The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-12-01
BY THE MILE.
THAT'S THE WAY MRS. BURNETT
WANTS TO BUY LACE.
The brilliant Novelist Works Only
Under High InspiratiOE-She Loves
FriIIs and FurbeIoIys and Has a
Passion For Furnishing Houses.

If Mrs. Frances Hodgson Burnett
could be said to have any especial fad
it would be that of house furnishing.
Nothing, indeed, gives her such zest
of life for the moment as to have an
empty suite or house before her, wait
ing for paper and fresco-for rugs and
touches and fixtures-for hangings and
decorations-and then, oh rapture! the
bibelots, the books, the myriads of
pillows which give the final air of
luxurious ease.
A few years ago the fitting up of
| her beautiful home in Washington, in
which her own sumptuouS den and
boudoir in pink and distinguishing
! features, was a joy untold.
Her London House.
Soon after came the appointing Of
| the home in LeXham Gardens, LON
| don, from which she removed 20 her
present palatial home in Portland
| place. And here was a field worthy
her highest endeavor For to remodel
and furnish this magnificent old
house required infinite zeal and pa
tience, a fine artistic sense and a very
long purse. The interior furnish is EN-
pire. The drawing rooms, which will
hold 400 people, present ain exquisite
harmony Of color, the prevailing tone
of which is olive green, the green bro
cade of the curtains toning into the
velvet pile and the wall paper. The
dining room is of carved oak, while
her own room is done up in dainty
cretonnes, the prevailing color and
design of which are carried out in the
wall paper.
FauntlerOy's Apartments.
This enormous undertaking nearly
satisfied her mania in this regard; her
zest, however, was not so dulled but
that she came back to America last
fall and entered into the furnishing of
her sons suite at Harvard with the
utmost enthusiasm, and few young
men there can boast a more elegant
department. with its music room,
library, bedroom, porcelain bath, etc
But he is a SON eminently worthy of
his environment. Fauntleroyism has
not i'm the least spoiled him, as it
might so easily have done. He is
clever, natural graceful, free from
egotism and affectation, earnest and !
ambitious to put the best into life and
get the best out of it. He has I'M !
usual musical talent, and can impro-
wise delightfully."- by the hour. His ad- i
vantageS have, of course, been extra
ordinary, foreign travel and foreign
tutoring having been added to the
school curriculum; and perhaps his
best education has come from his com
partnership with his mother, who never
talked down to her sons, but always
took them upon her own high plane.
A Masculine Head
Mrs. Burnett laughingly deplores the
day when bangs shall go entirely out
Iii IL
never present her unadorned front to
carping world. Her golden fringe
does help to conceal a very high, very
prominent forehead. Indeed her head
is of unusual size, and the phrenolo-
gistS all say contains a mans brains.
But whether masculine or feminine,
they'll do. She possesses the most ex-
traordinary fertility of imagination,
the kind that seems to respond spon-
taneously to any demands made upon
it.
Inspiration Fertility.
One day a little circle of women
friends were grouped about her-the
thing she most loves-when a. fair
haired young girl said; Dearest,
want to write a story; tell me how to
go to work
oh" said the gifted novelist, you
do not have to look for your story; it
everything contains the story. Now,
let us take the first thing our eye
lights upon, and I will tell you how to
make a story out of it, Then point
ing at random, Take that picture, for
instance" 1t CHANGED to be a Spanish
bull fight, and she began weaving her
magic spell about it, and it grew and
grew, until the young girl was fairly
swamped in it, and Mrs. Burnett her
self sufficiently interested to adopt and
develop it And that is how 'The
Pretty Sister of Don Jose" came to be
written.
At another time Miss Gertrude Hall,
after agoniZing for a fitting title for
a set of stories which she had lust
completed, in despair wrote Mrs Bur-
nett, who is her most intimate friend,
asking her to suggest one. Almost i'm
mediately came back six-ell of them
good. One of them actually inspired
Far From Today" And her stories
always make their first appearance
dressed in their best, so that she is
able to send her first copy to her pub
lishers-a beautifully dainty manu-
script, disfgured by her erasures or
interlfneations.
Child i'm a Book
I had the pleasure of reading her
"Two Little Pilgrims Progress in
w
year, and was somehow very unusual
ly stirred by the clever and beautiful
story, and when I told her how much
new purpose, courage and inspiration
it had given me, she replied that it
had had the same effect upon herself;
that really nothing had ever welded
more powerful influence over her
than this creation of her own brain.
She had always before felt that she
could not force herself to write, but
must wait upon her mood; she had,
however, consented to undertake this
story against her inclination, as in the
beginning the subject in no way 'ap-
pealeo to her. But this dear little
girl soon got absolute dominion over
her with her own two animating
ideas: you can do anything you set
your mind to-" and mo one is so
poor but that he has something to
give somebody" And under the slim
ulating influence of this little child
she regained the courage and conf
dence which seemed to have gone out
of her with the death of her eldest son. {
She came to feel that She too, could
do anything she set her mind to. and {
for che first time in her life found {
that she could even make herself |
write, thereupon producing two books
that will rank with the best she has
done. IA Lady of Quality" not yet
published, was suggested to her by one 6
of the vaults in her wine cellar in
Portland place TT is writtan il, +ba r