Introduction
much that was then accounted a luxury is now an absolute necessity, or so we think; but of one condition there can be no dispute, human nature was the same.
Among the many papers that had been so long preserved there chanced to be that rarest form of old documents, a journal. Almost two centuries ago, an eye-witness of the occurrences to be narrated made brief mention of the part he took therein. These, with various memoranda, which threw more or less light upon the doings of those days, were rolled together and enclosed in a quaint red leather wallet, from which the silver clasp had been taken; and from these time-worn records, which are still preserved, I have gathered the essential features of the story of Ruth Davenport, who in fact, and not merely in the author's fancy, was known to many as a "Quaker Fairy."
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