Page:My father as I recall him (IA cu31924013473610).djvu/31

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
GAD'S HILL.
21

were, but a moment ago had come across his path.

And then the forgetting of a word or a name. "Now into what pigeon-hole of my brain did that go, and why do I suddenly remember it now?" And as these thoughts passed through his mind and were spoken dreamily, so they also appeared in his face. Another instant, perhaps, and his eyes would be full of fun and laughter.

At the beginning of his literary career he suffered a great sorrow in the death—a very sudden death—of my mother's sister, Mary Hogarth. She was of a most charming and lovable disposition, as well as being personally very beautiful. Soon after my parents married, Aunt Mary was constantly with them. As her nature developed she became my father's ideal of what a young girl should be. And his own words show how this great affection and the influence of the girl's loved memory were with him to the end of his life. The