The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-11-06

about the only intervals of peace that
reigned between the pair, and what is
chiefly to her credit she never allowed
her unhappy brother 10 criticise or de-
fame his wife before her
So far as lay within his power Byron
repaid this patient and generous sister
His only child was named for her, dying
re left her everything save enough for
the support of his wife and daughter, and
his 'Stauzas 70 Augusta" are eloquent
of deeper, truer emotions than any other
human being ever aroused in him.
Though human, thou didst not deceive
Though woman. thou didst not forsake.
Though loved, thou forborest to grieve
me,
Though slandered, thou cOuldst never
shake.
When near his death in Greece his let
tiers to Augusta are full of pathetic almost
childlike reliance on her good sense, her
unfailing love to see that all went well
for his daughter, and that his wife could
be brought to reconciliation, and it was
the generous, long suffering Augusta who
followed him TO his tomb and fixed the
laudatory tablet above his grave.
A genuinely good, unselfish, valuable sis
ter, whose good work meant more to the
world of art than the public gives her
credit for, was Margaret Van Eyck. She
was the only sister of those great Flemish
artists, Jan and Hubert Van Eyck. To
keep house for them, to grind their colors,
to nurse, help and encourage her two great
brothers, Margaret forswore marriage
This sturdy Dutch woman herself painted
miniatures admirably, and was, along with
Jan and Hubert, honored and decorated
for the same, but, like Caroline Herschel,
she had rather a contempt for her own
achievements, and studied to paint in or
der that she might more intelligently as
sist them.
Jan and Hubert apparently estimated
this sister very highly and cherished her
tenderly. They also remained unmarried
and the three lie side by side in the old
town of Tregon. undivided in death, as in
life.
II am nothing, I have done nothing; all
I know 1 owe to my brother. 1 am only
a tool he shaped to his use-a well-trained
puppy dog would have earned as much,'
said Caroline Herschel when some one
tried to laud her own achievements. This
remarkable old lady who discovered eight
comets, lost her temper only when any
one dared draw comparison between her
self and her brother William. All she did
for her adored William is familiar his
tory to those who know anything about
the lives of great women. She made his
shirts, baked his bread and sat up all night
in the open air breathing on her ink to
keep it warm while the great astronomer
dictated to her and swept the heavens.
She even taught herself to love his wife,
a hard job for jealousy devoted sister.
After fifty years in England as his ador-
ing slave, her heart was so crushed at his
death that she fed back to Hanover. There
she lived to be 81 years old, and was buried
with a lock of his hair, while, by
her own arrangement, her tombstone
touchingly bears witness to the fact hat
she was Sir William Herschel's sister
and permitted to be his helper.
When Fanny Mendelssohn died her
brother Felix fell forward faintng; for a
month he would neither speak, read, write
nor play the piano, and shortly he died.
He confessed toward the end he had no
wish to live since he could not see his sis
ter again in life, and he was buried be-
side her whom he seemed to have loved
more tenderly than wife or children. As
an admiral musician this sister was OF
inestima bic value to Mendelssohn, and Ter
few compositions, pretty bits of fancy, he
loved to play as much as his own great
productions.
No wit less noble than these other abb
sorbingly devoted and unselfsh sisters was
Henrietta Renan. to whose cheerful resig-
ration of marriage for his sake her great
brother Ernest testifies. Though an hon
est man offered Henriette his heart and
home. with all that the prospects of WIFE
ly dignity and maternal ties must nave
meant 10 such a woman, she, without hes
itation, laid the whole offering on the altar
of ssterly fidelity.
Dorothy Wordsworth was the woman
who persuaded her brother to devote mis-
life to poetry, and as a guarantee of her
faith in him, she bore all her life with
his trying idiosyncracies, INDUCED his hui
mors, stimulated his courage and played
such a part as Jane Welsh failed to as
sumo for Carlye or Mary Shelly for the
great poet. Fanny Enders.