Excerpt from The Holcombes: A Story of Virginia Home-Life I say I have avoided personalities, and vet I plead guilty, so far as that humble race is concerned who have been so intimately connected with our domestic relations for centuries. With regard to them, I will say, that each portrait has been drawn from nature, - that great fountain head of truth. Each one who has found a niche in my gallery of family portraits lives as distinctly in my mem ory as if seen but yesterday. I have even retained their peculiarities of expression, as essentially necessary to a faithful portraiture of their characters. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.