and things, answering the very cry of my heart. My mother would
often let me stay with her for months. She had five sons, but no daughters
and she was very fond of me. This lesson she taught me: A party
of ladies came out from Independence to spend the day with her. Mrs.
Woodson and a Mrs. Porter, wife of Dr. Porter, I remember the latter, one
of the handsomest women I ever saw, beautiful feet, hands, hair, and a
woman who knew it, and, it was a mater of the greatest pride with her,
these charms. I was very much captivated by her splendid appearance
and could not keep my eyes from her. Next day Mrs. John Staton, a
country neighbor of my aunts, came in to make a visit, She was very
plain, wore a calico dress, waist-apron, and she was knitting a sock.
After she left aunt said to me: "Carry, you did not seem to like Mrs.
Staton's society as you did Mrs. Porter's; but one sentence of Mrs.
Staton's is worth all Mrs. Porter said. Mrs. Porter lives for this world,
Mrs. Staton lives for God." This Lesson I did not learn then, but have
since. Oh! for the old-fashioned women.


MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIRITUALISM.

Just at the close of the war when we were on a farm in Cass County,
Missouri, a colony of spiritualists were near us, Mrs. Hawkins, the
medium was about 60 years old, very peculiar, and finely educated.
My father had some farms he was selling for other people. He took
Mrs. Hawkins and several of her company to look at a farm with a view
of selling it. When she saw it from a hill some distance off she said:
"That is the place I saw in Connecticut." She bought it for a town site.
In writing to Washington to give it a name, the word "Peculiar" was
selected, and so it has ever been called. Mrs. Hawkins took a great
fancy to me. She would tell me of great things she had done, then say: