Margaret Ogilvy

"On the day I was born we bought six hair-bottomed chairs, and in our little
house it was an event, the first great victory in a woman's long campaign; how
they had been laboured for, the pound- note and the thirty threepenny-bits they
cost, what anxiety there was about the purchase, the show they made in
possession of the west room, my father's unnatural coolness when he brought them
in (but his face was white) - I so often heard the tale afterwards, and shared
as boy and man in so many similar triumphs, that the coming of the chairs seems
to be something I remember, as if I had jumped out of bed on that first day, and
run ben to see how they looked. I am sure my mother's feet were ettling to be
ben long before they could be trusted, and that the moment after she was left
alone with me she was discovered barefooted in the west room, doctoring a scar
(which she had been the first to detect) on one of the chairs, or sitting on
them regally, or withdrawing and re- opening the door suddenly to take the six
by surprise."

 - Excerpted from "Margaret Ogilvy"