Los Angeles herald., 1891-12-31
ELSIE.

! was practicing medicine at the time
In Rotterdam, a large struggling town
six miles south of Sheffield, in York
shire, England, in the heart of the South
Yorkshire coal district.
It is arough class of people with whom
q general practitioner generally has to
deal in such district, though there are
some very big swells in the neighbor-
hood to be sure. Still, as is always the
case in life among the toughest and most
uncouth, one sometimes finds a gentle
flower.
Such sweet exception was little Elsie
Underhill, to whose bedside l was called
professionally on the evening of Nov. 90,
1878. It is a long while ago, and doubt
much If any Of the persons connected
with the little story am about to tell
should any of them still be surviving)
will remember DR.. Newman. At any
rate, not one of those who knew me will
be hurt, and the one person against
whom I shall have much to say is so
mean and contemplate in my opinion
that care little for his.
1t was a poor little home was called
toin Church street, where Elsie's parents
lived, but very different from the dirty,
carelessly kept cottages and small houses
in the vicinity. But am not going to
weary you with a description. I was
met by the dear, old, Kindly faced moth
er at the door, where, before taking me
up stairs to the tiny room where lay her
suffering daughter, she told me some
thing of her history.
Elsie was only just turned nineteen,
but she had already made herself repu-
tation which was honorable and en-
nobling. The years before, when just
turned sixteen, being pretty and we'll
developed girl, with more than the aver
age amount Of intelligence, she had OBJ
tanned an engagement at The local thea
ter, where she had appeared in the char
acter of Jeanie Deans in Andrew Halli-
days adaptation of Sir Walter Scott's
novel, "The Heart of Midlothian" She
had attracted great deal of attention.
The local correspondent of London
theatrical paper, The Hornet, then the
property of Stephen Fiske, had spoken
highly of her, and more than one Lon
don manager had visited Rotterdam to
see her act. There were stock COM
panies in those days.
Among the many young fellows who
had become infatuated by her beauty
was one Horace Wilmington, the son of a
physician in Sheffield, very rich man.
This young mans attentions were very
III o1>& sv.%, >1rvo o<so
to the young girls parents, and through
them to Elsie. And then he began q
serious courtship.
In every way his manner and appar-
ent object were decidedly honorable.
Only one thing he omitted-he did not
take her to his own home.
In order to be near the man who had
completely won her heart, she refused
more than one lucrative offer to go to
London, where she would have at once
been on the high road to fame, and ac-
cepted an engagement at the Sheffield
Theater Royal, which being close to her
own home she could also reach very
easily. Here her opportunities were
wider than in Rotterdam, it is true, and
here she succeeded in increasing her al
ready high reputation. She remained
in Sheffield two seasons, playing during
the summer a series Of travelling engage
ments throughout the northern counties.
Then came proposal from a great
London manager which was SO good
that she could not afford to neglect it.
Her aged mother went with her to the
city of smoke and fog, and in Septem-
Der, 1878, she made her debut before
London audience at the Princess the
ater. Less than month later her health
entirely gave way and she found it
necessary to throw up her engagement
and return with her mother to the little
home in Rotterdam in which she had
breathed her earliest breath.
So much her mother told me, then
took me up to see her daughter.
Did I SAY just now that she was suffer
ing? That was hardly the case. She
was dying Of rapid consumption. She
was too weak to suffer much physically,
but the broken heart was giving her ex-
quisite torture
Such lovely girl l have rarely seen.
Brown curling hair swept back from the
sweet face and long dark lashes shaded
the blue gray eyes that were all intelli-
gence and had been wont to fill her au-
diences with blind enthusiasm.
The little room in which she lay was
filed with delicate feminine knick-
knacks, "reminiscences of her favorite
roles, souvenirs of her professional
friends, all arranged about the room
with gentle, thoughtful love by her
stricken mother. But most interesting
of all was a rather curious thing hang
ing above her pillow on the bedpost by a
narrow blue ribbon. 1t was something
that would attract the attention Of the
least observant.
A large gold split ring, elegantly
chased and evidently of antique manu-
facture, to which was suspended COM
mon copper English penny piece. The
combination was so incongruous, 30
ludicrous, that could not refrain from
taking it in my hand to examine.
''Oh, please don't touch that" ex-
claimed the dying girl; "it is all I have" F"
Then there was story to It'll
When had prescribed simple pallia-
tive for the racking cough and had given
instructions for other simple treatment,
went down stairs again with the
mother.