The Sun and the New York herald. [volume], February 22, 1920, Section 7 Magazine Section, Page 9, Image 79

About The Sun and the New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1920-1920

Image provided by: The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundation

                
THE SUiy AND NEW YORK HERALD, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1920.
Ameiicanomen Win Heart of France With Their Peris
Brilliant Writers Long -in Paris
Are Showered with Honors for, ,
Their Services During Wlar ;
Special Correspondence of Tin; Sun and
The New Yobk Herald.
Pams, Feb. 3, 1020.
THREE of America's most brilliant
pen women have lived for years in
Psris. They are Edith Wharton, Sirs. John
Van Vorst and Anna Bowman Dodd.
These three women are representative of
all that is best in American womanhood, a
credit to their country as well as being an
ornament of the greatest utility to the coun
try which they have chosen as their second
patrii. They have Riven the wealth of
their united pens unreservedly during the
war to useful production in the interests
not only of our own soldiers but most of
all to France, and France is grateful and
appreciative. Decorations, the highest that
could be awarded, have been showered upon
them by the Government, and every cour
tesy and assistance have been given to
them.
Withal, the three are totally different .in
temperament and us to their predilections.
Mrs. Wharton is almost morose in her cx
eluMveness. She moves in an ultra literary
Kt, lives much within herself, appears only
occasionally in the diplomatic world and
ilftncs herself to nil except a few intimates.
Her charities are wide nnd take great
dc.il of her time nnd strength, and she
makes pilgrimages to unknown and little
frequented regions in search of material
which afterward appears in her books, so
popular in England and ?y well known in
our own land. She" occupies a spacibus
apartment in the rue'de Varennes, n stone's
throw from the Rodin Museum, in the
heart centre of what remains of the last
stronphold of the aristicrfltie, and sur
loundcd by the legations of many foreign
countries.
Cousin of Secretary Lansing.
Jlrs. John Van Vorst, who by the way
is a cousin of Secretary Lansing, came to.
Paris years ago a handsome and accom
plished young widow, and made her entree
into French society under the patronage of
the Marquise do Castellane, who then lived
in rue Constantine facing Esplanade des
Invalidcs. '
The brilliant young Americame soon had
.ill the noblesse of .France kissing her gra
cious finger tips, and in the race for first
pHice in her affections' the best blood to
crther with the most brilliant intellects all
Iced the mark nnd started in a bunch. It
wa a race of brains versus pursang (blue
b'ondl, and in a way it was, the dark horse
that won.
Hugue Lc Roux, eminent journalist and
polemist, won the prize, and to-day Mrs.
Ilugiie Le Roux occupies an enviable posi
tion in governmental circles, her close
fnends being Senators, Deputies, high court
officials and politicians generally.. Her
ilons, are arr.ong the most important in
Taiis.
But of all the American writers in Eu
rope Anna Bowman Dodd perhaps enjoys
the greatest personal popularity. Anna the
leloed, she is affectionately termed by her
friends, and they ar" legion. She is univer
sal, one of those personalities of boundless
fntlnisiasm, whose flamme (ardor) is inex
tinguishable. ,
Mrs. Dodil vas born with a gold spoon in
her mouth, and in spite of a lavish temper
ament she seems to have always managed
to keep her golden spoon. Her life reads
like a romance one of the old fashioned,
clean, wholesome variety.
By her Three Normandy Inns, her best
known work, she enriched a whole province
Normandy. American and English tour- ,
ists took it up as a sort of glorified" guide
nook. They read it, and thermished to
Normandy by the hundreds of thousands.
They are still reading it and still going to
Normandy.
Her Last Book Daring.
Her last book, now in 'the hands of the
publishers (Harper's), is certainly the most
daring venture of all. It is Up the Seine
to the Battle Fields and in tliis Mrs. Dodd
carries her readers over obstacles which
might make such men as Eads and De Les
wps tremble with fear. The sand bars, the
islets, the up stream difficulties of the Seine?
its tides, all, the writer sweeps over with the,
tnie confidence of a woman and a writer of
imagination.
The difficulties? Well, Hut will .be a
matter for mere men to look after, and
'hey probably will have already promised
to do so in fact Mrs. Dodd's one. idea being
to Secure a comfortable passage for Amer
ican mothers who desire to visit the graves
of their sons lying on the battlefields of
France without their having to first undergo
the fatigue of a trip to Paris, so that their
pious and aching hearts may be spared the
hock of the gayeties of the great city widen
eems already to have forgotten the dead
before first arriving at the goal of their
long pilgrimage.
Mrs. Dodd is herself in New York put- '
ifiZ the finishing touches to her book, which
"ill appear early in the spring. The book
will contain many other surpris.es beside
that of the propaganda in favor of the
noble Seine. Mrs. Dodd is an authority on
historic France, and she is the only woman
member of the Archeoloffic;d Society of
Normandy. She has grouped into this new
hook four of the most tragic epochs in the
hmory oftbo Seinat
The flight of the Empress Eugenie, who, . I
it is a matter of history, was conveyed by,
the Into Dr. Evans, the Philadelplu'a dentist" ,
nud dentist to Napoleon III., from Paris )to- '
Trouvjlle, ner Havre; where- a boat -was
procured to convey her to England.
The second ' episode is again the llJght "
of a ruler, that of Louis Philippe.
The third 'event deals witli the second
funeral of. Napoleon1 L, as the body of the
great emperor wos c6nvcycd up the- Seine
from Havre to Rouen on special boats, that
event carried out with great pomp and
splendor. ,
Airs. Dodd, because of her important
relationship in Francp, has ken able to
secure much material which has hitherto
not been published in America; this to-.,
pettier with many authentic photographs
and sketches. The fourth bit a history on
which the nuthor has seized concerns the '
funeral barges of Villiam the Conqueror,
If Mrs. Dodd's most successful" books are
those dealing with French life and the ;
leauty of 'French landscapes, French his
tory and French characters this choioa of
subject was no mere accident Taken by
her parents to Europe nt tha, tender age of
two years, speaking French and German as
ii child as easily as her mother tongue, with
all her childhood up to the rge of eleven
passed in France, Germany and Switzer
land, Mrs. Dodd's earliest impressions were
European rather than American. Still the
rootNof a loyal and intense patriotism was
deeply imbedded through a long line of
New England ancestry.
Her father, Stephen Mann Blake, wan
born in the town of Franklin, Mass., in
1808. His own farm neighbored that of
Horace Mann. On the very day of the
birth of 1his one of the older Blake's sons
a brother of Horace Mann had died, and
the newborn babe was christened Stephen,
Mann 'in- memory of the dead child. This
early association with the great intaovator
of American education Horace Mann
had an enduring influence on Mr. Blake,
although he himself, as one of twelve chil
dren, started his career at the age of twelve
as a self-supporting individual. He was
therefore in every sense a self-made man,
that finest of all Amerfba's products.
Yet after he had won nt the early age of
frty financial independence Mr. Blake
proceeded to .Europe with his family, where
each of his four children was given every
educational advantage. .
On her mother's side Mrs. Dodd. comes
from a long Scotch and .Puritan ancestry.
The original Scotch, founder of the Ameri
can branch of ,the Munro family was Col.
William Munro, exiled by Cromwell to the
'Plantations of Massachusetts" in 1636.
The Colonel's marriage to Miss Anna Bow
man determined the American citizenship of
this the third son of the ScoKh baronet,
owner of Fould's CasSe, which is still ex
tant. In the battle" of Lexington fourteen,
Munros and Bowmanaf otigbt for American
independence. . "
On the return fthc family, to America
the Blake's settled in New York. There
were, however, frequent returns to Eur6pe,
and if was during ane of these tours in
France that the youthful authoress, then
Miss Anna Bowman Blake, made her first
literary' success. Harper' Magazine, hav
ing published several of her short articles
and stories, gave her an order for an im
portant paper an "Frssch Political Leaden."
MISS SOUME TCHENZ
STUDYING -Z2. "PARIS AN
INTIMATE FRIEND ef
MRS. VAN VORST
This review of the exciting days when
Gnmbetta was at the height of his declama
tory successes made an immediate hit This
initial .sueces3-was fdllowed by other raaga
n triumphs, such ea a. pap? a "Th
Concord School of Philosophy," which was
translated into French, and was commented
upon by all the leading French newspapers.
However, Miss" Blake was forced to wait
some years before she found her true lit
erary bent, which came in her first book,
Cathedral Days. This book, which is still
imprint, was the outcome of a coaching trip
thjiugh southern England, written years
after her marriage to Edward Williams
Dodd of Boston.
This book was. followed by a skit 6a
socialism, Tht Republic of the Future, a
audi totklat whtt, ansteUf ka mm
and price (50 cents), evoked a- storm of
applause and condemnation out of all pro
"portion to the "modesty of the effort- Bish
ops took the title of tlie-book as the basis
of tfisir sntwn, and both th American
and English press- f,ave lengthy comments,
praising i. picture, of a possible sociaHstie
world; or they toreVto tatters, aeconling
tc their anti or pro socialistic Triews. Inci
dentally quite two-thirds of 3Irs. Dodd's
predictions in the twenty-five years which
have elapsed since, the publication of the
hook have 4ma true. Her nest book, Three
yormsniy Unt (1892), h Utdmt, as a
publisher rteently deftied It,. "A JwasAold
word."
An illness following tha publication of
The Inns delayed all further work ofthe
kutto far list, but Mf. JU' iattHw
Differing Widely in Temperament,
Review of their Careers Gives
Interesting Character Study
tual activities were storing up material for
the seven otocr hookswnieh were tq loiiow.
The Broads, beautifully illustrated
by Pcnnell, was the outcome of a yachting
trip on the broads of Norfolk; England,
and came ouflirst in the Century Magazine,
the Broads was followed by another
book on (Normandy, Falaise, the Town of
the Conqueror (100d), This was perhaps
the first attempt made by an American
author to present Wijliam the Conqueror
in his own Castle of Falaise as a lad and,
youth conquering- his own dukedom before
he conquered England. This book hasjiad
a long life. Falaise, as well as all Mrs.
dodd's subsequent books, was written in
France.
In the. Palaces of the Sultans (1902)
was the result of a visit to Constantinople
by Mrs.. Dodd nnd her husband, in com
pagy .with the American Ambassador Gen.
Horace Porter and his wife.
This vision of the East opened up new
horizons to an author and, artist as impres
sionable as Mrs. Dodd; thus her next Iwok,
Oh the Knees of'Uie Gods (1008), the scene
of which is laid in Athena 500 B. C. at
the time'of its most brilliant decadent. p
nod. During the long years nf this continuous
literary activity Mrs. Dodd's social life has
been uninterruptedly brilliant In the
earlier years following her marriage her
house in New York was the centre of a re
markable gathering of literary and artistic
people. In the truest sense of the word
Mrs. Dodd held a salon where celebrities,
clever men and women, society leaders and
distinguished foreigners met to enjoy a
generous hospitality. Thcfrienaships thus?
formed in her Madison avenue home were
continued by.Mrs. Dodd on her frequent
visits to Paris and London, so that she
counts as. many ,frjends, and almost as
many readers, in foreign capitals &s in her
own.ieountry.
In her present French home, in that "Ma
noir de Vasouy" on the Normandy coast,
the reader sees the curtains-lifted on French
chateau life. Mrs. Dodd sinco the war has
received convalescent French soldiers and
p ensonnaires, as she fbnnerly welcomed her
American, English and French friends, ss
house guests.
" A sale of the work of blind and, wounded
French, soldiers, collected throughput the
hospitals in France, was one of Mrs. Dodd's
pet war works and most remunerative for
those unfortunates. But her war activities
are almost too numerous to mention and
include a'viait to America, where she pub
lished a -war book, Hrdfc France, the
proceeds of which she gave to the unhappv
refugees, beside raising a large sum in cash
hr her lectures and from her personal cx
equer for the same purpose.
Mrs.. Vob Verst Great Work.
As for Mrs, Hugtfe Le Roux, who writes
now under the riame pt Betty Van Vorst,
she did a wonderful, thing for our Ameri
can soldiers during the wari It WW toward
the close vvhen' the boys were one and all
preparing for a vacation which Ihey pro
posed, and did actually spend, seeing Paris
and FraflM. But with their very limited
knowledge of the country, and with noae at
all of the language, it was a difficult propo
sifcion for them with thsir very limited
tins.
Hsr la warn Vn. X Souxt ably
seconded by her husband, stepped into the
breach, nnd in an incredibly short "space
of time she brought out a numbertof useful
little books for their guidance. These were
got out in handy pocket editions, three
in number A Popular History of France,
A Popular Gcoyraphy of France and
Fraiice,,Onr Ally.
Hundreds of thousands of these werfa
distributed among the soldiers while they
were yet in rump to give them an oppor
tunity to study up a bit before the much
longed for vacntions, and many other
thousands were distributed both.ui this
country and in Anierica'nnd sold like wild
fire. They proved the very thing the boys
were looking for. They were purchased
alto in large numbers by those intending
to visit France in the near future, they are
still selling, and will prove a boon to the
million American travellers who will come
over during the next few years. ,
A new edition of Betty Van Vorst's
IFar History Up la Date is on the eve
of coining out, so the whole field will have
lieen covered in these very practical little
booklets.
Mrs. Lo Roux also did muclv.va'uable re
search work during the war in the War
Office for the report which Hugue Le
Roux made for the Peace Conference on
the American Colonies. In 1915-16 Mr.
and Mrs. Lc Roux made a trip arqund the
world on a French "good-will" or propa
ganda mission, and ftward the end of 1016
they went to America again for the Red
Cross drive in June, 1918, where Hugue Le
'Roux made dozens of public speeches and
incidentally raised an immense amount of
money for suffering and tortured France.
Lost Two' Nephews in War.
Mrs. Le Roux lost. two nephews in tha
war,' one Everit Herter, who was killed at
Chateau Thierry" in June, 1018, and Rnfplt
Doolittle of the Lafayette Squadrilla, wlu
was given the Croix de Guerre. Her hus
band lostJiis onjy son, and two nephews,
but this valiant corple, like the rest of
France, put their private griefs behind
them and through nil worked for the gen
eral good, their influence being enormous.
The Le Roux occupy a historic building,
;i8 rue de Vaugirard, cornering on the
Luxembourg Gardens and over!o6king the
Senate. This mansion was built for 'one of
the ladies-in-waiting to Murie de Medieis,
queen-mother of France during the nvi
nority of her son, Louis XIII., for whom"
the Luxembourg Palace was constructed,
and which is now the-Senate. There is still
r.n underground passageway running from
the Le Roux house to the Senate, now' ob
structed by the metro and the new sewerage
Systems. i
At present Mrs. Le Roux has a new
hobby; it is for the Chinese students, and
this penchant is revealed in the furnishings
of her home, where many Chinese art ob
jects are discreetly mingled with the ancient
and historic, French furniture and family
portraits of her own and her husband's
families.
Mrs. ,Le Roux wu deeply impressed as
to the sterling qualities of the Chinese peo
ple during her visit to the Orient She has
a valued Chinese woman friend in Paris,
Miss Soume Tchenz, who is at present
law student in the College of France, and
who helped found the present Chinese Re
public. Mrs. Le Roux has gOno in madly
for the study of Chinese, and has a lesson
every morning from her friend, the Chinese
blue-stocking.
Incidentally, the two are working hand
in hand to found and fit up a club in the
outskirts of Paris for the thousands of
Clrihese students now studying in the va
rious educational institutions of the French
capital, preparing themselves to take an
active interest in the future industrial de
velopment of China along modern lines.
These students come to Paris because the
row immigration laws make America im
possible for them, and yet their hearts are
turned toward the United States. They are
arriving in Paris nt the rate of 200 a
raqnth, and many of them are sleeping ten
in one small room, on the floor.
So, look out for a new drive in the di
rection of America by Betty Van Vorst and
Soume Tchonz. nnd this time it will' be. for
the upliftirg of the Chinese. A, little book
was got out ,'ns n souvenir for returning
American soldiers nnd presented to them
by Jhe French Government. It was dedi
cated "To the Homeward-Bound Ameri
cans," and this booic was also from the pen
of Bettv Van Vorst.
The Oldest Confection
THE greater part of black licorice is
derived from Spain, where it ir
made frum the juice cf the plant and liiised
with starch to prevent it from melting in
hot weather. The licorice plant is & hrub
'that attains a height of three feet and it
grows wild where its roots reach the
water. It flourishes especially on the banks
ir the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
Since the valley of the Euphrates cci
t nintd one of tue earliftet civilization., in
the jwurlJ, he probability is that lis-.rice
is acout th; oldest confection in the world,
and tin: tastt which the boys aad girls af
to-day like so well waa, eajoyed by As