Pages 10 through 19
Page 10: This page includes a poem and an essay that offer advice on how to properly live one's life: don't anticipate troubles before they come, and remember that life is short. The page also includes an image of Venice and a short description of life there. Though Prudence may have wished to travel, there is no evidence that she ever managed to visit Europe.
Page 11: Most of this page is filled with a long, humorous story in which a "brakeman" (a railroad employee) makes analogies between Christian denominations and different types of train routes. The other item on the page is a collection of short and simple riddles.
Page 12: This page contains two poems, one by the famous American poet John Greenleaf Whittier and the other signed only "M.W.B." The page also contains a short piece about word origins and a joke about avoiding family arguments. The joke is racially offensive because it relies, as a lot of the "humor" preserved in the scrapbook does, on a depiction of African Americans as gullible or easily confused.
Page 13: This page has a Christmas theme. It contains a poem by "Rose Geranium" called "The Angel's Offering" and an image of an angel leaving presents by a child's bed. There is also an essay about the cultural and historical importance of the Christmas holiday.
Page 14: This page contains the second half of the Christmas essay begun on the previous page as well as poems by T. Buchanan Read and an unnamed poet.
Page 15: This page continues the Christmas theme from the previous two pages, with an image that corresponds to the angel image from page 13, another poem about Christmas, and a poem about the old and new years.
Page 16: This page contains three poems: "Papa's Letter," about a little boy who is trampled by horses; "My Friend," about a southern woman who is unfaithful to her Confederate soldier fiancee; and "My Rights," about the rights of women to make their own decisions (but not to vote).
Page 17: This page contains two poems about death, one by John H. Boner and one by Edwin Arnold.
Page 18: This page contains three poems and a short quotation from the eighteenth-century author and educator Hannah More.
Page 19: Like many of the pages in Prudence's scrapbook, this one contains a number of pieces about self-improvement: the importance of being honorable, modest, considerate, and so forth. There is also a piece describing the deaths of the twelve apostles.
| Previous page on path | View the Scrapbook from Beginning to End, page 2 of 11 | Next page on path |
Discussion of "Pages 10 through 19"
Add your voice to this discussion.
Checking your signed in status ...