Caroline Gilman

Recollections of a Southern Matron Caroline Gilman

Publisher Marketing: THE "SOUTHERN MATRON" was penned in the same spirit, and with the same object, as the "New-England Housekeeper" - to present as exact a picture as possible of local habits and manners. Every part, except the "love-passages," is founded in events of actual occurrence. Should it be thought that the views of human life in the two works, as has been suggested in private, have too much sunshine about them, I can only reply, that, to have made different descriptions, I must have resorted to imagination instead of fact, as far as my personal observation is concerned. Perhaps, had I examined the details of the police-courts for my Northern sketch, or the registry of the magistrate-freeholders for my Southern, I might have found gloomier scenes; but they would not have been such as Clarissa Packard and Cornelia Wilton would recognise in their daily experience Some apology may be necessary, as a matter of taste, for the frequent introduction of the negro dialect; but the careful reader will perceive that it has only been done when essential to the development of individual character. I am indebted to one Northern and two Southern friends for the original materials of the story of Betsey, the servant-maid, the Deer Hunt, and My brother Ben's education, all of which I have modified to my narrative.