The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-09-18
she was reading very constantly at that

she was reading very constantly 1T that
time.
So vivid is her imagination that when
she is listening to description OF any
thing, as, for example, bit Of landscape,
she sees the picture before her and Is apt
to ask, "Isn't there hill off at the right Z"
or. Seems to me there ought 70 be clump
of trees over at the Ieff" Miss Wilkins.
first successful story, Two Old Lovers"
had hard time Of it. She sent it first 70
Ltppincott's. and it was returned with .
note from the editor, presumably telling
her why he could not accept it. But since
Miss Wilkins has never been able to deci-
pher the editors note. she does not yet
know what was the matter with the story.
Then it went to the Century. then to the
atlantic. and finally to Hdrper's Bdzar.
where Miss Booth looked at the schools
girl manuscript and laid it aside to be
taken up when she had time to spare, for
she was not favorably Impressed by tho
childish looking script. When she did
find time to read it, however. she accepted
it and it became the first stone in the foun.
dation of its authors fame.
Miss Wilkins works systematically. She
sets herself daily task Of 1000 words,
and usually accomplishes it, sometimes in
the almost incredible space of forty min
utes, but often in hours of hard tugging.
When she is nearing the end of story
she becomes impatient to complete it. At
such times she lays aside her rule and
writes many more than the allotted LOCO
words.
She is wonderfully susceptible to sur
roundings. There are many houses in
which she cannot write at all, though in
the old-fashioned. straight-lined. square
roomed house in Randolph, Mass, where
she does most of her work, she can write
in any one of the three rooms she occu-
pies, and has desk in each. When her
pen begins to lag she goes into another
room, and this slight change of surround
ings usually sets her mind to going again.
The main idea of story is always
clearly defined in Miss wilkins mind be-
supply any of the details until she takes
up her pen.
Her subjects for stories are suggested by
the merest hints. Any little incident of
unselfshness or of suffering, seen by her
or related to her, is likely to touch the
spring of her sensibilities and become the
motive of one of her beautiful, simple little
stories. "Jane Field" now running in
Harpcr's. Is Miss wilkins first long story.
Mrs. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward, al
though unquestionabiy a brilliant and
highly cultivated woman, is, above these
qualities, q good woman, as everybody
who has read her books must have felt.
A gentle, shy, delicate featured woman,
she seems to be the embodiment of that
deep longing for spiritual peace and good
ness which underlies all her political work.
More than almost any other American
writer Mrs. Ward ''puts her soul on
paper"
Wherever she takes her reader there she
has been herself. She tells of the weary,
waiting wives of Gloucester fishermen be-
cause she has lived among them and
knows and sympathizes with their Joys
and sorrows. The miseries of wretched
women as depicted in "Hedged In" were
but the miseries she saw while trying to
save the tempted in the Abbott mission.
She wrote of factory life in "a Silent
Partner" because she was filled with a
longing to help in every way the poor fac
tory girls among whom she was striving
personally. This tells better than it can
be told in any other way how Mrs. Ward
writes her very successful books.
Her home at Gloucester ls very inter-
esting one. The house is small. but COM
fort is suggested in all its appoin tments
Somewhat apart from the dwelling is the
study, separate building, and as cosey q
place for the literary work of the happy
couple who lnhabit it as one can well
imagine. Willis B. HAWKINS.