St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-07-07
A POETS LOST LOVE.
A Romance of Dante Rossetti'.
Wife and Her Untimely Death.

"A Nonance Oh Dante kOSSettl'S
Wife and Her Untimely Death.
Boston Herald.
1t was in 1850 that Rossetti, who was
twenty-five in the May of 1855, first
met, and meeting loved, Elizabeth
Eleanor Siddal, who was to be his future
wife. She was the daughter of a Shelf
field cutler, and she was herself mil
liners assistant in London. Walter
Deyerell, an artist, who was Collin
sons SON successor in the 'Pre-Raphaelite
brotherhood" CHANGED to see Miss Sid
dial; was greatly struck with her beauty
of face and form, and persuaded her to
SIT for him. Sharing his friends en-
thusiasm, RosSetti, toward the close of
1850, persuaded her to sit for him also.
He soon recognized in her a strong apti-
tude for art, which he set himself to
work to foster.
1t was not long before mutual sympa-
thy rlpened into mutual love. A pOr-
trait head of the young lady, painted by
herself, is now in possession of William
Michael Rossetti. 1t is signed ''E. f..
81" and dated ''1S53-54." 1t is a lovely
face, with its pale, luminous complexion
Its mouth half tender and half sad. its
dropping eyes and its crown of abundant
oAoiiHS iSu nail L TIC tHSuScultuI Ut
tween ROsSetti and Miss Siddal is sup
posed to have taken place on the Esd of
May, 1860, and they were married in
st. Clements Church, Hastings. They
made little bridal trip to Paris, and
settled themselves, on their return, at
IA Chatham Place, where, at last,
they may be supposed to have been
happier than often falls to the lot of
any one. On the 9TH OF March, 1861, a
dead baby was born to them, and from
this time Mrs. ROSsetti was so i'll that she
frequently reSorted to laudanum to re-
leve the intense pain consequent upon
her double MISREPRESENTATION, allied
to neuralgia. One night, in the February
of 1862, she took, by some unhappy acct
dent, an overdose of opium and died.
ROssetti was almost maddened by his
sorrow. Many varied and partially true
accounts have been given of his burying
his poems with his wife. 1t was done in
the frenzy of his grief. On the day of
the funeral he came into the room where
she was lying in her frozen beauty ready
for her burial. Other people were
in the room, but he seemed not
even to see them. He held in his
hand a book into which, at her de-
sire, he copied all his poems up to
that date. He spoke to her as if she
were living still. "These were her
poems," he cried, ''hers only, and she
must take them with her on her way"
With this he laid the book on her pill
low beside her cold, fair face, leaving it
there to be buried with her at High
gate cemetery. For seven years these
poems remained there entOmbed with
the dead. For some time strong press
ure had been brought to bear upon
Rossetti by his family and friends to
have the book eXhumed, and at last he
reluctantly consented. The necessary
permission of the home secretary was
obtained, and the volume-soaked
through with the awful dews of death
was withdrawn from its sacred tomb.
1t had to be dried leaf by leaf, then its
contents were copied out by the author
and one of his friends, aud in 1870 his
first volume of Poems" was published.