Mary Jane Holmes was an American writer living in the last half of the 1800's. She began teaching school at age 13. Her novels centered on domestic life. Her novels were published in a serialized form in different magazines. In her work, she comments on how various social issues effect women. An excerpt from the book reads, "The person thus addressed was a lady, whose face, though young and handsome, wore a look, which told of early sorrow. Matilda Remington had been a happy, loving wife, but the old churchyard in Vernon contained a grass-grown grave, where rested the noble heart which had won her girlish love. And she was a widow now, a fair-haired, blue-eyed widow, and the stranger who had so excited Janet's wrath by walking from the depot, a distance of three miles, would claim her as his bride ere the morrow's sun was midway in the heavens. How the engagement happened she could not exactly tell, but happened it had, and she was pledged to leave the vine-wreathed cottage which Harry had built for her, and go with one of whom she knew comparatively little.