About this Item
First edition. Green cloth covered hardback with black embossed design to front board and gold lettering to front board and spine. 12 x 17.5 cm. 171 pages. 3 black & white line illustrations, 1 diagram and chart to rear. The Preface: "These Letters were never intended for publication, and were only the details written to our family of an every-day life, and now put in the same shape and composition ; not as a literary work, but in the hopes that the various experiences we underwent may be useful to future colonists intending to emigrate and farm, either in Manitoba or Colorado. M.G.C.H." Some rubbing and marking to cloth. Book cocked. Corner front endpaper creased. Tip of page 57 'missing' but still attached to following page where pages roughly cut. Book cocked, else binding sound and contents clean and complete. Remnant of bookplate inside front board '.kwork Praed', possibly '.Mackworth Praed'.--- The nineteenth century was marked by intense colonization by countries like Britain, France, Portugal, Spain and the Netherlands. Initially, the pioneering efforts were made by men who battled unfamiliar terrain to create territories that they marked out as their own, while their wives, mothers, sisters and daughters kept the home and hearth in their native land. However, with travel becoming more common and family life assuming more importance, the women too began to travel to the four corners of the earth. There are many accounts by Victorian women of their travels to the colonies and these are valuable insights into the social history and fabric of the colonies. Many of these accounts were however, quite superficial and concentrated more on the scenery and landscape?two of the most important things that interested women of the period. A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba by Mrs. Cecil Hall was published in 1884. The book consists of a series of letters written by the author to her family in England and as she says in the preface, were never meant to be published. However, she later felt they provide useful tips for those intending to make the journey and settle in a far off land. Her brother had migrated to Manitoba in 1881. In 1882, Mrs. Hall and her sister traveled to Canada via New York and Chicago. En route, the letters describe their meeting with President Chester Allen, the newly appointed head of state who took over as President after the assassination of President James Garfield. In Chicago, the letters describe a city that's limping back to normalcy after the Great Chicago Fire. Their journey by train across the vast plains of Canada, their arrival on the farm managed by her brother and two others who have purchased 13,000 acres and their experiences in the New World are chronicled in these letters. The sisters spend three months on the farm where they soon roll up their sleeves and pitch in, abandoning their fine lady's ways! Cooking, cleaning, helping on the land, ruining their soft hands and learning a different way of life are well described. The ladies then move to Colorado, where they visit friends who are here to try their luck in gold mining. The book closes with a letter from their brother who updates them on the progress he and his friends have made on the Manitoba farm. As an account of the difficult and hostile conditions that pioneers faced in America and Canada, A Lady's Life. is an interesting and valuable work. Seller Inventory # 000703
Contact seller
Report this item
