagine how bright she is compared with the rest of us. Irregular verbs are mere playthings. I wish my parents had chucked me into a French convent when I was little instead of a foundling asylum. Oh, no, I don't either, no. Because then maybe I should never have known you. I'd rather know you than French. Goodbye, Daddy. I must call on Harriet Martin now, and, having discussed the chemical situation, casually drop a few thoughts on the subject of our next president. Yours in politics, J. Abbott. 17th October Dear Daddy Long Legs Supposing the swimming tank in the gymnasium were filled full of lemon jelly. Could a person trying to swim manage to keep on top, or would he sink? We were having lemon jelly for dessert when the question came up. We discussed it heatedly for half an hour, and it still unsettled. Sally thinks she could swim in it, but I am perfectly sure that the best swimmer in the world would sink. Wouldn't it be funny to be drowned in lemon jelly? Two other problems are engaging the attention of our table. First, what shape are the rooms in an octagon house? Some of the girls insist that they're square, but I think they'd have to be shaped like a piece of pie, don't you? Second, suppose there were a great big hollow sphere made of looking glass, and you were sitting inside. Where would it stop reflecting your face, and begin reflecting your back? The more one thinks about this problem, the more puzzling it becomes. You can see with what deep philosophical reflection we engage our leisure. Did I ever tell you about the election? It happened three weeks ago, but so fast do we live that three weeks is ancient history. Sally was elected, and we had a torchlight parade with transparencies, saying McBride forever, and a band consisting of fourteen pieces, three mouth organs, and eleven combs. We're very important persons now in 258. Julia and I come in for a great deal of reflected glory. It's quite a social strain to be living in the same house without a president. Bonne nuit, chère daddy. Acceptez mes compliments. Très respectus, je suis votre Judy. Twelfth, November. Dear daddy long legs, we beat the freshman at basketball yesterday. Of course we're pleased, but if we could beat the juniors, I'd be willing to be black and blue all over and stay in bed a week in a witch hazel compress. Sally has invited me to spend the Christmas vacation with her. She lives in Worcester, Massachusetts. Wasn't it nice of her? I shall love to go. I've never been in a private family in my life. I accept it lock willow, and the samples are grown up and old and don't count. But the McBrides have a house full of children. Well anyway, two or three. And a mother, and a father, and a grandmother, and an angora cat. It's a perfectly complete family. Packing your trunk and going away is more fun than staying behind. I'm terribly excited at the prospect. Seventh hour, I must run to rehearsal. I'm to be in the Thanksgiving theatricals. A prince in a tower with a velvet tunic and yellow curls. Isn't that a lark? Yours, J.A. Saturday. Do you want to know what I look like? Here's a photograph of all three that Leonora Fenton took. The light one who was laughing is Sally. And the tall one with her nose in the air is Julia.  She is really more beautiful than that, but the sun was in her eyes. Stone gate. Warchester mass. 31st December. Dear Daddy Long Legs, I meant to write to you before and thank you for your Christmas check. But life in the McBride household is very absorbing, and I don't seem to be able to find two consecutive minutes to spend at a desk. I bought a new gown, one that I didn't need but just wanted. My Christmas present this year is from Daddy Long Legs. My family just sent love. I've been having the most beautiful vacation visiting Sally. She lives in a big old-fashioned brick house with white trimmings set back from the street. Exactly the kind of house I used to look at so curiously when I was in the John Greer home. I wonder what it could be like inside. I never expected to see with my own eyes, but here I am. Everything is so comfortable and restful and home-like. I walk from room to room and drink in the furnishings. It is the most perfect house for children to be brought up in, with shadowy nooks for hide and seek, and open fireplaces for popcorn and an attic to romp in on rainy days and slippery banisters with a comfortable flat knob at the bottom. And a great, big, sunny kitchen and a nice, fat, sunny cook who has lived in the family 13 years and always saves out a piece of dough for the children to bake. Just the sight of such a house makes you want to be a child all over again. As for families, I never dreamed that they could be so nice.  We have the jolliest times at the table. Everybody laughs and jokes and talks at once, and we don't have to say grace beforehand. It's a relief not having to thank somebody for every mouthful you eat. I dare say I'm blasphemous that you'd be, too, if you'd offered as much obligatory thanks as I have. Such a lot of things we've done, I can't begin to tell you about them. Mr. McBride owns a factory, and Christmas Eve he had a tree for the employees' children. It was in the long packing room, which was decorated with evergreens and holly. Jimmy McBride was dressed as Santa Claus, and Sally and I helped him distribute the presents. To hear me, Daddy, but it was a funny sensation. I felt as benevolent as a trustee at the John Greer home. I kissed one sweet, sticky little boy, but I don't think I padded any of them on the head. And two days after Christmas, they gave a dance at their own house for me. It was the first really true ball I had ever attended. College doesn't count where we dance with girls. I had a new white evening gown, your Christmas present, many things. And the long white gloves and white satin slippers. The only drawback to my perfect, utter, absolute happiness was the fact that Mrs. Lippet couldn't see me leading the cantillion with Jimmy McBride. Tell her about it, please, the next time you visit the JGH. Yours ever, Judy Abbott. P.S., would you be terribly displeased, Daddy, if I didn't turn out to be a great author after all, but just a plain girl? 6.30, Saturday. Dear Daddy, we started to walk to town today, but mercy how it poured. I like winter to be winter with snow instead of rain. Julia's desirable uncle called again this afternoon and brought a five-pound box of chocolates. There are advantages you see about rooming with Julia. Our innocent prattle appeared to amuse him, and he waited for a later train in order to take tea in the study. We had an awful lot of trouble getting permission. It's hard enough entertaining fathers and grandfathers, but uncles are a step worse, and as for brothers and cousins, they are next to impossible. Julia had to swear that he was her uncle before a notary public, and then had the county clerk's certificate attached. Don't I know a lot of law? And even then, I doubt if we could have had our tea if the dean had chance to see how youngish and good-looking Uncle Jervis is. Anyway, we had it. With brown bread, Swiss cheese sandwiches, he helped make them, and then ate four. I told him that I had spent last summer at Lock Willow, and we had a beautiful, gasopy time about the samples, and the horses, and cows, and chickens. All the horses that he used to know are dead, except Grover, who was a baby colt at the time of his last visit. And poor Grove now is so old, he can just limp about the pasture. He asked if they still kept donuts in a yellow crock with a blue plate over it on the bottom shelf of the pantry, and they do. He wanted to know if there was still a woodchuck's hole under the pile of rocks in the night pasture. And there is!  The twenty-fifth great-grandson of one Master Jervis caught when he was a little boy. I called him Master Jervis to his face, but he didn't appear to be insulted. Julia says she's never seen him so amiable. He's usually pretty unapproachable. But Julia hasn't a bit of tact, and men, I find, require a great deal. They purr if you rub them the right way, and spit if you don't. That isn't a very elegant metaphor. I meant it figuratively. We're reading Marie Bashkirtcheff's journal. Isn't it amazing? Listen to this. Last night I was seized by a fit of despair that found utterance in moans, and that finally drove me to throw the dining-room clock into the sea. Makes me almost hope I'm not a genius. They must be very wearing to have about, and awfully destructive to the furniture. Mercy, how it keeps pouring! We shall have to swim to chapel tonight. Here's ever Judy, 20th January. Dear Daddy Long Legs, did you ever have a sweet baby girl who was stolen from the cradle in infancy? Maybe I am she. If we were in a novel, that would be the day no more, wouldn't it? It's really awfully queer not to know what one is. Sort of exciting and romantic. There are such a lot of possibilities. Maybe I'm not American. Lots of people aren't. I may be straight descended from the ancient Romans, or I may be a Viking's daughter, or I may be the child of a Russian exile, and belong by rights in a Siberian prison. Or maybe I'm a gypsy. I think perhaps I am. I have a very wandering spirit, though I haven't as yet had much chance to develop it. Do you know about that one scandalous blot in my career the time I ran away from the asylum because they punished me for stealing cookies? It's down in the books, free for any trustee to read. But really, Daddy, what could you expect when you put a hungry little nine-year-old girl in the pantry scouring knives with the cookie jar at her elbow, and go off and leave her alone, then suddenly pop in again. Wouldn't you expect to find her a bit crummy? And then when you jerk her by the elbow and box her ears and make her leave the table when the pudding comes until all the other children, and it's because she's a thief, wouldn't you expect her to run away? I only ran four miles. They caught me and brought me back, and every day for a week I was tied like a naughty puppy to a stake in the backyard while the other children were out at recess. Oh, dear, there's the chapel bell, and after chapel I have a committee meeting. I'm sorry, because I meant to write you a very entertaining letter this time. I'll veto Zane, share Daddy, PaxDB, Judy, P.S. There's one thing I'm perfectly sure of. I'm not a Chinaman. 4th February. Dear Daddy Long Legs, Jimmy McBride has sent me a Princeton banner as big as one end of the room. I'm very grateful to him for remembering me, but I don't know what on earth to do with it. Sally and Julia won't let me hang it up. Our room this year is furnished in red, and you can imagine what an effect we'd have if I added orange and black. But it's such nice, warm, thick felt. I hate to waste it. Would it be very improper to have it made into a bathrobe? My old one shrank when it was washed. I'm entirely admitted of late, telling you what I'm learning. But though you might not imagine it from my letters, my time is exclusively occupied with study. It's such a very bewildering matter to get educated in five branches at once. The Test of True Scholarship, says chemistry professor, is a painstaking passion for detail. Be careful not to keep your eyes glued to detail, says history professor, stand far enough away to get a perspective of the whole. You can see with what nicity we have to trim our sails between chemistry and history. I like the historical method best. If I say that William the Conqueror came over in 1492 and Columbus discovered America in 1100 or 1066 or whenever it was, that's mere detail that the professor overlooks. It gives a feeling of security and restfulness to the history recitation that is entirely lacking in chemistry. Sixth hour bell, I must go to the laboratory and look into a little matter of acids and salts and alkali.  If the theory worked, I ought to be able to neutralize that hole with good strong ammonia, potentine. Examinations next week, but who's afraid? Yours ever, Judy. Fifth March, Dear Daddy Long Legs, there is a March wind blowing and the sky is filled with heavy black moving clouds. The crows and the pine trees are making such a clamor. It's an intoxicating, exhilarating, calling noise. You want to close your books and be off over the hills to race with the wind. We had a paper chase last Saturday over five miles of squashy cross country. The fox, composed of three girls and a bushel or so of confetti, drove half an hour before the 27 hunters. I was one of the 27. Eight dropped by the wayside. We ended 19. The trail led over a hill through a cornfield and into a swamp where we had to leap lightly from hummock to hummock. Of course, half of us went in ankle deep. We kept losing the trail and we wasted 25 minutes over that swamp. We went down the hill through some woods and in at a barn window. The barn doors were all locked and the window was up high and pretty small. I don't call that fair, do you? But we didn't go through. We circumnavigated the barn and picked up the trail where it issued by way of a low shed roof onto the top of a fence. The fox thought he had us there but we fooled him. We went right away over two miles of rolling meadow and awfully hard to follow for the confetti was getting sparse. The rule is that it must be at most six feet apart but they were the longest six feet I ever saw. Finally, after two hours of steady trotting we tracked a missier fox into the kitchen of Crystal Spring. That's a farm where the girls go on bobsleds and hay wagons for chicken and waffle suppers and we found the three foxes placidly eating milk and honey and biscuits. They hadn't thought we would get that far. They were expecting us to stick in the barn window. Both sides insisted they had won. I think we did, don't you? Because we caught them before they got back to campus. Anyway, all nineteen of us settled like locusts staring clamored for honey. There wasn't enough to go round but Mrs. Crystal Spring that's our pet name for her she's by rights at Johnson brought up a jar of strawberry jam and a can of maple syrup just made last week and three loaves of brown bread. We didn't get back to college till half past six half an hour late for dinner and we went straight in without dressing perfectly unimpaired appetites. Then we all cut evening chapel the state of our boots being enough of an excuse. I never told you about examinations I passed everything with the utmost ease. I know the secret now and I'm never going to fail again. I shan't be able to graduate with honors though because of that beastly Latin frozen geometry freshman year but I don't care. I've been reading the English classics so long as you're happy. That's a quotation I've been reading the English classics Speaking of classics have you ever read Hamlet? If you haven't do it right off it's perfectly corking. I've been hearing about Shakespeare all my life but I had no idea he really wrote so well I always suspected him of going largely on his reputation I have a beautiful play I read a long time ago when I first learned to read I put myself to sleep every night by pretending I'm the person the most important person in the book I'm reading at the moment I present I'm Ophelia and such a sensible Ophelia I keep Hamlet amused all the time and pet him and scold him and make him wrap up his throat when he has a cold I've entirely cured him in melancholy the king and queen are both dead an accident at sea, no funeral necessary so Hamlet and I are ruling in Denmark without any bother we have the kingdom working beautifully he takes care of the governing and I look after the charities I've just founded some first class orphan asylums if you or any of the other trustees would like to visit them I shall be pleased to show you through I think you might find a great many helpful suggestions I remain sir yours most graciously Ophelia, queen of Denmark 24th March maybe the 25th Dear daddy long legs I don't believe I can be going to heaven I'm getting such a lot of good things here it wouldn't be fair to get them here after too listen to what has happened Jerusia Abbott has won the short story contest a $25 prize that the monthly holds every year and she's a sophomore contestants are mostly seniors when I saw my name posted I couldn't quite believe it was true maybe I am going to be an author after all I wish Mrs. Lippitt hadn't given me such a silly name it sounds like an authoress doesn't it also I've been chosen for the spring dramatics as you like it out of doors I'm going to be Celia own cousin to Rosalind and lastly Julia and Sally and I are going to New York next Friday to do some spring shopping and stay all night and go to the theater the next day with Master Jervie he invited us Julia is going to stay at home with her family Sally and I are going to stop at the Martha Washington hotel did you ever hear of anything so exciting I've never been in a hotel in my life nor in a theater except once when the Catholic Church had a festival and invited the orphans but that wasn't a real play and it doesn't count and what do you think we're going to see Hamlet think of that we studied it for four weeks in Shakespeare class and I know it by heart I'm so excited over all these prospects that I can scarcely sleep goodbye daddy this is a very entertaining world yours ever Judy I've just looked at the calendar it's the 28th another pro script I saw a streetcar conductor today with one brown eye and one blue wouldn't he make a nice villain for a detective story April 7th dear daddy long legs mercy isn't New York big Orchester has nothing to it do you mean to tell me that you actually live in all that confusion I don't believe that I shall recover for months from the bewildering effect of two days of it I can't begin to tell you all the amazing things I've seen I suppose you know though since you live there yourself but aren't the streets entertaining and the people and the shops I never saw such lovely things as there are in the windows it makes you want to devote your life to wearing clothes Sally and Julia and I went shopping together Saturday morning Julia went into the most gorgeous place I ever saw white and gold walls and blue carpets and blue silk curtains and gilt chairs a perfectly beautiful lady with yellow hair and a long black silk trailing came to meet us with a welcoming smile I thought we were paying a social call and started to shake hands but it seems we were only buying hats well at least Julia was she sat down in front of a mirror and tried on a dozen each lovelier than the last and bought the two loveliest of all I can't imagine any joy in life greater sitting down in front of a mirror and buying any hat you choose without having to first consider the price there's no doubt about it Daddy New York would rapidly undermine this fine stoical character which the John Greer home so patiently built up and after we'd finished our shopping we met Master Jervie at Sherry's I suppose you've been to Sherry's pictured that then pictured the dining room the John Greer home with its oil cloth covered tables and a white crockery that you can't break and wooden handled knives and forks and fancy the way I felt I ate my fish with the wrong fork but the waiter very kindly gave me another so that nobody noticed and after luncheon we went to the theater it was dazzling marvelous unbelievable like dream about it every night isn't Shakespeare wonderful Hamlet is so much better on stage than when we analyze it in class I appreciated it before but now clear me I think if you don't mind that I'd rather be an actress than a writer wouldn't you like me to leave college and go into dramatic school then I'll send you a box all my performances and smile at you across the footlights only wear red rose in your butt in the hole please so I'll surely smile at the right man it would be an awfully embarrassing mistake if I picked out the wrong one we came back Saturday night and had our dinner on the train at little tables with pink lamps and negro waders I never heard of meals being served in trains before and I inadvertently said so we're on Earth where you brought up said Julia to me in a village I said meekly to Julia but didn't you ever travel she said to me not till I came to college then it was only 160 miles and we didn't eat I said to her she's getting quite interested in me because I say such funny things I try hard not to but they do pop out when I'm surprised and I'm surprised most of the time it's a dizzying experience daddy to pass 18 years in the John Greer home and then suddenly be plunged into the world but I'm getting acclimated I don't make such awful mistakes as I did and I don't feel uncomfortable anymore with the other girls I used to squirm whenever people looked at me I felt as though they saw right through my sham new clothes to the checked ginghams underneath but I'm not letting the ginghams bother me anymore sufficient unto yesterday is the evil there I I forgot to tell you about our flowers Master Jervie gave us each a big bunch of violets and lilies of the valley isn't that sweet of him I never used to care much for men judging by trustees but I'm changing my mind 11 pages this is a letter have courage I'm going to stop yours always April 10th dear Mr. Richman here's your check for $50 thank you very much but I do not feel that I can keep it my allowance is sufficient to afford all the hats that I need I'm sorry that I wrote all that silly stuff about the millinery shop it's just that I had never seen anything like it before however I wasn't begging and I would rather not accept any more charity than I have to sincerely yours Jerusha Abbott 11th April dearest daddy will you please forgive me for the letter I wrote you yesterday after I posted it I was sorry and tried to get it back but that beastly mail clerk wouldn't give it back to me it's the middle of the night now and I've been awake for hours thinking what a worm I am what a thousand-legged worm and that's the worst I can say I've closed the door very softly into the study so as not to wake at Julia and Sally and I'm sitting up in bed writing to you on paper torn out of my history notebook just wanted to tell you that I am sorry I was so impolite about your check I know you meant it kindly and I think you're an old deer to take so much trouble for such a silly thing as a hat I ought to have returned it very much more graciously but in any case I had to return it it's different with me than other girls they can take things naturally from people mothers and brothers and aunts and uncles but I can't be on any such relations with anyone I like to pretend that you belong to me just to play with the idea but of course I know you don't I'm alone really with my back to the wall fighting the world and I get sort of gaspy when I think about it I put it out of my mind and keep on pretending you see daddy I can't accept any more money than I have to because someday I shall be wanting to pay it back and even as great an author as I intend to be won't be able to face a perfectly tremendous death I'd love pretty hats and things but I mustn't mortgage the future to pay for them you'll forgive me won't you for being so rude I have an awful habit of writing impulsively when I first think things and then posting the letter beyond recall but if I sometimes seem thoughtless and ungrateful I never mean it in my heart I thank you always for the life and freedom and independence that you've given me my childhood was just a long, sullen stretch of revolt and now I'm so happy every moment of the day that I can't believe it's true I feel like a made-up heroine in a story book it's quarter past two I'm going to tiptoe out to post this off now you'll receive it in the next mail after the other so you won't have a very long time to think bad of me good night daddy love you always Judy End of Section 4 Recording by Joe Carabas Valeo, California Section 5 of Daddy Long Legs this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Joe Carabas Daddy Long Legs by Gene Webster Section 5 sophomore year continued May 4th Dear Daddy Long Legs Old day last Saturday it was a very spectacular occasion first we had a parade of all the classes with everybody dressed in white linen the seniors carrying blue and gold Japanese umbrellas and the juniors white and yellow banners our class had crimson balloons very fetching especially as they were always getting loose and floating off and the freshmen wore green tissue paper hats and string string also we had a band in blue uniforms hired from town also about a dozen funny people like clowns in a circus to keep the spectators entertained between events Julia was dressed as a fat country man with a linen duster and whiskers and baggy umbrella Patsy Moriarty Patricia really did you ever hear such a name? Mrs. Lipit couldn't have done better who was tall and thin was Julia's wife in an absurd green bonnet over one year waves of laughter followed them the whole length of the course Julia played the part extremely well I never dreamed that a Pendleton could display so much comedy spirit begging Master Jervis Parton I don't consider him a true Pendleton though any more than I consider you a true trustee Sally and I weren't in the parade because we were entered for events and what do you think we both won at least in something we tried for the running broad jump and lost but Sally won the pole vaulting 7 feet 3 inches and I won the 50 yards sprint 8 seconds that was pretty panting at the end but it was great fun with the whole class waving balloons and cheering and yelling what's the matter with Judy Abbott she's alright who's alright Judy Abbott that daddy is true fame then trotting back to the dressing tent and being rubbed down with alcohol and having a lemon to suck you see we're very professional it's a fine thing to win an event for your class because the class that wins the most gets the athletic cup for the year the seniors won it this year with 7 events to their credit the athletic association gave a dinner in the gymnasium to all of the winners we had fried soft shell crabs chocolate ice cream molded in the shape of basketballs I sat up half of last night waiting Jane Eyre are you old enough daddy to remember 60 years ago and if so did people talk that way the haughty lady blanche says to the footman stop your chattering nave and do my bidding and Mr. Rochester talks about the metal welkin when he means the sky and as for the mad woman who laughs like a hyena he bled curtains and tears up wedding veils and bites it's melodrama of the purest but just the same you read and read and read I can't see how any girl could have written such a book especially any girl who was brought up in a church art there's something about those brontes that fascinates me their books their lives their spirit when I was reading about little jane's troubles in the charity school I got so angry I had to go out and take a walk I understood exactly how she felt having known Mrs. Lipit I could see Mr. Brocklehurst don't be outraged daddy I am not intimating that the John Greer home was like the Lowood Institute we had plenty to eat plenty to wear and sufficient water to wash in and a furnace in the cellar but there was one deadly likeness our lives were absolutely monotonous and uneventful nothing nice ever happened except ice cream on Sundays and even that was regular in all the 18 years I was there I had only one adventure when the woodshed burned I had to get up in the night and dress so as to be ready in case the house should catch but it didn't and we went back to bed everyone likes a few surprises and it's a perfectly natural human craving but I never had one until Mrs. Lipit called me to the office to tell me that Mr. John Smith was going to send me to college and then she broke the news so gradually that it just barely shocked me you know Daddy I think that the most necessary quality for any person to have is imagination it makes people able to put themselves in other people's places it makes them kind and sympathetic and understanding it ought to be cultivated in children but the John Greer home instantly stamps out the slightest flicker that appeared duty was the one quality that was encouraged I don't think children ought to know the meaning of the word it's odious detestable they ought to do everything from love wait till you see the orphan asylum that I'm going to be the head of it's my favorite play at night before I go to sleep I plan it out to the littlest detail the meals and clothes and study and amusements and punishments for even my superior orphans are sometimes bad but anyway they are going to be happy I think that everyone, no matter how many troubles he may have when he grows up ought to have a happy childhood to look back on and if I ever have any children of my own no matter how unhappy I may be I'm not going to let them have any cares until they grow up there goes the chapel bell I'll finish this letter sometime Thursday when I came in from laboratory this afternoon I found a squirrel sitting on the tea table helping himself to almonds these are the kind of callers we entertain now that warm weather has come and the windows stay open Saturday morning perhaps you think last night being Friday with no classes today I passed a nice quiet readable evening with a set of Stevenson that I bought with my prize money but if so you've never attended a girls college daddy dear six friends dropped in to make fudge and one of them dropped the fudge while it was still liquid right in the middle of our best rug we shall never be able to clean up the mess I haven't mentioned any lessons of late but we are still having them every day it's sort of a relief though to get away from them and discuss life in the large rather one-sided discussions that you and I hold but that's your own fault you're welcome to answer back any time you choose I've been writing this letter off and on for three days and I fear by now who's that being bored goodbye Mr. nice man Judy Mr. Daddy Longleg Smith sir having completed the study of argumentation and the science of dividing the thesis into heads I have decided to adopt the following form for letter writing it contains all necessary facts but no unnecessary verbiage I we had written examinations this week in A. chemistry B. history I. eye a new dormitory is being built A. its material is small A. red brick small B. green stone B. its capacity will be small A. one dean five instructors small B. two hundred girls small C. one housekeeper three cooks twenty waitresses I. eye I. we had junket for dessert tonight I. V. I am writing a special topic upon the sources of Shakespeare's plays V. Loomink man slipped and fell this afternoon at basketball and she A. dislocated her shoulder B. bruised her knee V. I I have a new hat trimmed with A. blue velvet ribbon B. two blue quills C. three red pom-poms V. I. I. it's half past nine V. I. I. I. good night, Judy 2nd June Dear Daddy Longlegs, you will never guess the nice thing that has happened The McBrides have asked me to spend the summer at their camp in the Adirondacks They belong to a sort of club on a lovely little lake in the middle of the woods The different members have houses made of logs dotted about among the trees and they go canoeing on the lake and take long walks through trails to other camps and have dances once a week in the clubhouse. Jimmy McBride is going to have a college friend visiting him part of the summer so you see we shall have plenty of men to dance with Wasn't it sweet of Mrs. McBride to ask me? It appears that she liked me when I was there for Christmas Please excuse this being short It isn't a real letter It's just to let you know that I'm disposed of for the summer Yours in a very contented frame of mind Judy 5th June Dear Daddy Longlegs Your secretary man has just written to me saying that Mr. Smith refers that I should not accept Mrs. McBride's invitation but should return to Locke Willow the same as last summer Why? Why? Why, Daddy? You don't understand about it Mrs. McBride does want me really and truly I'm not the least bit of trouble in the house I'm a help They don't take up many servants and Sally and I can do lots of useful things It's a fine chance for me to learn housekeeping I'm a woman ought to understand it and I only know asylum keeping There aren't any girls our age at the camp and Mrs. McBride wants me for a companion for Sally We're planning to do a lot of reading together We're going to read all of the books for next year's English and sociology The professor said it would be a great help if we would get our reading finished in the summer and it's so much easier to remember it if we read together and talk it over Just to live in the same house with Sally's mother is an education She's the most interesting entertaining, companionable charming woman in the world She knows everything Think how many summers I've spent with Mrs. Lipit and how I'll appreciate the contrast You needn't be afraid that I'll be crowding them for their house is made of rubber When they have a lot of company they just sprinkle tents about in the woods and turn the boys outside It's going to be such a nice healthy summer exercising out of doors every minute Jimmy McBride is going to teach me how to ride horseback and paddle a canoe and how to shoot and oh, lots of things I ought to know It's a kind of nice, jolly carefree time that I've never had and I think every girl deserves it at least once in her life Of course I'll do exactly as you say but please please let me go daddy I've never wanted anything so much This isn't Jerusha Abbott the future great author writing to you It's just Judy a girl 9th June Mr. John Smith Sir, yours of the 7th instant hand in compliance with the instructions received through your secretary to spend the summer at Laquillo Farm I hope always to remain Ms. Jerusha Abbott Laquillo Farm 3rd August Dear Daddy Long Legs It's been nearly two months since I wrote which wasn't nice of me I know but I haven't loved you much this summer You see I'm being frank You can't imagine how disappointed I was at having to give up the McBride's camp Of course I know that you're my guardian and that I have to regard your wishes in all matters but I couldn't see any reason it was so distinctly the best thing that could have happened to me If I had been daddy and you had been Judy I should have said bless you my child run along and have a good time see lots of new people and learn lots of new things live out of doors and get strong and well and rested for a year of hard work but not at all just a curt line from your secretary ordering me to lock Willow See in personality of your commands that hurts my feelings it seems as though if you felt the tiniest little bit for me the way I feel for you it sometimes send me a message that you'd written with your own hand instead of those beastly type written secretary's notes there was the slightest hint that you cared I'd do anything on earth to please you I know that I was to write nice long detailed letters without ever expecting any answer you're living up to your side of the bargain I'm being educated and I suppose you're thinking that I'm not living up to mine Daddy it's a hard bargain it is really so awfully lonely you're the only person I have to care for and you are so shadowy you're just an imaginary man that I've made up and probably the real you isn't a bit like my imaginary you but you did once when I was ill in the infirmary send me a message and now when I'm feeling awfully forgotten I get out your card and read it over I don't think I'm telling you at all what I started to say which was this although my feelings are still hurt but it's very humiliating to be picked up and moved about by an arbitrary, peremptory, unreasonable, omnipotent invisible providence still I want a man has been as kind and generous and thoughtful as you've here to for been towards me I suppose he has a right to be arbitrary, peremptory, unreasonable invisible providence all he chooses and so I'll forgive you and be cheerful again I still don't enjoy getting Sally's letters about the good times they're having at camp however we will draw a veil over that and begin again I've been writing and writing this summer four short stories finished and sent to four different magazines so you see I'm trying to be an author I have a workroom fixed in a corner where Master Jervie used to have his rainy day playroom it's in a cool breezy corner with two dormer windows and shadowed by a maple tree with a family of red squirrels living in a hole I'll write a nicer letter in a few days and tell you all the farm news we need rain yours is ever, Judy 10th August Dear Daddy Long Legs Sir, I address you from the second crotch in the willow tree by the pool in the pasture there's a frog croaking underneath a locust singing overhead and two little devil down heads darting up and down the trunk I've been here for an hour it's a very comfortable crotch especially after being upholstered with two sofa cushions I came up with a pen and tablet hoping to write an immortal short story I've been having a dreadful time with my heroine I can't make her behave as I want her to behave so I've abandoned her for the moment and I'm writing to you not much relief though for I can't make you behave as I want you to either if you were in that dreadful New York I wish I could send you some of this lovely breezy, sunshiny outlook the country is heaven after a week of rain speaking of heaven do you remember Mr. Kellogg that I told you about last summer the minister of the little white church at the corners the poor old soul is dead last winter of pneumonia I went half a dozen times to hear him preach and got very well acquainted with his theology he believed to the end exactly the same things he started with it seems to me that a man who can think straight along for forty seven years without changing a single idea ought to be kept in the cabinet as a curiosity I hope he's enjoying his harp and golden crown he was so perfectly sure of finding them there's a new young man very consequential in his place the congregation is pretty dubious especially the faction led by deacon Cummings it looks as though there was going to be an awful split in the church we don't care for innovations in religion in this neighborhood during our week of rain I sat up in the attic and had an orgy of reading Stevenson mostly he himself is more entertaining than any of the characters in his books I dare say he made himself into the kind of hero that would look well in print don't you think it was perfect of him to spend all the ten thousand dollars his father left for a yacht and go sailing off to the south seas he lived up to his adventurous creed if my father had left me ten thousand dollars I'd do it too the thought of Velima makes me wild I want to see the trapecs I want to see the whole world I'm going to be a great author or artist or actress or playwright or whatever sort of a great person I turn out to be I have a terrible wander thirst the very sight of a map makes me want to put on my hat and take an umbrella and start I shall see before I die the palms and temples of the south Thursday evening at twilight sitting on the doorstep very hard to get any news into this letter Judy is becoming so philosophical of late that she wishes to force largely of the world in general instead of descending to the trivial details of daily life but if you must have news here it is our nine young pigs waited across the brook and ran away last Tuesday and only eight came back we don't want to accuse anyone unjustly but we suspect that Widow Doud has one more than she ought to have Mr. Weaver has painted his barn and his two silos a bright pumpkin yellow a very ugly color but he says it will wear the brewers have company this week Mrs. Brewer's sister and two nieces from Ohio one of our Rhode Island reds only brought off three chicks out of fifteen eggs we can't imagine what was the trouble Rhode Island reds in my opinion are a very inferior breed I prefer Buff Orpington's the new clerk in the post office at Bonnie Rigg Four Corners drank every drop of Jamaica ginger that they had in stock seven dollars worth before he was discovered old Ira Hatch has rheumatism and can't work anymore he never saved his money when he was earning good wages so now he has to live on the town there's to be an ice cream social at the school house next Saturday evening come and bring your families I have a new hat that I bought for twenty five cents at the post office this is my latest portrait on my way to rake the hay it's getting too dark to see anyway the news is all used up good night Judy Friday good morning here is some news what do you think you'd never, never, never guess who's coming to lock Willow a letter to Mrs. Semple from Mr. Pendleton he's motoring through the Berkshires and is tired and wants to rest on a nice quiet farm if he climbs out at her doorstep some night will she have a room ready for him maybe he'll stay one week or maybe two or maybe three he'll see how restful it is when he gets here such a flutter as we are in the whole house is being cleaned and all the curtains washed I'm driving to the corners this morning to get some new oil cloth for the entry and two cans of brown floor paint for the hall and back stairs Mrs. Dowd is engaged come tomorrow and wash the windows in the exigency of the moment we wave our suspicions in regards to the piglet you might think from this account of our activities that the house was not already immaculate but I assure you it was whatever Mrs. Semple's limitations she is a housekeeper but isn't it just like a man daddy he doesn't give the remotest hint as to whether he will land on the doorstep today or two weeks from today he should live in a perpetual breathlessness until he comes and if he doesn't hurry the cleaning may all have to be done over again there's anasi waiting below with the buck board and grover I drive alone but if you could see old grove you wouldn't be worried as to my safety with my hand on my heart farewell Judy P.S. isn't that a nice ending to Judy's letters Saturday good morning again I didn't get this envelope to yesterday before the postman came so I'll add some more we have one mail a day at 12 o'clock rural delivery is a blessing to the farmers our postman not only delivers letters but he runs errands for us in town at 5 cents an errand yesterday he brought me some shoestrings and a jar of cold cream then burned all the skin off my nose before I got my new hat and a blue Windsor tie and a bottle of blacking all for 10 cents that was an unusual bargain owing to the largeness of my order also he tells us what is happening in the great world several people on the route take daily papers and he reads them as he jogs along and repeats the news to the ones who don't subscribe so in case war breaks out between the United States and Japan or the President is assassinated or Mr. Rockefeller leaves a million dollars to the John Greer home, you needn't bother to write I'll hear it anyway no sign yet of Master Jervie but you should see how clean our house is and with what anxiety we wipe our feet before we step in I hope he'll come soon I am longing for someone to talk to Mrs. Semple to tell you the truth gets rather monotonous she never lets ideas interrupt the easy flow of her conversation it's a funny thing about the people here their world is just this single hilltop they're not a bit universal if you know what I mean it's exactly the same as at the John Greer home our ideas there were bounded by the sides of the iron fence only I didn't mind it so much because I was younger and was so awfully busy by the time I'd got all my beds made and my baby's face is washed and had gone to school and come home and had washed their faces again and darned their stockings and mended Freddie Perkins trousers he tore them every day of his life and learned my lessons in between I was ready to go to bed and I didn't notice any lack of social intercourse but after two years in a conversational college we do miss it and I shall be glad to see somebody who speaks my language I really believe I've finished Daddy nothing else occurs to me at the moment I'll try to write a longer letter next time yours always, Judy P.S. the lettuce hasn't done it all well this year it was so dry early in the season 25th August well, Daddy, Master Jervie's here and such a nice time as we're having at least I am and I think he is too he has been here ten days and he doesn't show any signs of going the way Mrs. Semple pampers that man is scandalous if she indulged him as much when he was a baby I don't know how he ever turned out so well he and I eat at a little table set on the side porch or sometimes under the trees or when it rains or is cold in the best parlor he just picks out the spot he wants to eat in and carry trots after him with the table then if it has been an awful nuisance and she has had to carry the dishes very far she finds a dollar under the sugar bowl he is an awfully companionable sort of man though you would never believe it to see him casually he looks at first glance like a true Pendleton but he isn't in the least he is just as simple and unaffected and sweet as he can be and that seems a funny way to describe a man but it's true he's extremely nice with the farmers around here he meets them in a sort of man-to-man fashion that disarms them immediately they were very suspicious at first they didn't care for his clothes and I will say that his clothes are rather amazing he wears knickerbockers and pleated jackets and white flannels and riding clothes with puffed trousers whenever he comes down in anything new Mrs. Semple, beaming with pride walks around and views him from every angle and urges him to be careful where he sits down she's so afraid he'll pick up some dust he bores him dreadfully he's always saying to her run along Lizzie and tend to your work you can't boss me any longer I've grown up it's awfully funny to think of that great big long-legged man he's nearly as long-legged as you daddy ever sitting in Mrs. Semple's lap and having his face washed particularly funny when you see her lap she has two laps now and three chins but he says that once she was thin and wiry and spry and could run faster than he such a lot of adventures we're having we've explored the country for miles and I've learned to fish with funny little flies made of feathers also to shoot with a rifle and a revolver also to ride horseback there's an astonishing amount of life in Old Grove we fed him on oats for three days and he shied at a calf and almost ran away with me Wednesday we climbed Sky Hill Monday afternoon it's a mountain near here not an awfully high mountain perhaps no snow on the summit but at least you're pretty breathless when you reach the top the lower slopes are covered with woods but the top is just piled rocks and open moor we stayed up for the sunset and built a fire and cooked our supper Master Jervie did the cooking he said he knew how better than me and he did too because he's used to camping then we came down by moonlight and when we reached the wood trail where it was dark by the light of an electric bulb that he had in his pocket it was such fun he laughed and joked all the way he talked about interesting things he's read all the books I've ever read and a lot of others besides it's astonishing how many different things he knows we went for long tramp this morning and got caught in a storm our clothes were drenched before we reached home but our spirits not even damp you should have seen Mrs. Semple's face when we dripped into her kitchen oh, Master Jervie, Miss Judy, you are soaked through dear, dear, what shall I do? that nice new coat is perfectly ruined she was awfully funny he would have thought that we were ten years old and she a distracted mother I was afraid for a while that we weren't going to get any jam for tea Saturday I started this letter ages ago but I haven't had a second to finish it isn't this a nice thought from Stevenson? the world is full of a number of things I am sure we should all be as happy as kings it's true, you know the world is full of happiness and plenty to go round if you're only willing to take the kind that comes your way the whole secret is in being pliable in the country, especially there are such a lot of entertaining things I can walk over everybody's land and look at everybody's view and dabble in everybody's brook and enjoy it just as much as though I owned the world and with no taxes to pay it's Sunday night now, about eleven o'clock I'm supposed to be getting some beauty sleep but I had black coffee for dinner so no beauty sleep for me this morning, said Mrs. Semple to Mr. Pendleton with a very determined accent we have to leave here at quarter past ten in order to get to church by eleven very well, Lizzie, said Master Jervie you have the buggy ready and if I'm not dressed, just go on without waiting we'll wait, said she as you please, said he only don't keep the horses standing too long then, while she was dressing he told Carrie to pack up a lunch and he told me to scramble into my walking clothes and we slipped out the back way and went fishing it discommoded the household dreadfully because Lock Willow of a Sunday dines at two but he ordered dinner at seven he orders meals whenever he chooses he would think the place were a restaurant but that kept Carrie and Amisai from going driving but he said it was all the better because it wasn't proper for them to go driving without a chaperone then anyway, he wanted the horses himself to take me driving did you ever hear anything so funny? and poor Mrs. Semple believes that people who go fishing on Sundays go afterwards to a sizzling hot hell she is awfully troubled to think that she didn't train him better when he was small and helpless and she had the chance besides, she wanted to show him off in church anyway, we had our fishing he caught four little ones and we cooked them on a campfire for lunch they kept falling off our spiked sticks into the fire so they tasted a little ashy but we ate them we got home at four and went driving at five and had dinner at seven and at ten I was sent to bed and here I am writing to you I am getting a little sleepy though good night here is a picture of the one fish I caught ship ahoy, cat and long legs avast, belay, yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum guess what I'm reading our conversation these past two days has been nautical and piratical isn't treasure island fun did you ever read it or wasn't it written when you were a boy Stevenson only got 30 pounds for the serial rights I don't believe it pays to be a great author maybe I'll be a school teacher excuse me for filling my letter so full of Stevenson my mind is very much engaged with him at present he comprises Lock Willow's library I've been writing this letter for two weeks and I think it's about long enough never say daddy that I don't give details I wish you were here too we'd all have such a jolly time together I like my different friends to know each other I wanted to ask Mr Pendleton if he knew you in New York I should think he might you must move in about the same exalted social circles and you are both interested in reforms and things but I couldn't for I don't know your real name it's the silliest thing I ever heard of not to know your name Mrs Lipit warned me that you are eccentric I should think so affectionately Judy P.S. I'm reading this over I find that it isn't all Stevenson there are one or two glancing references to Master Jervie 10th September Dear Daddy he has gone and we are missing him when you get accustomed to people or places or ways of living and then have them snatched away it does leave an awfully empty annoying sort of sensation I'm finding Mrs Semple's conversation pretty unseasoned food college opens in two weeks and I shall be glad to begin work again I've worked quite a lot this summer though six short stories and seven poems those I sent to the magazines all came back with the most courteous promptitude but I don't mind it's good practice Master Jervie read them he brought in the post so I couldn't help his knowing and he said they were dreadful they showed that I didn't have the slightest idea of what I was talking about Master Jervie doesn't let Paul Lightness interfere with truth but the last one I did just a little sketch late in college he said wasn't bad and he had it typewritten and I sent it to a magazine they've had it two weeks maybe they're thinking it over you should see the sky there's the queerest orange colored light over everything we're going to have a storm it commenced just that moment with tremendously big drops and all the shutters banging I had to run to close the windows while Carrie flew to the attic with an armful of milk pails to put under the places where the roof leaks and then just as I was resuming my pen I remembered that I'd left a cushion and rug and hat and Matthew Arnold's poems under a tree in the orchard so I dashed out to get them all quite soaked the red cover of the poems had run into the inside Dover Beach in the future will be washed by pink waves a storm is awfully disturbing in the country you're always having to think of so many things that are out of doors and getting spoiled Thursday daddy daddy what do you think the postman has just come with two letters first my story is accepted fifty dollars alor I am an author second a letter from the college secretary I'm to have a scholarship for two years that will cover board and tuition it was founded for marked proficiency in English with general excellency in other lines and I've won it I applied for it before I left but I didn't have an idea I'd get it I'm on account of my freshman bad work in maths and Latin but it seems I've made it up I'm awfully glad daddy because now I won't be such a burden to you the monthly allowance will be all I'll need maybe I can earn that with writing or tutoring or something I'm longing to be back and begin work yours ever Jerusha Abbott author of when the sophomores won the game for sale at all newsstands price ten cents end of section five recording by Joe Carabas Vallejo, California section six of Daddy Long Legs this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Joe Carabas Daddy Long Legs by Gene Webster section six, junior year 26th September Dear Daddy Long Legs back at college again and an upper classman our study is better than ever this year faces the south with two huge windows and oh so furnished Julia with an unlimited allowance arrived two days early and was attacked with a fever for settling we have new wallpaper and oriental rugs and mahogany chairs not painted mahogany which made us sufficiently happy last year but real it's very gorgeous but I don't feel as though I belonged in it I'm nervous all the time for fear I'll get an ink spot in the wrong place and Daddy I found your letter waiting for me pardon I mean your secretaries will you kindly convey to me a comprehensible reason why I should not accept that scholarship I don't understand your objection in the least but anyway it won't do the slightest good for you to object for I've already accepted it and I'm not going to change that sounds a little impertinent but I don't mean it so I suppose you feel that when you set out to educate me you'd like to finish the work and put a neat period in the shape of a diploma at the end but look at it just a second from my point of view I shall owe my education to you just as much as though I let you pay for the whole of it but I won't be quite so much indebted I know you don't want me to return the money but nevertheless I'm going to want to do it if I possibly can and winning this scholarship makes it so much easier I was expecting to spend the rest of my life in paying my debts but now I shall only have to spend one half of the rest of it I hope you understand my position and won't be cross the allowance I shall still most gratefully accept it requires an allowance to live up to Julia and her furniture I wish that she had been reared to simpler tastes or else that she were not my roommate this isn't much of a letter I meant to have written a lot I've been hemming four window curtains and three porters I'm glad you can't see the length of the stitches I'm polishing a brass desk set with tooth powder very uphill work and sawing off picture wire with manicure scissors and unpacking four boxes of books and putting away two trunkfuls of clothes it doesn't seem believable that Jerusha Abbott owns two trunks full of clothes but she does and welcoming back fifty dear friends in between opening date is a joyous occasion good night daddy dear and don't be annoyed because your chick is wanting to scratch for herself she's growing up into an awfully energetic little hen with a very determined cluck and lots of beautiful feathers all due to you affectionately, Judy 30th September dear daddy are you still harping on that scholarship I never knew a man so obstinate and stubborn and unreasonable and tenacious and bulldogish and unable to see other people's point of view as you you prefer that I should not be accepting favors from strangers strangers and what are you pray is there anyone in the world that I know less I should recognize you if I met you in the street now you see if you had been a sane sensible person and had written nice cheering fatherly letters to your little Judy and had come occasionally and patted her on the head and had said you were glad she was such a good girl then perhaps she wouldn't have flouted you in your old age but would have obeyed your slightest wish like the dutiful daughter she was meant to be strangers indeed you live in a glass house Mr. Smith and besides this isn't a favor it's like a prize I earned it by hard work if nobody had been good enough in English the committee wouldn't have awarded the scholarship some years they don't also but what's the use of arguing with a man you belong Mr. Smith to a sex devoid of a sense of logic to bring a man into line there are just two methods one must either coax or be disagreeable I scorned coax men for what I wish therefore I must be disagreeable I refuse sir to give up the scholarship if you make any more fuss I won't accept the monthly allowance either but will wear myself into a nervous wreck tutoring stupid freshmen that is my ultimatum and listen I have a further thought since you are so afraid that by taking this scholarship I am depriving someone else of an education I know a way out you can apply the money that you would have spent for me towards educating some other little girl from the John Greer home don't you think that's a nice idea only daddy educate the new girl as much as you choose but please don't like her any better than me I trust that your secretary won't be hurt because I pay so little attention to the suggestions offered in his letter but I can't help it if he is he's a spoiled child daddy I've meekly given in to his whims before but this time I intend to be firm yours with a mind completely and irrevocably and world without end made up Jerusha Abbott 9th November Dear Daddy Long Legs I started downtown today to buy a bottle of shoe blacking and some collars and the material for a new blouse and a jar of violet cream and a cake of castile soap all very necessary I couldn't be happy another day without them and when I tried to pay the car fare I found that I had left my purse in the pocket of my other coat so I had to get out and take the next car and was late for gymnasium it's a dreadful thing to have no memory and two coats Julia Pendleton has invited me to visit her for the Christmas holidays how does that strike you Mr. Smith fancy Jerusha Abbott of the John Greer home sitting at the tables of the rich I don't know why Julia wants me she seems to be getting quite attached to me of late I should to tell the truth very much prefer going to Sally's but Julia asked me first if I go anywhere it must be to New York instead of to Orchester I'm rather odd at the prospect of meeting Pendleton's en masse and also I'd have to get a lot of new clothes so Daddy dear if you write that you would prefer having me remain quietly at college I will bow to your wishes with my usual sweet docility I'm engaged at odd moments with the life and letters of Thomas Huxley it makes nice light reading to pick up between times do you know what an archaeopteryx is it's a bird and a stereognathus I'm not sure myself but I think it's a missing link like a bird with teeth or a lizard with wings oh no it isn't either I've just looked in the book it's a mesozoic mammal I've elected economics this year very illuminating subject when I finish that I'm going to take charity and reform then Mr. trustee I'll know just how an orphan asylum ought to be run don't you think I'd make an admirable voter if I had my rights I was 21 last week this is an awfully wasteful country to throw away such an honest educated conscientious intelligent citizen as I would be yours always Judy 7th December dear daddy long legs thank you for permission to visit Julia I take it that silence means consent such a social whirl as we've been having the founders dance came last week this was the first year that any of us could attend only upperclassmen being allowed I invited Jimmy McBride and Sally invited his roommate at Princeton who visited them last summer at their camp an awfully nice man with red hair and Julia invited a man from New York not very exciting but socially irreproachable he is connected with a deal of modern chichesters perhaps that means something to you doesn't illuminate me to any extent however our guests came Friday afternoon in time for tea in the senior corridor and then dashed down to the hotel for dinner the hotel was so full that they slept in rows on the billiard tables they say Jimmy McBride says that the next time he is bidden to a social event in this college he is going to bring one of their Adirondack tents and pitch it on the campus at 7.30 they came back for the president's reception and dance our functions commence early we had the men's cards all made out ahead of time and after every dance we'd leave them in groups under the letter that stood for their names so that they could be readily found by their next partners Jimmy McBride, for example would stand patiently under the M until he was claimed at least he ought to have stood patiently but he kept wandering off and getting mixed with R's and S's and all sorts of letters I found him a very difficult guest he was sulky because he had only three dances with me he said he was bashful about dancing with girls he didn't know the next morning we had a glee club concert and who do you think wrote the funny new song composed for the occasion it's the truth, she did oh I tell you daddy your little foundling is getting to be quite a prominent person anyway our gay two days were great fun and I think the men enjoyed it some of them were awfully perturbed at first at the prospect of facing one thousand girls but they got acclimated very quickly our two Princeton men had a beautiful time at least they politely said they had invited us to their dance next spring we've accepted so please don't object daddy dear Julia and Sally and I had our new dresses do you want to hear about them Julius was cream satin and gold embroidery and she wore purple orchids it was a dream and came from Paris and cost a million dollars Sally's was pale blue trimmed with Persian embroidery and went beautifully with red hair it didn't cost quite a million but was just as effective as Julius mine was pale pink crepe de sheen trimmed with achry lace and rose satin and I carried crimson roses which Jay McGabe sent Sally having told him what color to get and we all had satin slippers and silk stockings and chiffon scarves to match you must be deeply impressed by these millinery details one can't help thinking daddy what a colorless life a man is forced to lead when one reflects that chiffon and Venetian point and hand embroidery and Irish crochet are to him merely empty words whereas a woman whether she is interested in babies or microbes or husbands or poetry or servants or parallelograms or gardens or play-toe or bridge is fundamentally and always interested in clothes it's the one touch of nature that makes the whole world kin that is an original I got it out of one of Shakespeare's plays however to resume do you want me to tell you a secret that I've lately discovered? and will you promise not to think me vain? then listen I'm pretty I am, really I'd be an awful idiot not to know it with three looking glasses in the room a friend P.S. this is one of those wicked anonymous letters you read about in novels 20th December dear daddy long legs I've just a moment because I must attend two classes pack a trunk in a suitcase and catch the four o'clock train but I couldn't go without sending a word to let you know how much I appreciate my Christmas box I love the furs and the necklace and the Liberty scarf and the gloves and handkerchiefs and a book and purse and most of all I love you but daddy you have no business to spoil me this way I'm only human and a girl at that how can I keep my mind sternly fixed on a studious career when you deflect me with such worldly frivolities I have strong suspicions now as to which one of the John Greer trustees used to give the Christmas tree and the Sunday ice cream he was nameless and by his works I know him you deserve to be happy for all the good things you do goodbye and a very merry Christmas yours always, Judy p.s. I am sending a slight token too do you think you would like her if you knew her? 11th January I meant to write to you from the city daddy but New York is an engrossing place I had an interesting and illuminating time but I'm glad I don't belong to such a family I should truly rather have the John Greer home for a background whatever the drawbacks of my bringing up there was at least no pretense about it I know now what people mean when they say they are weighed down by things the material atmosphere of that house was crushing I didn't draw a deep breath until I was on an express train coming back all the furniture was carved and upholstered and gorgeous the people I met were beautifully dressed and low voiced and well bred but it's the truth daddy I never heard one word of real talk from the time we arrived until we left I don't think an idea ever entered the front door Mrs Pendleton never thinks of anything but jewels and dressmakers and social engagements she did seem a different kind of mother for Mrs McBride if I ever marry and have a family I'm going to make them as exactly like the McBrides as I can not for all the money in the world would I ever let any children of mine develop into Pendultons maybe it isn't polite to criticize people you've been visiting if it isn't please excuse this is very confidential between you and me I only saw Master Jervie once when he called at tea time and then I didn't have a chance to speak to him alone it was really disappointing after our nice time last summer I don't think he cares much for his relatives and I'm sure they don't care much for him Julia's mother says he's unbalanced he's a socialist except thank heaven he doesn't let his hair grow and wear red ties she can't imagine where he picked up his queer ideas the family having been Church of England for generations he throws away his money on every sort of crazy reform instead of spending it on such sensible things as yachts and automobiles and polo ponies he does buy candy with it though he sent Julia and me each a box for Christmas you know I think I'll be a socialist too you wouldn't mind would you daddy they're quite different from anarchists they don't believe in blowing people up probably I am one by rights I belong to the proletariat I haven't determined yet just what kind I'm going to be I will look into the subject over Sunday and declare my principles in my next I've seen loads of theatres and hotels and beautiful houses my mind is a confused jumble of onyx and gilding and mosaic floors and palms I'm still pretty breathless but I am glad to get back to college in my books I believe that I really am a student this atmosphere of academic calm I find more bracing than New York college is a very satisfying sort of life the books and study and regular classes keep you alive mentally and then when your mind gets tired you have the gymnasium and outdoor athletics and always plenty of congenial friends who are thinking about the same things you are we spend a whole evening and nothing but talk talk talk and go to bed with a very uplifted feeling as though we had settled permanently some pressing world problems and filling in every crevice there is always such a lot of nonsense just silly jokes about the little things that come up but very satisfying we do appreciate our own witticisms it isn't the great big pleasures that count the most it's making a great deal out of the little ones I've discovered the true secret of happiness daddy and that is to live in them now not to be forever regretting the past or anticipating the future but to get the most that you can out of this very instant it's like farming you can have extensive farming and intensive farming well I am going to have intensive living after this I'm going to enjoy every second and I'm going to know I'm enjoying it while I'm enjoying it most people don't live they just race they're trying to reach some goal far away on the horizon and in the heat of the going they get so breathless and panting that they lose all sight of the beautiful tranquil country they are passing through and then the first thing they know they're old and worn out and it doesn't make any difference whether they've reached the goal or not I've decided to sit down by the way and pile up a lot of little happinesses even if I never become a great author did you ever know such a philosopher as I'm developing into? yours ever Judy p.s. it's raining cats and dogs tonight two puppies in a kitten have just landed on the windowsill dear comrade hooray I'm aphabian that's a socialist who's willing to wait we don't want the social revolution to come tomorrow morning it would be too upsetting we want it to come very gradually in the distant future when we shall all be prepared and able to sustain the shock in the meantime we must be getting ready by instituting industrial, educational and orphan asylum reforms yours with fraternal love Judy Monday 3rd hour 11th February dear DLL don't be insulted because this is so short it isn't a letter it's just a line to say that I'm going to write a letter pretty soon one examinations are over it's not only necessary that I pass but pass well I have a scholarship to live up to yours studying hard End of section 6 Recording by Joe Carabas Vallejo, California