PDF The Making of the West; Volume 2: Since 1500: Peoples and Cultures by Lynn Hunt; Thomas R. Martin; Barbara H. Rosenwein; Bonnie G. Smith in History

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WILL you take my life? This was the somewhat startling question put to me by Mrs. Hardinge - better known as Belle Boyd - on my recent introduction to her in Jermyn Street. "Madam;" said I; "a sprite like you; who has so often run the gauntlet by sea and land; who has had so many hair-breadth escapes by flood and field; must bear a 'charmed life:' I dare not attempt it." Then; placing in my hands a roll of manuscript; she said; "Take this; read it; revise it; rewrite it; publish it; or burn it - do what you will. It is the story of my adventures; misfortunes; imprisonments; and persecutions. I have written all from memory since I have been here in London; and; perhaps; by putting me in the third person you can make a book that will be not only acceptable to the public and profitable to myself; but one that will do some good to the cause of my poor country; a cause which seems to be so little understood in England." I took the manuscript; promising to look it over; and return it with an estimate of its merits. I have done so; and hence the publication of "Belle Boyd; in Camp and Prison." The work is entirely her own; with the exception of a few suggestions in the shape of footnotes - the simple; unambitious narrative of an enthusiastic and intrepid schoolgirl; who had not yet seen her seventeenth summer when the cloud of war darkened her land; changing all the music of her young life; her peaceful "home; sweet home;" into the bugle blasts of battle; into scenes of death and most tumultuous sorrow.