In fact, no one can comprehend either
Mrs. Stowe or her writings without some knowledge of the life and
character of this remarkable woman, whose strong, vigorous mind and
tremendous personality indelibly stamped themselves on the sensitive,
yielding, dreamy, and poetic nature of the younger sister. Mrs. Stowe
herself has said that the two persons who most strongly influenced her
at this period of her life were her brother Edward and her sister
Catherine.
Catherine was the oldest child of Lyman Beecher and Roxanna Foote, his
wife. In a little battered journal found among her papers is a short
sketch of her life, written when she was seventy-six years of age. In
a tremulous hand she begins: "I was born at East Hampton, L. I.,
September 5, 1800, at 5 P.M., in the large parlor opposite father's
study. Don't remember much about it myself." The sparkle of wit in
this brief notice of the circumstances of her birth is very
characteristic. All through her life little ripples of fun were
continually playing on the surface of that current of intense thought
and feeling in which her deep, earnest nature flowed.
When she was ten years of age her father removed to Litchfield, Conn.,
and her happy girlhood was passed in that place. Her bright and
versatile mind and ready wit enabled her to pass brilliantly through
her school days with but little mental exertion, and those who knew
her slightly might have imagined her to be only a bright, thoughtless,
light-hearted girl.
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