Hills of the Shatemuc, Volume I — Susan Warner

Hills of the Shatemuck is a pastoral set in the Hudson River area of New York. It follows the lives and doings of a rural family, and was based in part on the early life through young manhood of the author's father, Henry Warner. As with the rest of her work, the book attempts to teach by example. Winthrop and Elizabeth, the principal characters, embody noble virtue and demonstrate the duties of Christian life and character. As the author once put it, "He who serves God with what costs him nothing, will do very little service, you may depend on it." This is Volume I of the work. Susan Bogert Warner was an American author of religious fiction, children's fiction, and theologigical works. Writing as "Elizabeth Wetherall," she wrote over thirty novels. Her first, The Wide, Wide World, was most popular, and was translated into French, German, and Dutch. She also wrote with her younger sister Anna Bartlett Warner, and the sisters wrote Christian songs. The Warners could trace their ancestry to the Pilgims. Their father, Henry Warner, was a successful lawyer who lost most of his fortune in the Panic of 1837. The sisters turned to writing to earn money in 1849.