I have in the letters to my sister preserved the endearing epithets as they were originally written, and which we in Sweden make use of among relatives or dear friends; although many readers may think them somewhat childish, I cannot help it. I have attempted to exclude them and to substitute others more befitting, but I could not succeed; such appeared stiff, unnatural and prosaic. Better the childish than the prosaic, thought I; and the little words will, I trust, be overlooked for the sake of the great matter, which, without any merit of mine, is yet contained in these letters.
And if, dear reader, thou hast now and then patience with the letter-writer when she speaks in sickness of body, or in the foolishness of affection, thou wilt be rewarded by being led, in her healthier and stronger moments, as by a sisterly hand, into a more familiar and cordial intimacy with that great country beyond the Atlantic, with its people, its homes, and its inner life, than might otherwise have been the case; and this thou wilt find is worth all the trouble.
I know the faults of my work, a knowledge often painful to me, better than my reader, or any one else. And this knowledge would depress me, if I did not know at the same time, that all which is best in this work will contribute in bringing nearer to each other the good homes of the New World, and the good homes of Europe, and above all those of my native land; in bringing the noble, warm hearts there, nearer to those which beat
