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Many quiet evenings I would sit alone in the twilight and repeat all the poems and passages of Scripture that I knew. Thus, ten long summers passed and I was still longing for an education, though my mother taught me many interesting things at home and read a great deal to me. It was about four years since that beautiful evening, when I knelt beside my grandmother's rocking chair and repeated over and over the humble petition, "Dear Lord, please show me how I can learn like other children."

CHAPTER V
THE PROMISE OF AN EDUCATION

I OCCASIONALLY went to school with the children of our neighborhoods and one afternoon in November, 1834, mother met me at the gate and I heard a paper rustling in her hand. My first thought was that she had a letter announcing the death or illness of some friend. Instead of that, she produced a circular from the New York Institution for the Blind, sent her by an acquaintance, in fact by the same man who had given me the little book describing the rainbow already mentioned. As she read the announcement, I clapped my hands and exclaimed,

"O, thank God, he has answered my prayer, just as I knew He would."

That was the happiest day of my life; for the dark intellectual maze in which I had been living seemed to yield to hope and the promise of the light that was about to dawn. Not that I craved physical vision, for it was mental enlightenment that I sought; and now my quest seemed almost actually rewarded. The New York Institution was a foreign name to me, but it was enough to know that some place existed where I might be taught; and my star of promise even then was becoming a great orb of light.

My mother was fully conscious of my joy, but to test me she said,

"What will you do without me? You have never been away from home more than two weeks at one time in your whole life."

This presented a new idea: I had not thought of the separation from her; and for a moment I wavered. Then I answered as bravely as I could,

"Much as I love you, mother, I am willing to make any sacrifice to acquire an education." And she replied,

"You are right, my child, and I am very glad you have the chance to go." But her voice betrayed the tremor in her heart. How wonderful is a mother's love.

Nearly a month before I was fifteen years old, on March 3rd, 1835, I made another journey to New York, one that was more pleasant and fruitful than the first had been. On the morning that I was to leave home mother wakened me from a sound sleep and told me the stage was at the door. The thought of going away thoroughly unnerved me; I dressed with trembling fingers; hastily ate a few mouthfuls of breakfast; swal-lowed my sobs; and then quickly hurried from the house lest I might break down completely if I waited to bid mother good-bye. You can imagine my feelings as the stage rumbled on and on toward Norwalk, where we were to take the steamboat for New York. For more than an hour I uttered not a word, although the kind lady by whom I was accompanied tried her best to cheer me and to draw me into conversation. My suffering was indeed intense, and I would have given half my kingdom at that moment, could the gift have bought me the power to shed a few tears.

Finally, my companion turned to me and said, "Fanny, if you don't want to go to New York, we will get out at the next station, and take the returning stage home. Your mother will be lonesome without you, anyway."

It was a sore temptation to return. I hesitated for a time, but, after a good cry, I felt better and said,

"No, I will go on to New York."

That decision I never for a moment regretted, for, had I returned to my mother that morning I would have cast away my pearl of great price, for it is not probable that I should ever have been brave enough to start again for the Institution.

We took the steamboat at Norwalk, and its quiet motion helped to soothe my mind after the distracting experiences of the morning; and so later in the afternoon we floated gently into the harbor of the great city, my adopted home.

For three days we remained with friends; and on Saturday morning March 7, 1835, we were driven to the New York Institution for the Blind on Ninth Avenue. There everyone treated me as though I was kith and kin to them; but I missed the companions of my childhood, the dear lady, who had accompanied me, and most of all my mother, who seemed to be far away, a thousand miles or more. When evening came they took me to the little room in which I was to sleep; everything was strange, and nothing in the place where I was accustomed to find it at home, -- but I bravely tried to think only of pleasant things. It was no use, however, for I could not keep the curl from coming to my upper lip; I sat there on my trunk, a forlorn being indeed, and sighed heavily. Our matron, a motherly Quaker woman, put her arms about me and said,

"Fanny, I guess thee has never been away from home before."

I replied meekly, "No ma'am, and please excuse me, I must cry," and then burst forth the flood of tears that I had tried so hard to restrain. When the fit of weeping had passed, one of my fellow pupils came and sat down with me on the trunk; and for a whole hour we talked about everything but home.