Then I drove to the homes of the people I wished
to use for subjects and made appointments for sittings, and
ransacked the cabin for costumes. The letter came on the eight A.M.
train. At ten o'clock I was photographing Colonel Lupton beside
my dining-room fireplace for the father in the story. At eleven I
was dressing and posing Miss Lizzie Huart for the princess. At
twelve I was picturing in one of my bed rooms a child who served
finely for Little Sister, and an hour later the same child in a
cemetery three miles in the country where I used mounted
butterflies from my cases, and potted plants carried from my
conservatory, for a graveyard scene. The time was early November,
but God granted sunshine that day, and short focus blurred the
background. At four o'clock I was at the schoolhouse, and in the
best-lighted room with five or six models, I was working on the
spelling bee scenes. By six I was in the darkroom developing and
drying these plates, every one of which was good enough to use. I
did my best work with printing-out paper, but I was compelled to
use a developing paper in this extremity, because it could be
worked with much more speed, dried a little between blotters, and
mounted. At three o'clock in the morning I was typing the
quotations for the pictures, at four the parcel stood in the hall
for the six o'clock train, and I realized that I wanted a drink,
food, and sleep, for I had not stopped a second for anything from
the time of reading Mr.
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