their husbands, tended to develop and strengthen them mentally and physically.
"In 1804 my father's family removed to Boston, and in the public and private schools of that city I mingled with all classes without distinction. It was the custom then to send the children of such families to select schools; but my parents feared that would minister to a feeling of class pride, which they felt was sinful to cultivate in their children. And this I am glad to remember, because it gave me a feeling of sympathy for the patient and struggling poor, which but for this experience I might never have known." Under such humane influences, with such ancestors and associations, in the public schools, in the Friends' meeting, on the adventurous island, and in the suburbs of Boston, the child passed into girlhood, with lessons of industry and self-denial well learned, and with her life all before. — She lived in a period when women of genius had vindicated their right to be recognized in art, science, literature, and government, and through many of the great events that have made the United States a Nation. It was such a combination of influences that developed Lucretia Mott into the exceptional woman she was.
In an unlucky hour her father endorsed for a friend, and to save his honor, was compelled to lose his property. It was a blow from which he did not recover, and henceforward much of the support of the family devolved upon the mother, who had remarkable tact, energy, and courage. Both parents were ambitious for their children, and did all they could for their education; that was one thing about which all Quakers were tenacious. In her fourteenth year Lucretia and her elder sister were sent to "The Nine Partners," a Friends boarding-school in Dutchess County, New York, and there pursuing her studies with patient zeal, she remained two years without once going home for a holiday vacation. At fifteen, a teacher having left, Lucretia was made an assistant, and at the end of the second year, was tendered the place of teacher, with the inducement beside, that her services would entitle a younger sister to her education.
Her well-balanced character enabled her to meet with calmness, all life's varied trials, of which she had her full share. As one of eight children in her father's house, with his financial embarrassments, and sudden death: and afterward with five children of her own, and her husband's reverses; Lucretia's heroism and strength of mind were fairly tested. In both of these financial emergencies, she opened a school, and by her success as a teacher, bridged over the chasm."
In her eighteenth year, Lucretia Coffin and James Mott, accord-
