ffred's
nearly-forgotten treasures...a collection of fugitive pieces, of which I thought more than
did others, as the meagreness of its sale proved...
—Lois Waisbrooker, Workers in the Vineyard
This work is quite different in character from Lois Waisbrooker's novels. While I'm not impressed by her poems on angels and spirits, I am impressed by her personal reflections on her life. However, the final piece, "Charity," is the most notable, and strikes me as possibly being an early version of Helen Harlow's Vow. In any case, Waisbrooker's 200th birthday anniversary is coming up in less than a year, and I decided that it was quite appropriate to transcribe this work (and possibly My Century Plant).
The text is taken from this scan of the 1871 edition. Aside from obvious typographical errors, most spellings were left as is. Because this work is a mixture of both poetry and short prose, I decided to use some fancier text formatting to make it easier to read. However, I don't intend to make a habit of it for most novels.
[Note: If you do read this book on a Kindle e-reader, I recommend you do so in landscape mode in order to minimize breaking of poetic lines.]
So here it is: the master HTML version, the home-brew Kindle version, and the actual Amazon publication.
June 22, 2025