Julia Ward Howe (1819 – 1910) by Laura E. Richards

Our mother was once present at a meeting where there was talk of ancestry and heredity. One of the speakers dwelt largely upon the sins of the fathers. He drew stern pictures of the vice, the barbarism, the heathenism of the “good old times,” and ended by saying with emphasis that he felt himself “bowed down beneath the burden of the sins of his ancestors.”

Our mother was on her feet in a flash.

“Mr. So-and-So,” she said, “is bowed down by the sins of his ancestors. I wish to say that all my life I have been buoyed up and lifted on by the remembrance of the virtues of mine!”

These words are so characteristic of her, that in beginning the story of her life it seems proper to dwell at some length on the ancestors whose memory she cherished with such reverence.