The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1898-07-08
A BEAUTIFUL SOCIALIST.
A Lovely and Talented Society Girl
Does Reform Work.

OoSS nSIoIHl oTNs
Among the many remarkable careers
Of the modern woman, called new"
none have been more remarkable thar
that of Beatrice Potter, the wife Of the
English socialist, Sidney Webb, who has
just passed drought the United States
on a trip around the world. Renun-
Citations of material pleasures for the
sake Of an idea have always awed and
impressed the public imagination ever
since the days of Gautama Buddha, and
no modern remuneration has Deer more
inspiring than that Of his beautiful
socialist,
Miss Potter was the seventh and
youngest daughter of a wealthy Lam
cashire manufacturer, whose wife was
not only the mother of seven beautiful
and gifted girls, not one of whom was
less than five feet eight inches in
statue, but who was noted for her own
talents and accomplishments. She was
a religious woman, but read her bible
morning and evening in the original
Hebrew and Greek, and the writings Of
the church fathers in Latin-which is
not common among even the most reli-
gious Women She was a profound
and persistent student and was until
death the most intimate friend Of Her.
oS1S opCAlSCAy II SollSullGu u0T uOl
only on matters affecting his daily life,
but upon the most abstruse scientific
questions. The eccentricity of this bril-
liant woman was her horror Of fat
people. h herself was of a fragile,
almost transparent, physiquie, and to
hr mind adipOse tissue seemed almost
a vice. She fed the seven daughters
with the greatst care, weighing every
meal before they were allowed to eat it,
and f~iGrnUQrQ6 NV oao1profn nvrnrs~oo~<
how little a growing girl can eat and
yet retain health and vigor. Later they
confessed that they never. until they
had homes of their own, knew whar
it was to feel a sensation Of hunger.
Yet they thrived upon this severe sys-
tenn, all seven growing up tall, hand
some and vigorous, with alert and bril-
liant minds and retaining always the
slimness of their figures.
OF all the seven the youngest, Beat
rice, was the most remarkable. She
pursued her studies under the direction
and with the assistance of Herbert
Spencer, who has always declared hers
to be the most remarkable female mind
he has ever encountered. She was the
tallest of the seven, n when she was
introduced to London society was said
to be one of the most beautiful women
Of her generation. Such a girl, Who
possessed beside an ample fortune Of
her own, was not likely to want fol
admirers and the most brilliant men Of
England were glad to be her friends.
One day. without warning, she disap-
peared from the ball rooms n drawing
rooms of May Fair, and was not to be
discovered by n of her whilom COM
statistics which she had collected her.
attention to the condition of the work.
ing girls of London, and, putting on
the costume of one, she went into a
sweat shop and shared their existence,
with the secret purpose Of studying
it's hardships. Two months later she
%reappeared with a mass of facts and
statistics which she had collected her
self, and which she embodied in an
article in n of the reviews, that
stirred all England, was made the sub
ject of debate in parliament and re-
suited in the appointment of 3. COM
mission which investigated and re-
formed the sweat shops. From that
day Beatrice Potter returned no more
to the world. Her sisters had all mar
ried men of position, but she scorned
their happy, busy, domestic lives, and
was to be found only among the manual
laborers, sharing the curious delusion
Of other socialists that the only labor
worth consideration is such as may
be performed with the hands. Her
studies led her all over Europe. Occa-
sionally she would for a brief
space and gather about her for an aft
ernoon her early friends, but her real
companions had ceased to be the men
who were making and ruling the Eng
lish empire, M creating it's science,
literature and art. Her friends were
those who called on her in their shirt
sleeves and smoked clay pipes in her
drawing room. Five years ago she
astonished even those who knew her
best by marrying Sidney Webb, the
socialist. They set up a modest home
in the east end Of London, all her for
tune, beauty and talent being finally
and ~irrevocably devoted to the cause
of manual labor.
Two years 6 the fruits of her
studies appeared in the form of a monu-
mental work IN the subject of labor
and wages. In it no theories were adj
vanced, no doctrines promulgated. It
contained simply the mass of facts
out Of which doctrines and theories
might be built. This year another great
work, bearing her WI as we'll as her
husbands name, has appeared. In it
she Celebrates the conclusions she has
drawn from her facts, and while pro-
founder students of the social question
by no means accept her theories, it is
universally admitted that no more mas
terly and scientific presentation Of the
question has been made OF recent years,
and that the beautiful woman, who
deserted the London ball rooms less
than a decade ago. has produced a
work which will be a text book and
a mine Of reference for all students
of modern sociology.
Elephants Teeth.
Whosoever has looked inside an ele-
plants mouth has seen a strange sight.
Elephants have no front teeth, and