[p. 82] consistent members of the Society of Friends (commonly called Quakers), as their families had been for several generations. Anna Folger, the youngest of six sisters, was a woman conspicuous throughout her life for great energy, keen wit and unfailing good sense. She inherited the dignified bearing of her grandfather, ‘Tory Bill Folger,’ who was said never to have found anything in his life but a jackknife sticking in a post above his head. Anna was less conventional than her sisters. It is told of her once, when she went for water to the pump near by which was owned in common by several families, and was using her own vigorous strokes, that one of her sisters remonstrated, saying, ‘Don't, Anna, don't pump so strong!’
The house where Lucretia was born is not standing now. She was still a little girl when they left it, and she remembered only one incident connected with it—that one day, when she was left in charge of a baby sister, it was struck by lightning and a neighbor came in and took both of them home with her; but curiously enough, no impression of terror remained with this recollection. The associations of her childhood belonged to the house on Fair street, into which they moved in 1797. It is still standing, in good preservation. As with all houses of that period, more attention had been paid to comfort and strength in its erection than to style or ornament, although the solid mahogany rail on its easy staircase shows that it was meant to be as handsome as was consistent with proper Friendly simplicity. Its frame was of solid handhewn oak. (Query—where did such oaks grow? On little Nantucket?) The walls over the open fireplaces were panelled up to the ceilings and the best rooms were wainscoted all around. The room at the right hand of the front door was the parlor, the scene of many lively family parties, and it was little Lucretia's place on these occasions to slip in while the elders were at tea in the other room, replenish the wood fire, and draw the chairs into a sociable circle around it. This
