For whom was I crying? For all the immigrants like the Lambs, who came to America seeking a better life but settled instead for a soot-infested home and dangerous work in the mills and gave thanks for it? For the education Dad bestowed on me that held no purpose other than to sharpen my wits to become the perfect servant? What did it say about society that the best a lowborn, educated girl could hope for was respectable servitude? It was as if all of Dad’s teaching gave me a glimpse into a world for which I longed but had no means of entering.
