The Topeka state journal. [volume], December 01, 1906, Last Edition, Image 6

About The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980

Image provided by: Kansas State Historical Society; Topeka, KS

                
'HE TOPEHA DAILY
JOURITAL SATURDAY IT I G II T.
GAM H Kn 1 i J J M bVi 0li H tlPsM i twiOH M, hsj Ivy kf 1 iivv) w
"M OF THE YOIMiEE SlMSEilTI OM
! I J l "W'sr ' -' '-"- v- 'A'" 1 1
' j - jj y
Alice Hegan: Rice Jf ; , ' ! Alics Baowk )rS
- H a ' S3' " 4
: - f- : " 1 1 i - - if -
CS Edith ahtom GjTtrgfe) MatoVak Yokst CgJ
rIIEX one comes to count
them the number of gift
ed young" women authors
tr w In this country is note
worthy. New England as a field of
fiction, especially short story fiction,
has been apparently OTerworked. so
that it seemed as if there was noth
ing more to say. Yet now comes a
Kew Hampshire young woman of the
unpretentious name of Alice Brown,
who fairly recreates for us the Kew
England of fiction. Critics say Miss
Brown has the clearest insight Into the
real Kew England character of any
writer. What is more, her English is
cf surpassing excellence, her literary
style itself giving pleasure. Her pub
lisher told me the other day that when
a new book by a given author is to be
printed the size of the edition is de
termined by the whole number of sales
of the author's last book. When Miss
Brown's new book, "The Country
Road," was published an edition equal
to the number of volumes of "High
Noon" sold, with' an additional 500, to
make sure, was issued. On the day of
its publication, however, the orders
coming in for "The Country Road"
could not begin to be filled.
Miss Brown now lives in Boston and
Is on the editorial staff of a periodical.
! ?
Bertha Runkle. otherwise Mrs. Louis
H. Bash, won fame through her first
long story, "The Helmet of Navarre,"
which has piso been successfully
dramatized. Bertha Runkle is the
daughter of a gifted and distinguished
mother, Mrs. I,ucia Gilbert Runkle, one
of the first women in this country to
become an editorial writer on a leading
daily paper. What is more, Lucia Gil
bert Runkle had the honor of serving
on Horace Greeley's own paper in his
own daj and he himself recognized her j
Edith Wharton
Marie Yah Yokst
brilliant ability and appointed her on ;
l.is staff of assistants. Bertha Runkle !
Bash acknowledges with affectionate
pride the debt she owes to her mother
in the way of help.
Marie Van Vorst, author of "Amanda
of the Mill" and contributor of verse
and fiction to magazines and newspa
pers, became interested in the labor
question very early in her career. Her
sister-in-law, Mrs. John Van Vorst, al
so a writer, likewise became interested,
and the two young women spent sev
eral years investigating the conditions
surrounding women and children who
work in factories. The two enthusias
tic students of industrial life worked a
year in factories along with the other
women in order to know Just how it
was for themselves. "Amanda of the
Mill" Is one of the outcomes of this
pilgrimage among the toilers. Miss
Van Vorst now lives in Paris most of
the time. Her newest book Is "The Sin
of George Warrener."
? m.
Edith Wharton, who wrote the un
mirthful "House of Mirth," which some
claim is a true picture of so called high
social life, has a new book In press
called "The Fruit of the Tree." Mrs.
Wharton herself belongs to the social
set she writes of, so presumably knows
it throughout. Among authors of the
tempestuous, temperamental school
Edith Wharton takes high rank. She
is a strong, vivid writer of excellent
English:
Ellen Glasgow first became known
through her novel "The Voice of the
People," a thrilling story of the con
flict between the old and the new life
of the south. Ellen Glasgow has the
rl-ht mindedness to belDng to both the
old and the new south. In genius she
belongs to the whole country. She
knows how to turn the human soul in
side out and show its deepest impulses
and most hidden griefs throbbing as
under a miscroscope. There is consid
erable psychological analysis In her
work. Miss Glasgow llveb In Rich
mond, Va., where she was born. She
is a handsome young woman with a
rare charm of personality, when one
can get at her, which is not always, for
she is reserved and sensitive. Her
thoughts are always on her stories.
She toils over them patiently and per
sistently, often rewriting portions of
them many times.
! !
Another handsome young southern
novelist in whom readers the country
over are interested is Miss Mary
Johnston, also of Richmond, Va
though she was not born there. Buch
anan, Botetourt county, Va., - was
the spot where her eyes opened on the
earthly scene. When she was sixteen
her parents removed to Birmingham,
Ala. It was there her first famous
book, "To Have and to Hold," was be
gun, though it was finished at a small
mountain resort In Virginia. Miss
Johnston's pretty home in Richmond
was bought. It is said, largely from the
money "To Have and to Hold" brought
its brilliant author. Her public missed
her name awhile from the periodical
lists of writers of new novels. Sev
eral years Mary Johnston has been al
most an invalid, too ill to write any
tMng. Her health, always rather frail,
seemed to give down altogether, and It
was feared she would never take up
that magic pen again. Then, quite re
cently and so suddenly that it seemed
almost miraculous, bright, gentle Mary
Johnston got well. Her recovery was
as strange as It was sudden, but it was
complete, and now many more stories
that reflect honor upon American lit
erary women may be looked for from
her.
e
Alice Hegan Rice's literary career Is
so bright and cheery that one likes to
read of It. This Louisville girl had
been alternately writing a little for
magazines and having much of a good
time socially when at length her "Mrs.
Wlggs of the Cabbage Patch" sudden
ly appeared and took all the world's
fancy. On the stage Mrs. Wlggs has
been as successful as she was In a
book. From that and her subsequent
stories and from the wise Investments
she had wit enough to make Mrs. Rica
is now a capitalist worth $300,000. In
speaking of her you must not call her
Hegan with the accent on the "He,"
but He-gan, accent on the "gan."
Clara Louise Burnham Is notably tha
Christian Science novelist. Of her last
novel, "The Opened Shutters," 17,300
copies were ordered in advance of pub
lication. Mrs. Burnham Is a daughter
of George F. Root, the song writer.
e
Ever youthful and well beloveJ
among authors is Kate Douglas Wig
gin. In private life she is Mrs. George C.
Riggs. She born in Philadelphia,
spent much of her early life In Cali
fornia and now lives in New York city
In winter, spending the rest of the year
either traveling in Europe or writing
at her lovely country home, Quillcote,
at Hollis, Me. Her "Rebecca of Sunny
brook Farm" has passed its eighteenth
edition. LILLIAN GRAY.
rom
nternal
.ate Clyde
WOMAN came to see me the
4 other day. She said she was
so bored she didn't know what
to do. That seems funny to
me. My greatest worry Is that I may
not have time to do all I want to do.
But, then, that may be because my
digestion is so good.
Dyspepsia is one of the greatest
causes of inactivity and unhappiness.
Dyspepsia but, there, this Isn't a
medical treatise!
Some day I am going to write an ode
on dyspepsia.
I am going to Immortalize it as a
great maker of history.
I am going to prove that all the war
riors who were defeated because they
put off until tomorrow what they
snould have
done today did
so because their
heads were
heavy and they
felt "dopey"
from the badly
assimilated food
in their stom
achs. I shall
prove that Nero
burned Rome
because he was
peevish from
having eaten
too many lam
Preys, that
Wyclif was a
reformer merely
So bored the didn't know because his
what to do. stomach made
him perpetually
restless and dissatisfied, that Savana
rola preached hell and brimstone be
cause he had them both inside of him.
that pepsin tablets would have cured
Napoleon of his thirst for conquest,
that But why go on with the list?
Its possibilities are endless.
t S
To return to my caller, I told her to
put herself on a diet and then if that
didn't work to ask herself what she
really wanted and to get it.
That sounds impossible, but it isn't.
If there is no excuse for being bored
in this world, there is certainly none
for being unhappy.
Barrios real ill health or physical
.trmlty, of course.
"TvWe is no situation so bad there
isn't some hole left to crawl out of it.
Just lemember that and you will feel
better right away. If you can't see
the hole It is because you haven't
looked hard enough for it.
Some of the ways out are exceeding-
" JLi n '
- Ml 1 D
VISCOUNTESS A0KI.
to Interior
Something t
II f I w
ill! "riv ;f u
J I
Y, ( j
A - v ' jYvf I
. :'
Viscountess Aoki, wife of the Japanese ambassador at Washington, Is a
German. She was the first European noblewoman to marry a Jap. As a girl
she was Baroness von Rahden. She and Viscount Aoki have a good -sized family
of children.
ly difficult, tight squeezes, but the. are Woman is not meant to be idle any
ways out just the same. more than man is all precedent to the
It is the woman who will not see her contrary. I think every woman ought
way out who deserves to be unhappy, j to have some interest in life outside of
Most women are sad because they j man and matrimony,
haven't enough to do. j These two. by the way, are the chief
You never saw a really busy woman ' trouble makers!
unhappy in your life. She hasn't time j w'hen a woman pins all her hopes of
to be. . happiness on one human being and
does not care for anything outside of
him that is where her misery begins.
When he is cross (and where is the
angel man who isn't?) her world is
dark and empty; whereas, the woman
with other sources of interest in life
can turn to them and be perfectly
happy.
Most women would like more spend
ing money with which to take up dif
ferent things horseback riding, let us
say, music or languages. Well, why
don't they try to earn it Instead of
moping? We are every one of us able
to do one thing and to do it well enough
to be compensated for it.
I have no patience with the woman
who weeps and goes without what she
When he is cross.
wants. Why, it Is the wanting of
things and the earning of them which
make the world go ahead.
The woman who "stays put" deserves
all the unhappiness she is enduring
through her own laziness, and with
this remark we will leave her to fight
it out!
H .
Every year there is a fad in interior
decoration, and the woman who in
sists upon keeping abreast with the
times Is almost hysterical as a result.
You see, my dears, it doesn't do any
more to have a red or a green dining
room. Blue is the proper color.
I must say it is a pretty fad, for the
blue used is not the dark blue which is
so gloomy or the sickly shade asso
ciated with the boudoirs of blonds, but
a rich medium tone somewhat on the
"Alice" shade. This is stunning with
oak woodwork and ecru lace curtains,
and when the same tone is repeated in
the rug and in sundry bits of china the
effect is dazzling.
In a very old fashioned house up
town this blue has been used to trans
form a homely dining room.
Ecru "bonne femme" curtains were
placed In the windows. The side cur
tains of rich blue material were placed
so as to cover the woodwork and in
crease the apparent size of the win
dows. The atrocious old mantel be
tween the two windows was torn down
eeor a tiori;
of Botrt of Trie
O DRY
' saw ; ,-v - j i ,
f
'?"
-OS
4fsS';y'
t ( ?y ' V y s'
f
THE ONLY SURVIVING CHILD OF JEFFERSON DAVIS.
At Colorado Springs, Colo., lives . Mrs. J. Addison Hayes, the last living
child . of the president of the Southern Confederacy. Mrs. Hayes was born
toward the close of the civil war. In 1S64, near Vicksburg. She has four chil
dren. . ' : .
and a tapestry combining tones of blue
and old rose was substituted. In front
of thjs was placed an old blue vase, and
old blue plates decorated the lower
shelf which was left over the fireplace.
The portiere leading into the draw
ing room was in old rose, and the
homely doorway leading into the hall
- was , transformed with blue portieres.
I When the round oak table is set with
the 'blue dinner service you actually
i forget to eat, the effect is so pretty,
j People with shirred princess gowns
I are having their own troubles just now.
! The shirrings can still be worn, but
j who wants to appear in them next to
the new eelskin princesses?
- The best way out of it is to cut the
dress in half, making the waist part
end in a wide girdle of the material if
possible and goring the skirt into a
circular pattern, which you can easily
dj once it is separated from the waist.
If you have a tea table which Is
slightly the worse for wear, why don't
you adopt a new idea and have a glass
top made for it? This is fitted with
handles of wood and lifts off like a
tray. It is exceedingly swell, if you
will permit me to use rather a vulgar
term.
Among the latest books published by
an enterprising firm is one telling how
to keep your house in order with a
chapter on gas
fixtures, one on
radiators and
others of a sim
iliarly useful
nature. I am
informed that
plenty of wo
men who are
not house own
ers are reading
upon these sub
jects, it being
much easier to
be your own
carpenter (if
you know how)
than to wait for
the owner of
your apartment Being your oxen carpen
house to get to tcr.
work at your
repairs. (If you have never lived in.
an apartment take my word for It!)
Before I close I want to tell you of a
novel bridge prize a friend of mina
won the other day. It was a silver
holder, something like an English toast
rack, containing three red morocco
books. The first was entitled "Chafing
Dish Recipes;" the second, "Salads,"
and the third, "Fancy Desserts."
It seems to me that these could ba
made very valuable by the addition of
the best recipes of different people well
known for their good cooking.
It certainly makes a prize much more
likely to be appreciated than most of
the sijly things one usually sees at
card parties.
New York.