We have no family pictures, Prue and I, only a portrait of my grandmother hangs upon our parlor wall. It was taken at least a century ago, and represents the venerable lady, whom I remember in my childhood in spectacles and comely cap, as a young and blooming girl. She is sitting upon an old-fashioned sofa, by the side of a prim aunt of hers, and with her back to the open window. Her costume is quaint but handsome. It is a cream-colored dress made high in the throat, ruffled around the neck and over the bosom and shoulders. The waist is just under her shoulders, and the sleeves are tight, tighter than any of our coat-sleeves, and also ruffled at the wrist. Around the plump and rosy neck, which I remember as shrivelled and sallow, and hidden under a decent lace handkerchief, hangs, in the picture, a necklace of large ebony beads. There are two curls upon the forehead, and the rest of the hair flows away in ringlets down the neck. The hands hold an open book: the eyes look up from it with tranquil sweetness, and through the open window behind you see a quiet landscape—a hill, a tree, the glimpse of a river, and a few peaceful summer clouds. Often in my younger days, when my grandmother sat by the fire after dinner lost in thought perhaps remembering the time when the picture was really a portrait—I have curiously compared her wasted face with the blooming beauty of the girl, and tried to detect the likeness. It was strange how the resemblance would sometimes start out; how, as I gazed and gazed upon her old face, age disappeared before my eager glance as snow melts in the sunshine, revealing the flowers of a forgotten spring. It was touching to see my grandmother steal quietly up to her portrait, on still summer mornings when every one had left the house—and I, the only child, played, disregarded—and look at it wistfully and long. She held her hand over her eyes to shade |