The Indianapolis leader., 1881-08-20
WOman's HfstOry.
"Man, for his glory,
To history flies;
While woman's bright story
Ia told in her eyeao

The above verse written by the poet M Moore
was, in its day, no doubt, considered some
thing very fine, and not merely the prett,
conceit OF a sentimental sOng-maker, but
verse embodying vast amount of truth. 1t
meaning to man can only awaken delight
] fui emotions, and to the beautiful woman
the compliment is certainly delicious enough
to give an added lustre to the lovely orb
sometimes called the windows of the soul
But the poet of our day tell of womanhood
| In far different measure. Hawthorne has
| painted women for us with heroic souls
tender, gentle, noble women. Whittier has
| enhaloed Barbara Frietchie with divine
radiance, radiance not of youth and beau
ty and to fade away like them, but with a
rich sunset splendor about it. We behold
patriotic devotion in grey-haired matron
a mother of mothers, on whom coming gen.
erations will gaze, as we do now, with rev.
erence.
In what holy strain does Bryant sing of
woman? Not of woman's form and features,
fashioned OF clay, but of her immortal part.
Take for instance, this, from his Future
Life"
SHOW shall know thee, in the land which
TIE disembodi+d spirits of the dead,
When all of thee that time wither sleeps,
Or in the yet more grand "Conquerors
Grave:"
'She met the hosts of sorrow with look
That altered not beneath the frowu they wore;
And soon the lowering brood were tanned aud took.
Meekly. her gentle rule, and frowned no more.
Her soft hand put aside the assaults Of wrath,
And cslmlyb roke In twain
The fiery shafts Of pain.
And rent the nets of passion from her path.
BY that victorious hand despair was stain.
With love she vanquished hate, and overcame
Evil with good in her Great Masters name"
We look not on the dainty Evangeline,
done in water-colors (and the water all of
tears to find her
bright story
Is told in her eJ es."
Oh, no; you forget even Longfellow's
portrayal of her loveliness, the flesh and
blood loveliness of the happy, hopeful
maiden, on the evening of her betrOthal,
while you follow her in her faithful wander
ings. She is growing old, bat you forget it,
as you follow, follow on, and, in the words
of that greatest, dearest poet:
'Year after year her tender steps pursuing,
Behold her grown more fair"
Nor vet is the story of the sweet Puritan
Priscilla, the winning winner of the friend
of Miles Standish, the stalwart Captain of
Plymouth, only record of fair tresses and
bright eyes; but q life like picture Of COM
mon sense, energy, gentleness and piety,
such as beftted one of the foremothers of
our dear country.
In the sweet story of Minnehaha, Laugh
ing Water, that wondrOus CLEAN, that death
less echo, out of beautiful Past, is there
only that beauty of earth, seen in the black
hair and wild, bright eyes of dusky forest
maiden? Oh, we see-the while the place
on which we tread seems holy grounds
trusting young wife, in the very beauty of
holiness, following fond young husband
from the land OF the Dacotahs; or with
many tears, we see, after the famine and
the fever, how Hiawstha saw his lovely
Minnehaha lying dead before him.
''Then he sat down, still and speechless,
On the bed of the Mnnehaha,
At the feet of Laughing Water,
At those willing feet, that never
More would lightly run to meet him."
Never more would lightly follow"
And so, as he thought of her as he laid
her in that snowy grave under the moaning
hemlocks, we think of her, as loving and
dutiful wife, as purified spirit where all is
pure, in the land of the hereafter.
And how sings Emerson, who is surely
the greatest authority on thesubject of beauty
that has blessed our age? The brightness
of her eyes does not finish his story OF the
graceful maid," for
"At last she to his hermitage,
Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage
The gay enchantment undone-
gentle wife, but fairy none"
Delightful transformation thisl And again
this bard of
"Divine ideas below,
Which came and found him young.
And always found him So"
tell us how it is
l. soft In streets or humblest places,
detect far wandered graces,
Which from Eden wide astrsy,
In lowly homes have lost their way"
So here will end this little chapter on
woman's history, as given by our poets, the
while we wonder where the greatest change
has been since Moore's day-among poets
or among women. LOUISE V. BOYD.
Dublin, Ind.