Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1901-04-25
STORY OF RERECcA.



SCOTS Sweet Heroine Sweetheart of
Irvings.
When AdoIph J. Latz died recently
Il St Louis the curtain went finally
! down on q real life drama of true love
and devotion.
The plot of the play is that of two
brilliant young men who love q beau
tiful woman. One man loves the girl
more than the other, but the girl can
not decide between the two First she
favors one and then the other. Finally
she gives the man who loves her
most her positive and last answer
She says she cannot marry him, and
he leaves her forever. In time she
finds the other mans love not as great
or real as she supposed, and so those
| two part. All three live on to beau
| tiful old age. Each wins renown and
| fame, but they never meet again. The
! last act Of the play is that in which
an old man is seen playing softly on a
violin while his eyes are fixed on a
| faded miniature Of the girl he had
loved in youth. The strings of the
| violin snap. The old man falls for
ward in front Of the picture, and when
his friends pick him up he is dead
Curtain.
The girl that Adolph Late loved was
Rebecca Gratz, the heroine of Sir Wal
| ter SCOTS Ivanhoe. The rival, but
for whom Mr.. Late might have mar
ciCd Miss GratZ, was the gifted Amer
lean writer, Washington Irving.
Not much Of Miss GRATIS early life
is known except that she resided in
Philadelphia and that she wrote many
poems of great beauty, but few of
which have been preserved today.
Miss GTatz is chiefly remembered as
being the original of the character of
Rebecca in Sir Walter SCOTS novel.
The famous painting of her by Thomas
Sully has done much to perpetuate the
stories Of her wonderful beauty She
died many years ago
Adolph Late went to st. Louis over
seventy years ago. 1t was while on
one of his trips east that he met Miss
Gratz in Philadelphia. He loved her
from the first moment he saw her. He
returned to the west and worked des-
perately to make a fortune that he
might pour it all at her feet. But
Miss GratZ had another sutton Wash
ington Irving, then just rising to the
height of his fame, was much in love
with Miss Gratz, and, while she did
not have the same kind of affections
for him that she did for her sturdy
young lover out in the west, she was
infatuated with Irving, who was as
handsome as he was brilliant.
Irving went abroad in 1917 and Wis
tied Sir Walter Scott. He carried a
miniature Of Rebecca Gratz with him
and showed it to Sir Walter and
dwelt in all his youthful fire and en-
thusiasm on the beauty and witchery
of the superb young American girl
Sir Walter Was greatly impressed with
Irving's description Of his lady love
and adopted the girl as a character
in the story of Ivanhoe, which was
published in 1920.
After Mr.. Late had won the fortune
for which he had been striving he
FASTENED back to Philadelphia to
claim his bride. But Miss Gratz at
this time did not know her own heart.
The magnetism of Washington Irving.
while not winning her love to himself
at least prevented it from centering on
Mr.. Latz. Miss Gratz finally refused
Mr.. Latz, and the two parted forever.
Washington Irving, after his west
up liJT 1icnocn1 Of ToiI
ate siege to his lady's heart, but she
found that she could not love him
either, and so those two parted.
Irving died in 1859, Miss Gratz some
years later, and Mr.. Late, the last fig
ure in this real life love story, only a
few weeks ago at the age of 81. He
never married but remained all his
life true to his first and only love. He
spent his life in philanthropic work,
in reading, and study. He was fond Of
reading Ivanhoe, where the story of
Miss Gratz' beauty is so we'll told.
He carried the picture of his boyhood
love about with him always, and at
night when he would sit and pour out
the sadness and the loneliness of his
heart through the strings of the violin
he would have the picture setting be-
fore him on the table.
One thinking of this story is re-
minded of the play of Rosemary and
of the picture of the pathetic figure of
an old man sitting gazing into the
face in miniature while he lets fall
from the locker few dried and faded
leaves.
Rosemary" he says, as he picks up
the dried leaves, that's for remem-
brance"