Part 1 (1/2)

The Life and Beauties of f.a.n.n.y Fern.

by Anonymous.

PREFACE.

In preparing for the press ”THE LIFE AND BEAUTIES OF f.a.n.n.y FERN,” we have given to the reader a statement of the most prominent incidents in her eventful career, which is authenticated, not only by the testimony of her nearest relatives, but by communications from her own lips. The lives of distinguished men or women have always been accounted public property, and, in narrating that of f.a.n.n.y Fern, we have confined ourselves to simple facts, leaving the fancy-pictures to be filled up by others.

In giving selections from her ”Beauties,” we present the reader with a bouquet of ”Ferns,” all freshly gathered. In so doing, we have infringed on no one's copy-right; the sketches having been copied, in every instance, from the papers to which they were originally contributed. A large proportion of them have never before appeared within the covers of a book. These latter are the very articles upon which f.a.n.n.y made her reputation. We have given quotations which do justice to every variety of her versatile style. One page flashes with the keen edge of satire, another brims over with mirth, and a third is tearful with pathos.

We have shown f.a.n.n.y at home, on the street, and in church, and have thus furnished a key which will unlock many of the mysteries of ”Ruth Hall,” and ”Fern Leaves.”

I.

GENIUS IN PANTALETTES.

Saral Payson Willis, the subject of this sketch, was born in Portland, Maine, July 9th, 1811. Through the negligence, doubtless, of the clerk of the town, it is not recorded that the sun stood still on the eventful morning, but old housewives tell a legend of the c.o.c.ks'

crowing with extraordinary shrillness in honor of this wonderful advent. She is the daughter of Mr. Nathaniel Willis, one of the most industrious and respectable citizens of Boston, now a man well advanced in years. It is scarcely necessary to add that she is sister to Mr. N. P. Willis, the brilliant essayist and poet.

Mr. Willis, senior, ”commenced life” as a mechanic, and at the time of his marriage worked at the case as a journeyman printer. He afterwards published the Eastern Argus, in Portland. Meeting with reverses in that city, he removed to Boston, where he established, and for many years edited, the ”Recorder,” the oldest religious paper in New-England.

Mr. Willis has met with a similar experience to that of most men in his calling. He never made a fortune at publis.h.i.+ng. At the present time, although aged and infirm, he finds it necessary to devote his failing energies to the publication of the ”Youth's Companion.” Yet, notwithstanding his narrow means, Mr. Willis contrived--at how great a sacrifice only parents can guess, to give his sons and daughters that education which is a poor man's n.o.blest legacy.

II.

f.a.n.n.y AT SCHOOL.

In accordance with the course he had wisely planned for his children, Sarah Willis--the veritable ”f.a.n.n.y”--was favored with an early introduction into the seminary of Miss Catherine E. Beecher, in Hartford, Conn. At this well-conducted establishment--the most popular in the country, at that time--Miss f.a.n.n.y received her first strong impressions of life and the world. We have never heard her spoken of as a very apt or studious pupil. Staid works of philosophy and learning were not much to her taste. But from the prohibited pages of romances and poems, eagerly devoured in secret, her craving genius derived an active stimulus. Already she had become a keen dissector of the human heart, and she found plenty of pleasant practice for the scalpel of her wit among the young ladies of the school. Here, too, the novel and startling experiences of boarding-school flirtation gave their warm coloring to her future life. f.a.n.n.y possessed a large capacity for this description of knowledge, and her writings show a better memory for those more pleasant branches of female education, than for the dry rules of syntax and prosody. In fact, the best of her sketches are transcripts of her school-girl life--for f.a.n.n.y writes well only when giving the concentrated vinegar and spice of her own vivid experiences.

A sketch of f.a.n.n.y's, ent.i.tled ”A LEAF FROM MY EXPERIENCE,” referring to her school-life, may, perhaps, form the best embodiment of the earlier portion of her school-history.

”Miss Jemima Keturah Rix was at the head of a flouris.h.i.+ng school for very young ladies and gentlemen. She originated in the blue state of Connecticut, where the hens, from principle, refrain from laying eggs on Sunday, and the yeast stops _working_ for the same reason. She had very little opinion of her own s.e.x, and none at all of the other. Her means were uncommonly limited, yet 'she was too much of a gentlewoman to keep school, had it not been for her strong desire to reform the rising generation.'

”In person, she was tall and spare, with small, snapping black eyes, and thin, compressed lips, telling strongly of her vixenish propensities. She could repeat the Ten Commandments and a.s.sembly's Catechism _backwards_, without missing a word; and was a firm believer in total depravity and the eternal destruction of little dead babies.

”She had the usual variety of temper and disposition, generally found in a school, and a way of her own of getting along with them. She would catch a refractory pupil with one hand by the shoulder, and press the thumb with such force into the hollow of the arm, that the poor victim was ready to subscribe to any articles of faith or practice she might see fit to draw up; and who of us will soon forget that old bra.s.s thimble, mounted on her skinny forefinger, as it came snapping against our foreheads?

”Being considered an untamable witch at home, I had the ill luck to be sent to this little initiatory purgatory. This was unfortunate, as Miss Rix and I looked at life through very different pairs of spectacles. The first great grief I can remember, was when I was about as tall as a rosebush,--nearly breaking my heart, because a little boy _threw away_ one of my ringlets, that I cut off for his especial keeping. In fact, I may as well own it, I was _born_ a _coquette_; and the lynx eyes of Miss Rix had already discovered it.

”She always made a chalk line on the floor between the girls and boys, that neither were allowed to cross without a special permit. Being aware of this, I had been in the habit of making certain telegraphic communications with a little lover of mine, in jacket and trowsers, on the other side of chalk-dom.

”Little dreaming of the storm that was brewing, I sat watching her one morning, as she slowly drew from her pocket a long piece of cord, and tested its strength. Raising her sharp cracked voice to its most crucifying pitch, she called,