The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-05-29
MRS. E. D. E. N. SOUTHWORIH
Has Written More Popular Novels
Than Any Other Woman.

] Washington. d. C.-Prospect cottage.
a small, unpretentious, story-and-a half
! residence in Georgetown, or rather
/ West Washington, as it is now called,
/ is the home of Mrs. Southworth, the
most prolific American woman novel
/ ;st.
/ Mrs. Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte
/ Southworth, to give her full name was
/ bern in Washington in 1919, and for the
/ greater part of her life has lived there.
Although not many names are better
known TO the reading public of the last
! generation, there are few people with
whose personality the public is less ia
miliar. Mrs. SouthwOrth's health has
been such as not to allow indulgence in
Sc cial functions, in addition to which
her work and her inclination actually
forbade Il.
After an uneventful girlhood, Miss
NeVitte married Frederick H South
worth, in 1910. Four years later the
young wife found it necessary to add
to the support of the family, and for
five years she taught in the public
schools of Washington.
Finding a teachers salary unequal to
her needs, she supplemented it by writ
ing short stories. In 1S49 her first novel,
''ketribution," was published. Its SUE
cess was so great that she abandoned
the school and took up her pen, which,
for more than half a century, has not
been idle.
Romance after romance came in quick
succession, and were ca gerly devoured
by the novel reading public. While
many Of her stories are highly sensa-
tional and lurid, there is much strong
dramatic and finely descriptive ork in
them.
Mrs. Southworth must have made
what was considered fortune in those
days, but she has never altered her
style of living, and now that she is on
the turning point of so years, she dwells
in a house that might belong to poor
laborer.
Prospect cottage occupies a COM
handing view on Potomac Heights. The
low verandah which extends around
three sides furnishes a :oign of want
age from which a good part of the city
and the broad sweep of the river can
be seen. 1t nestles among the trees and
climbing vines. and before the advent
of two electric railways, must have
been a picture of rural beauty.
There IS a junction of the two roads
in front of the house, and on Sundays
when the cars are filled with crowds of
pleasure seekers, it is not a choice To-
cality. The policeman who keeps watch
and ward over that square usually vol
unteers the information to any one who
there little old house is where Mrs.
Southworth writ all them novels of
hern."
The stranger remembers with great
vagueness that in her childish days she
was interested in "Capitola" and her
troubles, and looks with eagerness to-
ward the house indicated. She sees a
low, dark, tumble-down dwelling, with
coarse Nottingham lace at the win
dows, giving evidence of great neglect |
at the present writing. The same guar
dian of the peace further relates that |
Mrs. Southworth, cd and invaded, |
lives alone, with only nephew, DR.. |
Southworth, to look after her declining |
years.
Mrs. Southworth has never been a ia |
vorite in society. Her early years were |
so full of work and woe that she had |
neither time nor disposition to ''go out |
to frivol." 1t was long before the liter |
airy part of society gave up trying to |
inveigle the authoress to enter its circle |
and then only after the reception of
note after note of refusal. couched in |
the most pathetic language. telling of |
work, worry and that direst of calami- !
ties. neuralgia
Necessity, which is said to be the
mother Of invention, assisted this pro-
life authoress, in devising the manila |