News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1890-09-18
HELEN M. WINSLOW.
BY CORA STUART WHEELER.

looks Ike stately white lily.
But Miss Winslow is large us well as
tall, in way that makes her, as she
comes into the sunshine of my study
corner, rather imposing figure IN
i her hong, fur trimmed wrap Her face
and brown hair miss brightness in
their coloring, but her gray eyes are
direct and honest, and her mouth as
firm as it is cheerfulin it's ready smile
while a grasp of Helen Winslow's
hand means g a friend while you are
true to yourself" Some women are
for always" even if we ourselves
fail and disappoint them. But Miss
Winslow seems too much "real folks .
herself to be able to overlook or COM
prehend very great weakness in 9th
ers.
She expressed it for me in one of the
first poems that | ever saw of hers,
called Over All
81 said
IF l could see light ahead
Could know the ships / sent to sea
Were blown by Fortunes gale towards me,
| could believe in matters great or small,
God watcheth over ALL
o selfish heart
Cans't though not see the nobler part?
To bear with patience sure defeat,
To upward climb with stubborn feet,
In spite of disappointment's iron thrall?
For God is over alli'"
Helen Winslow was born in West
field, Vermont, a quiet, picturesque
town, near Lake Memphremagog, on
the Canada line. She is the ninth
generation in direct descent from
Kenelm Winslow, brother of Govern
or Winslow of the Plymouth Colony.
Her great. great-grandmother Wins
low was Abigail Adams. Good,
staunch, Puritan blood all around.
While an infant, Helen was taken
with the family to live in Greenfield,
Mass, her mothers home, and later
for a long residence at St. Adams,
Vermont, where her father was a
leader in musical circles.
Mr. Winslow was a fellow-student
of Prof. Emerson and Wulf Fries the
venerable celloist, and a pupil of
Lowell Mason, a composer of church
music-many of his anthems are still
favorites. He was also a member of
the first English Opera Company Or
ganized in this country
The mother a scholar, linguist and
teacher, had a talent for verse, as had
an only brother who met a tragic
death, being drowned while bathing
in Lamoille river, just as he was pre-
pared to enter college.
Educated in Vermont schools and
prepared in it's normal school for a
profession tor which she had no taste,
Miss Winslow's duty as eldest daugh-
ter kept her at the bedside of her
mother until her death of old-fash-
ioned consumption.
A certain quaint humor, rivaling
Josiah Aliens wife, is not only ex
pressed in the "Aunt Philury Pa
pers," written years ago, but crop:
out in New England tales full of vigol
and charm. When Aunt PhiIury
takes Johnson Winter, her partner
to task for stopping a serenade b.
throwing out a box of Paris Greer
over the daughters lover, the who'll
scene is contagiously funny.
"Have you swallowed anything
Flavius?" says |.
"No, ma'am," says he, "nothin
but my pride and a few other thing
of that nature!'
Jack" a story published, one o
many, in every Other Saturday,
has not a touch of Marietta Holley'
style, however, but is a most bewitch
ing summer story, told in letters be
tween two girl friends, with a favo
of T. B. Aldrich in its telling, and tn
well-eXecuted surprise of its ending
Two years of attention to her faith
er's home after Mrs. Winslow's death
and then came the chance, upon he
father second marriage, to fulfill he
wish to come to Boston and begin tt
write and study in earnest.
InRoxbury, a Boston suburb easily
accessible, with her three sisters, Mis-
Winslow makes a home life simple anC
attractive. Her special fondness il
for cats, and so really intimate ar,
her relations with her pets that hel
anecdotes, told in and out of print, o
their curious intelligence and traits
would fill a volume.
The new life was a change and re
lief from the cramping atmosphere o
n small town.
The" Aunt Philury" papers alluded
to, were some of her first serious at
tempts at her profession, and were
written for The Yankee Blade, which
was under the editorship of Col. Al
bert Clarke at that time, after the
late Justin Jones had made it a fa
nous sensational sheet Her first
serial story was written for the same
weekly, whose editor sent Miss Wins
low to Lowell to make a special study
of American factory life. The result
was called "The Shawsheen Mills,
lately republished in The Yankee
Blade
"a Bohemian Chapter" published
in the "Boston Beacon" four sum
mers ago, was a clever serial story o
a girl-artist's struggle and success il
the Bohemian life of Boston. In
deed, Miss Winslow seems to linge
most alphabetically with young
women fighting hand to hand in an,
profession or trade for existence ant
an honest competence. Her touch j
always true, and she finds bette
working material in humanity an,
the real than in mere flights int,
ideal possibilities.
Her stories would fill two large vol
umes, and many give in their titles
clue to their practical trend: "Nora
Experiment, 1.-THE Way His Mothe
Did, "The Fresh-Air Girl, "Wha
My Plush Chair Did, :" "Nell's Idea,
"The T. b. r. Society" But other,
like "Kip," in The American Teacl
er, $50. K.,' A Tale of Wires and CN
cles," in Demorest's Magazine, @
"Nixie," in The Sunday Republican
are crisp and full of quaint humo
and pathos.
In such prose work as "Two Day
with the Appalachian Mountai
Club" there is that out-ofdoor al
mosphere and zestful love of natur
which Imogene Quincy shows, an
> this leads my pen back to Miss Wins
: lows poems of nature, which are, t
; me, her most delightful work, an
that by whose abiding charm she wi