The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-07-30

girl has done much to educate them in
the last ten years regarding the interme-
date class, and they are beginning to
wonder If 1t Is possible for a girl to pos
sess all the virtues of the convent maiden
and all the abandon of manner of the
grisette. But they have not fully an
swered that question to themselves, and
unfortunately, large number of our girls
have, like Miss Moffett, made such dis
astrous efforts to illustrate what Amer
lean independence means abroad that the
question is still a very undecided one in
the mind of the foreigner. The associa-
ton with such men for an unprotected
girl is full Of dangers. There is a sort of
moral miasma which she breathes con-
stantly. They encourage her to think
low; they ridicuIe her when she thinks
high They expect her to degenerate.
They initiate her into the realms Of liquid
Illusion.
when a girl who is her own chaperon
likes champagne" said a New York
bachelor to me, 1--WE men can see the
finish of her career at a glance. 1t is al
| most invariably the same-only some
reach the end little more rapidly than
others
yet you urge her to drink it." 1 said,
| and laugh at her If she refuses
Yes, merely to test her strength. But
in our hearts we are glad when she re-
fuses it. Glad for her, even If we lose a
| little amusement
And you show your admiration by
dropping her acquaintance" 1 added
Yes; but that is all the better for the
girl, is it not?" he asked, and Of course
l knew it was
Miss Moffett, according to reports, join
ed the other good fellows in a good
M,
and opened more bottles, many for which
her own money paid.
She fiirted with music and the drama
and art and craved publicity with an ew-
embarrassing fever of the mind. She
hcattered her forces in a half dozen d.
rections, and achieved nothing in any
thing. She had lost her power of con-
centrated purpose, and she had destroyed
the bloom of fresh, wholesome girlhood
before she met The Man
She was "a good fellow" but not a
high-minded woman.
Just what cause she had to love Leon
cavallo so deeply we do not know. The
Man says, II never knew her"
The girls letters indicate that an at
tachment had existed between them. This
passion may have been wholly upon her
side. She may have been Historically i'm
aginative and drink and drugs may have
aided her delusion. I do not know that
she used drugs. but I Judge her by the
women I have known who raced through
life on the same highway.
After being a good fellow" for a few
months among the Bohemians sleep has
to be induced by a perfectly harmless
powder which reliable" physician
prescribes.
In few years the private sanitarium
or Bellevue or the Morgue receives the
good fellow
Love goes where it is sent I believe
this old saying to be true. But when a
woman is in full possession of her high
est qualities love does not stay where it
is not welcome
The best lovers never commit suicide
Even in loves anguish they find rap
ture that makes life worth the living
Unrequited love is a spur to the strong,
death blow to the weak. Unrequited
love made Petrarch a great poet; but It
makes d smaller sou1ed man a drunkard
or suicide.
Love goes where it is sent, but suicide
comes where it is induced.
Miss Moffett induced the suicidal mood
by years of wrong living, by false stand
ards of pleasure and by unwholesome
craving after publicity. She was like
hundreds of other women in our land to-
day, whose ambitions outrun their in
dustry and overbalance their talents.
She was disappointed in three separate
avenues of art before she received her
disappointment in love. And without
doubt she was disappointed in herself. A
beautiful and accomplished girl cannot
live the artificial and unwholesome life
which this girl lived for several years
without becoming lonely for the ideal she
has abandoned or lost.
And there is no loneliness so terrible
as the missing OF ones best self.
Had the best self retained the ascend
ancy, the subject Of this sketch would be
alive today.
Alice Moffett's life and death contain q
tragic lesson. I wish every girl who is
starting into the world today with an
idea of entering upon a career-especially
those girls who are going abroad alone
to study music or art-might realize fully
just what this lesson is. The woman
who lives up to the best that is within
her will never die of unrequited love.
Whatever suffering and anguish may be
enabled to rise above each experience to
q nobler height of womanhood.
Live up, and you will be helped up;
live down, and you will be dragged down
by the sorrows of earth.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox.