SWEET CICELY

OR JOSIAH ALLEN AS A POLITICIAN

By “Josiah Allen's Wife”: Marietta Holley

With Illustrations

Eighth Edition

TO

THE SAD-EYED MOTHERS,

WHO, LIKE CICELY,

ARE LOOKING ACROSS THE CRADLE OF THEIR

BOYS INTO THE GREAT WORLD OF

TEMPTATION AND DANGER,

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED.

PREFACE.

Josiah and me got to talkin' it over. He said it wuzn't right to thinkmore of one child than you did of another.

And I says, “That is so, Josiah.”

And he says, “Then, why did you say yesterday, that you loved sweet Cicelybetter than any of the rest of your thought-children? You said you loved'em all, and was kinder sorry for the hull on 'em, but you loved her thebest: what made you say it?”

Says I, “I said it, to tell the truth.”

“Wall, what did you do it for?” he kep' on, determined to get areason.

“I did it,” says I, a comin' out still plainer,—“I did it to keepfrom lyin'.”

“Wall, when you say it hain't right to feel so, what makes you?”

“I don't know, Josiah,” says I, lookin' at him, and beyend him, way intothe depths of emotions and feelin's we can't understand nor help,—

“I don't know why, but I know I do.”

And he drawed on his boots, and went out to the barn.

CONTENTS