In Which We
Discuss Hitty: Her First Hundred
Years
Written by Rachel Field, illustrated by Dorothy Lathrop
HITTY
Her First Hundred Years
Week of
Chapter Fourteen: In
Which I End My Hay-Days and Begin a New
Profession:
Hitty is
rescued from her predicament in the hayloft by a hired worker who
pitched her
out of her hiding place into a cow’s stall.
She was, fortunately, found by a small boy who took her to the
farmer’s
wife. One of the boarders at the
farmhouse was an artist and when he saw Hitty he wanted her as a prop
for his
paintings. Even though her dress was
in
tatters and her coral beads scattered to the four corners of the
hayloft, the
artist saw her true character.
Mr.
Farley painted portraits in the neighborhood and one of the young
ladies sitting
for him agreed to fit Hitty out in respectable clothes.
Mr. Farley insisted that Hitty keep her
chemise with the cross-stitching of her name.
Hitty became an artist’s model and traveled all over for a
good many
years, but though they traveled to
One day a
visitor came to arrange with the Larraby sisters about lending a
beautiful
embroidered dress of their mother’s to a Cotton Exposition to be
held
soon. It was to be a great event, almost
more than Mardi Gras. The sisters
thought this would be a wonderful opportunity to dress Hitty as a model
for the
Exposition. Since Mr. Farley was
leaving
to paint portraits on several plantations, he agreed to leave Hitty
with the
sisters Larraby.
The
sisters dressed her in a bridal outfit made from a handkerchief that
had been
woven from cotton grown on their great-great-grandfather’s
plantation. Their own great-grandmother
had embroidered
it; and after her marriage, it was carried by every bride in the family. Now there would be no more weddings since
Miss Hortense and Miss Annette were the last of the family.
Hitty was
placed on display at the Exhibition but eventually stolen by a little
girl,
Sally, who had been eyeing her. Sally
found her chance and managed to get Hitty out of her display case and
make off
with her. Sally’s father was the
Captain
of the steamboat Morning Glory that plied the
One
Sunday, Captain Loomis went ashore and could not take Sally. She took Hitty in a basket and went exploring
along the river. She happened upon a
preacher preaching a sermon on the commandment about stealing. Sally stiffened at his words.
When a terrible thunderstorm came up, Sally
ran toward the Morning Glory. However
the crashes of the thunder were too much.
She cried up to God to not let the lightning strike her dead. She knew she broke the commandment about
stealing when she took Hitty from the Exhibition. She
knows she is a sinner but there wasn’t
time for her to repent and get baptized, and she promised she would and
begged
for the lightning not to get her this time.
In spite of that, the largest rumble and crackle of lightning
came. Finally, Sally cried that she would
give
Hitty back and ran pell-mell down the bank toward the river. Hitty knew only too well what she meant to
do.
DISCUSSION:
This is
one of my favorite chapters. So much
goes on, from Hitty being thrown from the hayloft finally, to becoming
an
artist's model for Mr. Farley, and then to
I love
how Hitty gets a glance of her appearance in the mirror and is shocked
at how
she has changed from her life experiences.
Her bright pink cheeks were almost gone, her eyes now a worn-out
blue,
and the grain of her ash wood was beginning to show through. She was feeling depressed about that until
she overheard Mr. Farley explaining that she was superior to
china-headed dolls
because she had "no trying highlights".
I liked
the way that Rachel Field had the Larraby sisters also stare at their
reflections. Miss Hortense would stand a
long time, with a
strange expression on her lips, before a picture of herself and her
sister in
their younger days, and Miss Annette was caught by Hitty peering with
that same
look in front of a long mirror. She
never heard the sisters mention anything about aging, but it was
because Hitty
knew what it was to change that she could understand all that must be
passing
in the sisters' minds.
And that Sally Loomis is something. She wasn't a bad child by any means, but she
just had to have that doll beyond anything.
________________________
A confession: when
I was younger, I was bored by the Hitty story after
she was lost by Isabella. I wished the
later chapters were longer and more detailed. I did hope that I might
actually
find Hitty at a thrift store or tide pool.
Now when I read the story, I see a completely different layer of
things, and
sometimes don't see them! Thanks for pointing out the congruence
between
the aging Larraby sisters and Hitty's own changes.
I also like the fact that Hitty experienced the US American Civil War
from both
a Northern and Southern perspective, pointing out that losses on both
sides
affected everyone.
Has anyone else compared the paperback Hitty and a hardback copy - I
have
noticed a number of alterations (mistakes?) in the paperback. Maybe
this was
already mentioned while I was away...
________________________
I have never held a paperback version of the story, but when they reset the type for that, it’s likely that there were mistakes in it.
________________________
Again, as
in the first reading, I am surprised that the “new” pearl
necklace was not
mentioned by Rachel Field. Hitty’s
corals are such a big part of her story, like her chemise, and for
Rachel not
to mention it when the Larraby sisters were preparing her outfit for
the
exposition was a big gaff in my opinion.
__________________________
The Hitty
timeline states that Hitty considers the Larraby sisters would not have
been
more than 45 to 50 years old, which actually sounds about right. (She
was with
the Larrabys before the 1884 Cotton Exposition. The Civil War ran from
1851 to
1864. Assuming they were betrothed as young women maybe around 20 or so
when
the War started, that would make them between the ages of 40 and 50.)
Field
describes them as “wrinkled old ladies in their shabby
silks”; “too frail to be
in the crowds”; “fingers were still tapering but worn and
yellow as ivory”;
Miss Hortense “nodding her head till the light twinkled on the
high comb which
caught up her ‘white’ hair.” One gets the idea from
the book that the ladies
must be in the 70’s or so. I wonder if Field just did not pay
enough attention
to the dates.
__________________________
I'm
guessing she just didn't figure anyone would be studying the book like
we
are!!! She could never have imagined her children's book would become a
cult
classic as it has.
__________________________
Chapter
14's description of the sisters Larraby absolutely makes us feel they
are much
older than their 40s, and so Rachel Field's private timeline must be in
error.
Or she used artistic license again to make the story flow better.
From Hitty Timeline:
Between 1870
and 1884 Hitty is found, and becomes an artist's model. She travels to
Due to
some comments made by the sisters (that they had both lost beaus in the
Civil
War) and Hitty’s comments as to the sisters' ages, we wonder if
she considered
them to be old when they could not have been more than 45 to 50. The
Civil War
ran from 1861 to 1864, and even if the beaus had been killed on the
very first
day of the war (and we know one was killed in the battle of Vicksburg),
that
would still have only made it 20 years before the Cotton Exposition in
New
Orleans, which occurred in 1884-85.
1884-85:
Hitty goes to the Cotton Exposition.
1884-85,
August: Hitty is stolen from the Cotton Exposition by Sally Loomis,
rides on
the Riverboat Morning Glory, and is set afloat on the