The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram., 1912-03-02
SOME LITTLE STORIES OF REAL LIFE
You Can't Tell What May Happen When You Go Down
Street.-The turning of Door-knob May
Change the Current of Your Life.

~ ESTHER GRIFFIN WHITE.
The most curious things happen.
II you read them in a work Of fiction
you would say that they were exagger-
ated.
This, in instance:
A man down in Virginia weeded an
old overcoat out of the attic, with an
accumulation of odds and ends OF ap-
parel, and finding that it was in good
condition and remembering that he
had always liked it when II was new
twenty years before, sent 1t to a tailor
to be overhauled.
When the coat was returned the
contents of the pockets were also sent.
among them an old letter.
The latter was. the man found to his
surprise. addressed in his own hand
whiting to a young woman in Balti-
more. He opened it and found written
therein his proposal for her heart and
hand.
All. then, was clear to him
She had been his sweetheart" the
account reads, They had come from
Germany on the same ship. He one day
wrote a letter setting forth his love
and asking her to marry him. He re-
teiye ed no answer to his letter Believ.
ing himself Tilted. he never tried to
see the girl again. left Baltimore and
settled in Virginia. In the stained and
faded letter he recognized the fact that
he had forgotten to post the love mis-
sive"
This. of course, is one of the stock
properties of the old time melodrama-
the letter that never came"
But 1t is the sequel which seems in
credible.
The man had married, had grown
wealthy, his wife had died After her
death he began again to think of his
early love. Found. upon investigation.
that she had married and that her hus.
band had died. That she had again
married and removed to distant
state, but that she had bern granted
an absolute divorce from her second
husband.
time-worn letter, and posted it himself
in the post-ofice to make sure" that ii
was safely on it's way.
The reply stated that she never
would have married anyone else had
she received the first letter
They were married and went to Ger
many on their honeymoon.
II this had been the basis of a move
1t would have been thrown down as ar
;,~n, %~1- ,h~
For strange as it may seem, the pho
tographic reproduction of an object il
not always as interesting as the origi
nal.
And frequently not only less inter
esting but utterly lacking in the quail
ity which made it striking and which
served to attract and hold the atten
tion.
You can see this in a photograph it
felf
Haven't you seen and known per
fectly beautiful persons who took flat
ly uninteresting pictures?
And. on the other hand, those yo,
found plain. even dull of feature, &C
tually plebian. and, in any event
uSlSACi OCouNllul AOl W AN
would be reproduced in amazing effec
tiveness by the camera?
The light plays strange tricks.
1t will do this with the vision O
! those suffering from myopia or what il
generally termed "near-sightcdness."
With the latter, objects ordinaril.
obscured and indefinite viii; assum
uncanny brilliances. People will loon
up with startling distinctness. 1t i
doubtful. indeed. whether any two pei
sons see any object alike.
! You can find this out by asking say
| five persons, how some certain othe
person was dressed on a stated occa
sion. Rarely will their accounts agree
A reporter finds this out early in tn
game.
Sent to the scene of an accident h
will And it sometimes almost imposs
BILE to get any accurate description o
! the cause and results. No two hav
seen 1t from the same angle. And ye
each one will firmly assert that his i
the only correct version.
| 1t is this which accounts for the ir
fatuation of some man for some won
an when other women are heard to d.
Clare-"I can't understand what b
sees in her"
1t is this which causes prolonge
disputes over the color Of eyes an
hair.
This which makes two pictures q
the same scene from the brushes Q
two artists seem utterly unlike
1t is the medium through which tn
vision is filtered, not the object itsel
which is seen.
That is the reason those artist,
called. sometimes incorrectly "impre,
sionists," were. at first, SO misundel
stood.
For they concerned themselves a