Note (return) — Chapter I

Many are the tales concerning JOANNA's flashing wit. There appeared many years back, in a modest shape that excited small interest amongst the reviewing herd, a booklet whereof the title furnished little if any indication to the contents. The Spinster's Reticule, for so the name ran, came forth with no blare of journalistic trumpets challenging approval from the towers of critical sagacity. It appeared and lived. But between its cardboard covers the bruised heart of JOANNA beats before the world. She shines most in these aphorisms. Her private talk, too, has its own brilliancy, spun, as it was here and there, out of a museful mind at the cooking of the dinner or of the family accounts. She said of love that "it is the sputter of grease in a frying-pan; where it falls the fire burns with a higher flame to consume it."1 Of man, that "he may navigate Mormon Bay, but he cannot sail to Khiva Point." The meaning is too obvious it may be, but the thought is well imaged.