The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1885-04-11
The story of Two Famous American
Beauties.


From The Men York World.
a strange fatality seems always to have
attended beautiful women from the time of
Helen of Troy down to the present hour.
Cleopatra, after having triumphed over
both Julius Caesar and Mark Anthony,
sought relief in suicide Everybody knows
the sad story of Petrarch and Laura, Of
Abelard and Heloise and of Beatrice Cenci.
The truthfulness as well as the pathos of
this idea is wonderfully wrought out and
fixed forever in Shakespeare's Romeo and
Juliet. There seems to be sort of pen
atty for being surprisingly beautiful. Very
few women who have become famous be-
cause of their beauty, have lived to a
mature age Of reasonable contentment and
happiness. Probably the most beautiful
woman known in this country during re-
cent years was Matte Ould, Of Virginia.
She was not only girl Of transcendent
beauty Of face, but of wondrously brilliant
intellect Her father, Robert Ould, was
famous during the war as the Commissioner
for the Exchange of Prisoners on the part
of the Confederate Government. When a
young man he was District-Attorney for
the District of Columbia, and lived in
Washington. He was lawyer of much
dignity and ability, but the latter part of
his life was clouded by the defeat of the
Confederacy and the unhappy ending of
his daughters life. She was the person
more than any other who gave White Sui
phur Springs, in Virginia, great fame as a
watering-place. Sometimes a fashion re-
sort owes its success to the patronage of a
single person. It was largely if not en-
tirely SO in this instance. Matte Ould was
the bright and shining leader of a coterie
of young girls that grew up in Richmond
lust after thewar They were the last and
the most famous representatives of society
of Virginia and the South that now seems
to be well-nigh extinct. They were at
White Sulphur during the summers of
1928 and thereabout. No such assem-
blages have since been seen there, nor will
any like them be ever seen there or else
where again. 1t was the last brilliant glow
Of Southern chivalry-a something that
has now passed into the realms of memory
and of worth mainly as a foundation upon
which romancers of the future may build.
For three or four seasons White Sulphur
was the rallying-place for that limited num-
Der of Southern gentlemen and ladies whose
fortunes had not been altogethef swept
away by the war. Most of the men had
been distinguished officers in the Confed-
crate army, such as Gen. Butler, Gen. Gary
and Gen. Hampton, of South Carolina;
Gen. Joe Johnston, of Virginia; Gen. Cor
don, of Georgia; Gen. Beauregard, Of Lou
isiana. and dozens of commanders of lesser
renown. Most of them were yet In the
vieor of manhood and had about them the
fresh fame that had come from their
achievements on the battlefield. The old
South had not yet entirely faded away
Many of the opinions and prejudices held
before the war were still entertained; the
heroism Of jackson, Lee and hundreds Of
others was theme Of exhaustless congrat-
ulation; battles were fought anew and VIC
tories were won afresh In this charmed
circle, almost closed to the people Of the
North, Matte Ould was the acknowledged
queen. She was the belle of every great
ball given at White Sulphur for two or
three seasons. And she justly earned the
distinction given her. OF all the brilliantly
beautiful women Of the sunny South none
have been her equal. Her company was
sought by every distinguished soldier and
statesman. Her presence was like a magic
charm to every assemblage. In voice,
look, gesture, movement, everything, she
was superlatively attractive. She was the
realization to every man of all that he had
ever in the widest stretches of his imagina-
ton pictured beautiful woman to be.
Hair that fell about her head and face and
neck and shoulders like golden cloud;
eyes that were great and luminous and APP
peaIing, that subdued every beholder, such
ewes under such a wealth of hair such
cheeks Of rose tint, full and round; neck
of perfect poise, graceful as the swan Is and
white and soft as the swans down; bosom
that rose and fell like the bosom of the sea,
and mouth that could but give some
sweet utterance to charm every listener.
Whether in the ballroom, at dinner or in
simple social gathering of a few close
friends, she was the same unspeakably de-
lightful creature, too unearthly to be
touched by human hands and too valuable
a prize for any one man, whether he be the
conaueror of hundred battleields or states
man full of honors All these came to her
and bowed themselves at her feet. No
woman was ever more completely the mas
ter of men, and many one lives to-day to
testify to the sharpness of his grief at her
refusal of his addresses. But shadow
comes suddenly and shuts out forever all
view Of this lovely girl. The sad story OF
her departure from her paternal roof, hasty
marriage and untimely death will probably
never be told in full-and probably ought
not to be. Her own mother had died when
she was child and just as she was coming
to girlhood her father married a second
time, and between her and her stepmother
there arose an irreconcilable feud, which
embroiled even the father, and at moment
when she was piqued and Inundated at
some cruel word where there ought to have
been expressed a kindlier sentiment, she
left her home forever and consented to a
marriage more through feeling of revenge
than the Fronting of her own heart and
Judgment. She made the fatal mistake OF
marrying a man she did not love, and from
the day she went to live under his roof her
spirit was broken, and she wilted away like
a flower plucked by rude hands. In two
years she had died, still unreconciled to
her father, and it was not long till he had
followed her, his heart having been COM
pletely crushed by the death of his beauti-
Gul daughter. In this tragedy there were
no swords or pistols, nor was there poison,
except that poison that comes from bitter
words unjustly spoken and from a pledge
of love where no love existed.
A woman who belonged to time still
more recent than that of Matte Ould, and
who had almost as great fame for heI
beauty, was Nellie Hazeltine, of St. Louis
She, too, belonged to the society of the
South, bat not to that kind so distinctive
and pronounced as that of which Miss Ould
was so captivating representative. St
Louis is in the matter of its social com
plexion Southern city. Slaves were
owned there before the war, and the lead
ing neonle there came originally from Vir.