Warning: If you have a visual impairment, use the manuscript transcript version including the Lucy Maud Montgomery’s foot notes and contextual annotation references.

Chapter 2

29a

got to drive a long piece, haven’t we? Mrs. Spencer said it was eight miles. I’m glad because I love driving. Oh, it seems so wonderful that I’m going to live with you I’ve never and belong to you. I’ve never belonged to anybody — not really. But the asylum was the worst. I’ve only been in it four months but that was enough. I don’t suppose you ever were an orphan so you in an asylum so you can’t (begin subscript)^(end subscript)(begin superscript)possibly(end superscript) understand what it is like. Mrs. Spencer said It’s worse than anything you could imagine. Mrs. Spencer said it was wicked of me to talk like that but I didn’t mean to be wicked. It’s so easy to be wicked without knowing it, (begin subscript)^(end subscript)(begin superscript)isn’t it? (end superscript)They were good, you know — the asylum people.

 

 



TEXT ANNOTATION

"29a": Montgomery had numbered this page 29, then repeated that number on the next recto page. Judging by the change in angle and ink, she went back and added the "a" and "b" to each to differentiate them. This error, among others later in the manuscript, means that the number of the sheet of paper shown in your browser window no longer matches Montgomery's numbering system.

PHOTO ANNOTATION

black and white image of a line of children in front of an iron fence outside the home.

"the asylum": A photo of the Protestant Orphan's Home, North Park Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, May 1874.
Nova Scotia Archives 1987–265 no. 5 / neg. no.: N–8733