Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1892-04-14
ELSIE.

| was practicing medicine at the
time in Rotterdam, large, strug
Cling town six miles south of Sheffield
in Yorkshire, England, in the heart of
the South Yorkshire coal district.
1t is a rough class of people with
whom general practitioner generally
has to deal in such district, though
there are some very big sWells in the
neighborhood to be sure. Still, as is
always the case in life, among the
rougl est and most uncOuth one some
times finds a gentle flower.
Such a sweet exception was little
Elsie Underhill, to whose bedside |
was called professionally on the even
ing of Feb. %, 1873. 1t 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 amy rate not one of
those who knew me will be hurt and
the one person against whom | shall
have much to say is so mean and con-
temptible in my opinion that | care lit
tie for his.
1t was poor little home | was called
to in Church street, where Elsies par
ents lived, but very different from the
dirty, carelcssly kept cottages and
small houses in the vicinity. But |
am not going to weary you with a de-
scription. | was met by the dear, old,
kindly faced mother at the door, where,
before taking me upstairs to the tiny
room where lay her suffering daugh-
ter, she told me something OF her his
tory
Elsie was only just turned 19, but
she had already made herself repu-
tation which was honorable and en-
nobling. Three years before, when
just turned Is, being a pretty and
well-developed girl, with more than
the average amount of intelligence,
she had obtained an engagement at .
local theater, where she had appeared
in the character of Jeanne Deans in
Andrew Halliday's adaptation of Sir
Walter Scotts novel The Heart of
Midlothian" She had attracted
great deal of attention. The local
correspondent of q London theatrical
paper. Tn HOrHct, then the property
of stephen Fske. had spoken highly
of her and more than one London
manager had visited Rotterdam to see
Eri act. There were stock companies
in those days.
Among the many young fellows who
had become infatuated by her beauty
was one Horace Wilmington, the son of
physician in Sheffield, a very rich
man. This young mans attentions
were very marked. He obtained an
introduction to the young girls par
ents, and through them to Elsie. And
then be began a 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 re-
fused more than one lucrative offer to
go to London, where she would have
at once been on the high road to fame,
and accepted an engagement at the
Sheffield Theater Royal, which being
close to her own home she could also
reach very easily. Here her opportu-
mites were wider than in Rotterdam.
it is true, and here she succeeded in
increasing her already high reputa-
ton She remained in Sheffield two
seasons, playing during the summer
series of travelling engagements
throughout the northern counties.
Then came a 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, 1873, she made her debut before
a London audience at the Princess
theater. Less than month later her
health entirely gave way and she
found 1t necessary to throw up her
engagement and return with her
mother to the little home in Rother-
ham in which she had breathed her
earliest breath.
So much her mother told me. then
took me up to see her daughter.
Did l say just now that She was sui
fering? That was hardly the case
She was dying of rapid consumption.
She was too weak to suffer much phys
ically, but the broken heart was Civ
ing her exqu' ute torture,
Such lovely girl have rarely seen.
Brown curling hair swept back from
the sweet face and long dark lashes
shaded the blue-gray eyes that were
all intelligence and had been won't to
fill her audiences with blind enthu-
siaSm.
The little room in which she lay was
filed with delicate feminine knick-
knacks, "reminiscences of her fayorite
roles, souvenirs of her professional
friends, all arranged about the room
with gentle, thoughtful love BY her
stricken mother. But most interest
ing of all was a rather curious thing
hanging above her pillow on the bed
post by a narrow blue ribbon. It was
something that would attract the at
tention of the least obseryant.
A large gold split ring, elegantly
chased and evidently of antique man
utacture, to which was suspended a
common copper English penny piece
The combination was so incongruous,
SO ludlcrous, that could not refrain
from taking it in my nand to examine.
ooh, please don't touch that" ex-
claimed the dying girl, at is all
havew
Then there was story to it!
When | had prescribed a simule nal