The Hot Springs star. (Hot Spings [Hot Springs], Dakota [Dakota Territory, i.e. S.D.]) 1886-189?, 1888-02-24
MOTHERS OF FAMOUS MEN.
What Aesssix. Dickens, Daudet and Lsigh
Hunt Owed to Their Mothers.

always Interesting studies. Concern.
lng many OF those women tho world
knows much. but of the majority it IL
ignorant. The mother Of Louis Agas.
siz, the scientist, was the wife Of a
Swiss Protestant Clergyman, and lived
to a very old age. Louis was her fav.
Orite son, and she trained him with the
greatest care. When, in 1857, Pro-
lessor Silliman, of Yale College, Wis.
tied her, he found her at four-score a
"tall, erect and dignifcd woman"
with animated address and cultivated
manners. When she was assured by
her guest that her sons adopted coun.
try loved him and was proud of him,
her strong frame was agitated, her
voice trcmbled with emotion, and the
flowing tears told the story Of a moth.
cr's heart. Tho day that Professor
Silliman left, shc walked a long way
in the rain to bid him and his wife
farewell. Presenting them with a lit
tie bouquet of pansies. she badc them
tell her son cher pcnsccs were all for
him." Pensee in French means both
pansy and thought. On the 50th birth.
day of Agassiz. the Saturday Club Of
Boston celebrated it with a dinner, at
which Longfellow, Holmes and Lowell
read poems. In the poem of the form.
CT, allusion was made to tho natural
mother as mourning over the fact that
tile great mother, Nature, had drawn
her SON from the tircside where she
wished to keep him:
"Ard the mother at homo savs Harkl
For his voice I listen und yearn,
1t Is rOwing late and dark,
And my boy does not RETURN"
Agassiz' head was bent during the
reading of the poem, but when tho al
fusion to his mother was made, his
rnddy face flushed with restrained feel.
Ing, tears gathered in his eyes. and as
the last line was uttered they dropped
slowly down his checks, one after au-
other.
The mother of Alpl,onsc and Earnest
Daudct. the French novelist, was an
intellectual woman. Size was q con-
slant reader. and her children were Il L
ly impressed with her superiority over
other mothers, and were profoundly
grateful to her in after life for her
careful training of their minds. The
father was a rich silk-wcavcr, and had
only an ordinary mind, loss of fortune
soured him, and he seemed to have
litlo influence over his gifted sons.
But the mother was their inspiration
and delight.
The childhood of Dickens was so
shadowed by poverty, and his scnsi.
tive and imaginative mind was SO keen.
ly alive to his position, that it is hard
ly possible that he could draw an ab-
solutcly impartial picture of his par.
ents. His mother had. q keen appre-
citation of the droll and of the pathetic,
and likewise considerable dramatic
talent. She was q comedy little woman,
with handsome, bright eyes, and o
genial, agreeable person. From her
Dickens undoubtedly inherited his
She possessed an extraordinary sense
of the ludicrous, and her power of inn
itation was something astonishing.
Her perception was quick, and she I'M
consciously noted everything that
came under her observation. In de-
scribing ridiculous occurrences, her
tone and gestures would be inimitablc,
| while nor manner was of the q~uaintcst.
Dickens declares that to her he owed
his first desire for knowledge, and
that his earliest passion for reading
wa awakened by his mother, who
taught him not only the first ru,liments
of English. but also u little of Latin.
Poverty saddencd and darkened many
years of her life, and her children
were early compelled to leave her and
earn their own living. but they all
l!onored and loved her as She de-
served.
Leigh Hunt thus writes of his moth
CT: ''My mother had no accomplish
mcnts but the two best of ALA love
of nature and of books. DR.. Franklin
offered to teach her the guitar; hut she
was too bashful to become his pupil.
She regretted this aftcrward, partly,
no doubt, for having SO illustrious a
master. Her first child, who died.
was named after him. I know not
whether the anccdotc is new, but
have heard that when DR.. Franklin in-
vented the harmonica, lie concealed il
from his wife till the instrument was iii
to play, and then woke her with it ono
night, when she took it for the music
of angels. Having been born
nine years later than the youngest OF
my brothers. I have no recollection o.
my mothers earlier aspect. Her eyes
were always fine and her person lady
like; her hair also retained its color
for II long period; but her brown com
pleXion had been exchanged for /,
jaundiced one, which she retained
through life; here checks we're sumke1
and her mouth drawn down with sor
row at tho orner She retained til,
energy of her character on great occa
sions, but her spirit in ordinary affairs
was weakened, and she looked ut tn
hustle and discord of the present stat
of society with a frightened aversion
Never shall l forget her face, as i
used to appear to mo coming up tn
cloisters, with that weary hang of til
head on one side and that melanchol,
smile.
One holiday in a severe winter, a
she was taking me home. she was pc
titioned for CHARITY by a woman sic
and ill-clothed. / was in Blackfriar
road. I think about midway. NJ
mother, with tears in her eyes, turne
up gateway or some other place, an
beckoning the woman to follow, too
off her flannel petticoat and gave it t
her. 1t is supposed that a cold whic
ensued fixed the rheumatism upon he
for life. Actions like this have doub
less been often performed, and do NJ
of necessity imply any great virtue j
the performer: but they do, if they al
; at peace with the rest of the character
Saints have been made for charities II
. lgreatar."-Fvons the Womaw's Argos,
A Queer Kiss Marx.