SevenAlexander stared at the image before him and shivers feathered up his spine. An enchanting family group stared out of the 1851 daguerreotype, as if making a silent, soulful appeal to not be forgotten. Two small children, a boy and a girl, probably no more than a year old, cuddled into a woman who was clearly their mother: she was hugging them close, one on either side. An older girl, perhaps four or five years old, sat cross-legged on an enormous cushion at the woman’s feet, clasping to her chest a small dog with an eager lolling tongue that made him look as though he was positively smiling into the future. The woman had an ethereal beauty, the other-worldliness of the image enhanced by the filmy white dress she wore, with a silky fluid flowing skirt and filmy neckline reminiscent of
