Little Women - 912 Freedom Library

Little Womenexecution, she searched newspapers for accidents,incidents, and crimes. She excited the suspicions of publiclibrarians by asking for works on poisons. She studied facesin the street, and characters, good, bad, and indifferent, allabout her. She delved in the dust of ancient times for factsor fictions so old that they were as good as new, andintroduced herself to folly, sin, and misery, as well as herlimited opportunities allowed. She thought she wasprospering finely, but unconsciously she was beginning todesecrate some of the womanliest attributes of a woman’scharacter. She was living in bad society, and imaginarythough it was, its influence affected her, for she wasfeeding heart and fancy on dangerous and unsubstantialfood, and was fast brushing the innocent bloom from hernature by a premature acquaintance with the darker side oflife, which comes soon enough to all of us.She was beginning to feel rather than see this, for muchdescribing of other people’s passions and feelings set her tostudying and speculating about her own. a morbidamusement in which healthy young minds do notvoluntarily indulge. Wrongdoing always brings its ownpunishment, and when Jo most needed hers, she got it.I don’t know whether the study of Shakespeare helpedher to read character, or the natural instinct of a woman613 of 861