Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/49

Rh ladies to do, but as far as I know without success, that is to say, biographical observations with regard to animals and plants. The turn for minute detail, acute perception of the lesser world, which is peculiar to woman, together with a poetic feeling which allies it to the spiritual—the universal, and which can discern in all things symbols of purpose rich in thought; these are all natural endowments which seem singularly to befit woman for that portion of science, and should in their pursuit and their application tend to make the searching soul richer in its daily life. Mary Townsend has treated her subject in this biographic and poetic manner, and given in her work the history of the insect metamorphoses. The little book is ornamented with copper plates, in which various kinds of insects are shown in various stages of their existence, especially in that in which they burst from their pupa state, and unfold their wings in space. It is not wonderful that the beautiful human spirit sternly imprisoned in its earthly pupa, should feel especially enamoured of this movement of transformation.

Mary Townsend, and a young sister of hers, also richly gifted, and delicate also in health—yet not in the same way as Mary—are now occupied in preparing a rhymed chronicle of the History of England for children's easy committal to memory. And thus that meagre Quaker-home encloses a rich poetical life, and in that a being which is almost an angel already, and which waits only for its transformation to become fully so. The parents are an old, classical Quaker couple. The old man's principal object and delight seems to be to take care of his daughters.

I have dined with Lucretia Mott, in company with all her children and grand-children, a handsome, flourishing multitude. She interests, rather than attaches me. Her husband, Mr. Mott, is a strong old gentleman, who seems to maintain his place, though he is obscured somewhat by