New-York tribune., 1908-08-08
4 PFMARKARLE KONAN.

The distinguished woman whom death has
lust removed from the ranks of American let
ters Miss Katharine Prescott Wormeley, was OF
a tyne which the world can i'll afford to lose.
She had character in proportion to her great
intellectual gifts; she was as noble as she was
brilliant Born in 1880, she belonged to a gen
Grafton untroubled to any serious extent, If
troubled at all. by revolutionary conceptions
of woman's proper sphere Queen Victoria,
tartlv exclaiming N one of her early letters
thar q certain Lady should be whipped
for her advanced" ideas. gave rather violent
expression TO a general feeling that the sex
could honOraby perform its duties and achieve
its happiness without abandoning any of its
traditional reserves Miss Wormeley had that
feeling. She was content, down to the day Of
her death with exercising a womans gentleness
and Kindness a wonan's grace and wit, woln-
ans goodness. But she found it easily possible
TO exercise at the same time such powers IF
energy and brain most men might envy
Blest with rich and eager temperament that
delighted in work she threw herself with ardor
into the task of the Sanitary Commission during
the war, and in after years her services to phil
anthropic institutions in Newport were marked
by the same zeal and the same efficient prac-
ticality. But these public labors never made
her a public personage--when once her duty
was done she quick TO return TO the privacy
for which she cared n0SI i mere Sne deNOleI
herself to her pen enriching literature with the
best English version of BalZac that has ever
been made suppIementing this monumental pro-
duction with many other equally sound transla-
tions from the French. and. through her volumi-
nous correspondence, sharing in the interests Of
her friends She letter writer of the old
school, with traits Of her own that made her
unique. Her briefest note touched with
charm She had seen much read much, and
always taken a vivid penetrating. humorous
view Of things. Her memory was remarkable,
and she seldom glanced at a subject without
recalling some incident or anecdote which
heightened the yivacty Of her clear. spOnta
neous style. For letters like hers-and she was
magnificently generous of them-one must go
back to the French and English classics.
She herself would have secuted this idea.
One Of the most beautiful of her gifts was her
delicate modesty. But she had noble pride,
an almost naughty aloofness from the feverish
impulses materialistic ideals and careless man
ners Of which, from afar, she took regretful
note. Nothing escaped her. She was keen
upon political and social developments as upon
a chapter in the history of her beloved BalZac.
What she saw moved her. on occasion. to wist
full remembrance of other days and other stand
ards Yet even in the midst Of her biting anal
ysis of some current question she would break
into laughter over its drofl side-and she had
a wonderful faculty for seeing the droll side.
She hated pompous gravity as she hated eccen-
trcity or any unwomany foible She would
not have been at home with a George Eliot or
a Harriet Martineau. But she would have been
happy-and made affectionately welcome-in the
company of Jane Austen or Mary Lamb.