The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1889-02-27
A GAY GIRL OF SIXTI-FlTE.
CiacinnatIs s'She" Carries off Young
and Beautiful Leo"

People in the West End, says the Gin
cinuati Enquirer, have been gossiplng
with ceaseless activity over recent
marriage. 1t is that of Mrs. Matte A.
Hood, aged 65 years. to David y. Swift,
aged 80.
They we're quietly married on the 22d,
without any fuss and feathers, by Rev:
J. Z. Tyler, the pastor of the Central
Christian Church, of which she Is a
member.
Mrs. Hood is wealthy widow, whose
bright black eyes have flashed their
lightning glances on the young men OF
the West End for score of years or so.
She is the Youngest antique lady that
probably ever tripped along Fourth
street as sprightly as maiden of sweet
sixteen. She had no hesitancy in openly
avowing that 'she never would marry
an old man." and she'd have a young
husband half her age or none. Widow
Hood is the mother of three grown
children-two married daughters and a
son-and the grandmother OF eight, yet
| in the grand matrimonial scramble for
man She did not propose to get left,
nor was she.
Her husband is Mr.. David 4. Swift, a
canvasser for a sewing machine COM
pany, and a young man of fine ap-
pearance and great manly beauty. Mrs:
Hood possesses a wardrobe that would
1 be the envy of any lady in Cincinnati.
Eighteen months ago she had forty
three dress, and now it is said the num-
Der has swelled to a hundred. They are
cat bias, polonaise, low neck and high
neck, Of silk and satin, with and with
out passementerie and in the latest
Parisian mode known to the dressmak-
er's art She wears elegant diamonds
and possesses pair of earrings as large
as ones thumb that flash out upon
paSsers-by as she promenades Fourth
street, casting their Illuminating rays
with the laviShness of a 800 power
Brush electric light.
1t was Mrs. Hoods proud boast that
she had the spirit of a girl. She would
only read Indian stories and dime
novels, as she said they did not weary
her. :,
The young people of the West End
vii! sadly mss her, for all last winter
she was the gayest Of the gay in a
coterie of Young people who met at each
Others houses to dance and play euchre,
and they always said: Bring along
Mrs. Hood, Tor she is younger than any
Of U.S.
Ponce de Leon went from the old to
the new world to find the fountain Of
youth, as he felt the repose of old age
crawling slowly over him, but Mrs.
Hood found it right here in smoke be-
grimed Cincinnati. For by association
with young people, allowing nothing to
worry or harass her, studying carefully
the theory and practice of make up"
she has succeeded in preserving her
youth and beauty long after other wo-
men have quit thinking of beaux and
!. dreaming of balls and turned their at
tention to beads and prayer books.
She is one of the best euchre players
, in the West End, and is passionately
fond of the theatre She has not missed
a play in three years, and was always a
familiar figure at matineeS. To young
law student of twenty, who was once
devoted to her, she said he reminded
her so much of her husband, who was
but a boy, and when the student had
: finished his course of studies and was
going away, she said: ''Now you are
, going, do write me. You know l shall
miss you so much when you are gone,
and l Shan't hear your merry laugh in
the room next me any more"
She had so trained her voice that ii
was musical as ripping waters, soft as
a purling brook through meadows
green, and everybody said, in contrast
ing her musical notes with the piping
tones of others: "How sweet and lovely
her voice is.
That Fourth street people have lost
treasure and Mr. Swift gained prize
is the universal verdict of everybody
who knows the happy couple. Mrs.
Hood was the daughter of the late John
Waggoner, by whom she vas left large
wealth.