The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-05-21
BEAUTY AND ITS OPPOSITE.
The Story of Pretty Girl, Homely
 Girl and Man.


 From the Washington Star.) As a Washington Star writer was talking to retired colonel in front of an uptown hotel few days ago, a very handsome woman passed them and the writer's eyes went after her al- most as fast as the oolonefs did.
 By Zucksn exclaimed the writer isn't she pretty?"
 Rather admitted the colonel "but beauty is something you can't most all ways bank on, especially the beauty of a womar's face or figure"
 "Well. it's always good to look at, l anyhow"
 "Of course, and sometimes it's lasting and actual, but oftener the very pretty woman is not the most attractive" | "Still. there's charm in beauty" | insisted the writer, as he strained his l eyes around the corner to get a farewell l view of the fleeting vision.
 | Now, here's where I come in with a story" laughed the colonel, who always makes his points with story. When I was man of thirty-five, I was on one occasion going down the Ohio river from Cincinnati to Louisville. As I passed into the cabin of the steamboat l that was to carry me, I saw two young women of twenty-two and twenty, say, standing on the guards, evidently wait l ing for some one. I noticed them be- ] cause one was So pretty that a man would have been reasonable to all his manliness not to have seen her. She was gray-eyed, with beautiful coin- | plexion, soft silken hair and a figure which was grace itself. As the young man of to-day would say, she was a 'corker. Her companion was as home I ly as the other was pretty; so homely | that felt sorry she had to carry such a l face around with her. Who or what | they were I had no means of knowing, but l was glad that was going on the same boat with them, for the sake of l the pretty girl.
 q went back to my stateroom, and in | a few minutes thereafter I heard Wo- mems voices in the cabin near my door. noticed then that I had left 1t open, and as closed it I saw that the two | young women had the stateroom ad- | joining mine and were just entering it.. They didn't see me, and closed the door, feeling elated over the idea that as soon as possible I would make the acquaintance of my pretty neighbor. Then, as began to slick up for the conquest, I heard voices in the next room One was sharp and angry, the other soft and pleading. I could only catch an occasional word, but learned they were sisters, and one of them was reading the riot act to the other, and the other was taking it very meekly in- deed.
 "After while one of them stepped out on the guards, and, though didn't care to peep out, I could hear her abus- ing everything in sight. She was out side only a minute or two, returning to begin her tirade inside. Inwardly thanked my stars that I had been thus placed, because by the merest chance had been let into the secrets of the dis positions of these two sisters, and wondered why it was that beauty couldn't carry other charms as well At the same time, 1 made up my mlnd that the conquest I was on the point of making or hoping to make, would De indefinitely postponed. As the boat pulled out I went forward to look at the city we were leaving, and when came into the cabin again the supper table stretched away down the length of 1t and I caught the appetizing odor oi ham and coffee and that sort Of thlng
 "I knew the captain, and he invited me to a seat at his table, and when sat down, behold, my two young wo- men sat opposite. The captain, oi course, knew them, and at once pre- sented me. They were rather quiet al first, and most of the talk was casriec on by the captain and myself. wal watching the homely girl now, as was afraid I would have to run up against the temper of the pretty one,and didn't want to be any further disillu' stoned. It was enough to simply lool at her, for, by love! temper or no tenn per, she was beauty. But was hun gry. and as I was getting my supper II eating shape I stopped talking, and al 1 at once the tones of the voice haC learned in my stateroom filled the va cancy my voice had left I was almost afraid to look up, but I did, because il
 wasn't the pretty girls voice at all. never felt so relieved in my life, anc that night as we sat on deck in the moonlight I told her all about it and g whole lot more''