Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1861-02-07

goino In her praises he makes melliAu0us
words fall into fine and sweep on with tri-
umphant music. But what Of Mrs. Shaks-
peare? the gentle Anne Hathaway he
leaves no immortal verse to her, only an
old bedstead in his last will and testament
Milton has three wives, and writes one SON
net on Mrs. Milton No. 2--after he buries
| herl
"Methought saw my late espoused saint =,
| BROUGHT 10 me, like Alcestis from the grave
We are all acquainted with Mr.. Walters
Amoret and Saccbarissa who gave him
cold shoulder, as he deserved, for he was an
insincere piece we all know his reply to
Saccharissa when in after-life she, in her
rouge and powder, asked him;
"Mr. Waller, when will you write such
| fine verses to me again Z"
40 Madami" replied that gallant old
boy, "when your ladyship is as young
| again"
We know these things, and great many
more not so much to the credit ofthis spark
ling, velvet butterfly; but we have not had the
pleasure of meeting either Of his two wives
in the society Of the muses. l fancy he did
not trouble himself much about them: but
he made the brides of other people famous.
This hasty and by no means complete list of
celebrated '1oves" and unknown wives, is
growing too long but must add to it one
wife and one love more pitiful than all
rendered historical personages by Swifrs
verse and Swift's cruelty. Mr.. Steddard has
told their story very pathetically in his note
on Swift These two women lavished on
the savage Dean such pure idolatry as the
world has seldom witnessed. By what
wizard spell he possessed himselfo these un-
fortunate hearts, it is difficult to surmise.
For years he held their souls in his hand,
tossing them to-and-fro as o coniurer tosses
the gilded balls. To Stella he was married,
though the marriage was not publicly &C
knowledged, and the parties never met ex.
cept in the presence of a third person.
Vanessa, after cherishing for eight years the
hope that Swift would make her his wife,
could no longer bear the suspense which was
undermining her health; she wrote to her
rival praying she would tell her whether or
not she was Swift's wife. Stella Immediately
answered in the affirmative. After suffering
such modification and misery as would have
driven any man butSwift to suicide, Vanessa
died in resentment and despair. Four years
after this, Stella lay on her death bed. For
fourteen she had waited in vain for love TO
dawn in the bosom of this poor wretch. 1t
is said that brief conversation then took
place between them relative to their unpro-
claimed marriage, Only Swifts reply was
overheard.
"Well, my DEAR" he said, ut shall be &C.
/ knowledged, if you wish it,"
at is now too late" said Stella, with q
t | sigh.
II aeqs TOO late. She died of lingering de-
I | cline in January, 1923. AFTER Stella'S
} DEATH" says Stoddard, land probably after
| Swift's one of her raven tresses came in pos.
r session of an antiquary. 1t was wrapped il
) paper and labeled in Swift's handwriting
s Only a 'oomGn's hair
e AS read this bitter page ofsecret history
= spectral hands seem to turn over the leave
| 10
], tically on the glittering tropes and flower!
t nothings with which Swift garlanded hi
|. victims. ] shall have TO turn up my gas
light and read The Legend Of Good Women
and think of happy ones, to exercise thos
f complaining ghosts that come and go in thu
: shadow of my bookcase.
5 The reader will remember the charming
: Lucy Herbert, who might have been
Y Duchess if she had not chosen to walk out o.
the purple and wed the poet Harrington
e who sang her praises as maid and matron
p and loved her, notwithstanding she was hi
/ wife, | will let a woman say that his poem
, 10 CesthI~ form ono of the rnost elegant mot
j. uments genius ever raised to the memory o.
f q wife. The amiable and lovely woman
: whose early death drove Parnell to destruc
tion, should not be forgotten; nor Ann
!, More, the wife of DR.. Donne, whose fidelity
e through poverty to death is loftier than an,
1 poetry, certainly much loftier than any 0
v the Doctors. And later still is Lady Lyttel
E ton, whose fight from the world, in the fius
of her youth and beauty, taught Lord Lyttel
d ton the only noble number he ever uttered
l. In times nearer our own, we recollect severe
n poets whose lives have been broken by tn
,r severing of these domestic ties which s
/ many have worn but lightly.
" In view of these and similar cases, witt
le French author once prepared an ingeniou
ir treatise in which he attemp to show VIII
| n ms at al
1t says that twenty poets are unhappy becaus
, their wives died, and twenty are wretchet
s because their wives lived. In one case tn
{ husband trembles for fear his consort vii
d leave him, and the other for fear that sh
D WON'T The humorist had proceeded thu
Q far when the ingenuity of his own logi
e made him an idiot, and he really complete
?, the essay with solemn protest against mai
IS riagel While we smile at the entertainin
n French gentleman, it is worth obserVin
" that many of the finest tributes paid to tn
Y pentler sex have emanated from old bache
iors the light. hearted "Benedicks" who neve
}, lived to be married Tasso made Leonor
immortal, and Herrick his Prudence Bald
0 win-and these were the most incurhble O
b old bachelors. There is one of Herriek'
J, lyrics To his sweetheart so diminutive an
2 chaste and perfect-'like an agate-stone o
Il the forehnger of an alderman that ca
g never think of it without quoting it:
'f ON HIS MAID PREV.
~ "In this little urn is laid
a Prevalence BALDWIN, once my maid,
2 From whose happy spark here let
= Spring the purple yioletP
: No reader OF. recent biography is III
i familiar with Lady Byron's unfortuna
q marriage, nor with the love of Jean Burn
- nor the touching account of Shelley's tw
wives, nor with the tender care with whic
,e the wife of Tom Moore watched over I'll
splendid ruin of his intellect. The memt
- rials of Thomas Hood by his son an
"a daughter, lately republished in this eountr
N by Ticknor & Fields, present US with d.
- lightful picture of domestic literary lif
~ The book itself is not a remarkable specime
= of biographical writing, but the characte
10 of Hood and his wife are 80 full of huma
"a goodness, so touched with all delicate grace
70 that one forgets every thing else. Mr.
j Hoods letters are delicious unreyealings
4 herself She was
of "a spirit yet 2 woman tO9'
= A creature not too bright OF good
le For human patuTe's daily food
er For transient sorrows, simpe Wies,
q Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears and smiles. -
Of Our own day and our own literature a
to not barren in instances of such unions, n
e, lacking in painful household histories. III
gs time has not come when it would be prop
ID | IN sNeaE of fha VUivaa af thnaa authora W