The times dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1903-1914, 1913-03-30

~ y the fourth OF April Mrs. Philip Lydg. the beau
tiful wife of Captain Phil Lydig, the million
are clubman, will sell the remarkable art
collection which she has spent ten years in per-
fccting. The ydlg house at No SO East Flfty-second
street will be stripped OF its wonderful tapestries
tiQues of bronze and marble, its Botticelli paintings
its rugs, carved chests, and Phoenican sarco-
phag What Stanford White called the most per-
feet little house in America" will go existence
the auctioneers block
Far moro keenly than the enforced perhaps final
REIMBURSEMENT of her ambitious social campaign does
Mrs. Lydg feel the giving up OF her collection, which
although not large is uniquely valuable land has many
features sought by Picrpont Morgan.
The soul that animated the little house was the per
feet expression Of the soul OF Mrs Lydg herself No
place was. ever so stepped in personality as this little
gem Of .Fiftysecond street.
Why society asks does Mrs. Lydig sell the
treasures that she has placed far beyond all of her
other possessions Society knows why Mrs. Lydg
rfccd her health III tho fight that made her OF
great leaders OF American fashionable society. and
that a. the very pinnacle OF her achievements when
She began threaten The supremacy Of Mrs Ava
Willing Astor herself she has had to throw every.
thing she had into Tho discard an effort to gain
back this lost health
That she has determined TO her collection proves.
society thinks, tina, Mrs I.ydig realizes that ne
fight for health will be longer and more bitter
one than her fight for social supremacy, and that She
may never return TO New York
But the great question that many fashionable lead
ers are asHng lnemseives with the case of this brill
pay?'
Mrs. Lydig bought her first picture The Girl in
Red by Coelo, the fifteenth century Spanish mas
Ter. the first year that she entered the social fight,
sitter marrying Captain Phil. 1t was as though She
said TO herself. with this picture l begin NV fight
win social leadership" With The sale of that Mic
her fight viii be ended
Her fight has continued TO he present dav She
has wonderful victory but in winning IT she
has been woefnly defeated The very qualities which
have made her in short years potent leader in
New York society have been her undoinc On the
night of April a when her paintings her bron2es and
her woodcaryings 20 under the hammer this page
OF her life will be pasted down forever This sale
and the attendant breaking up her home means ina,
the beautiful Mrs. INdg Will spend the next year in
strict retirement that she Will the life OF her
nit in desperate effort win back the most nricn
less treasure of all her health, lost in collecting bor
other treasures social position leadership n,ecc,ue
prestige and The more material treasures that nI her
house East Fifty-secpnd street
There are various prices that women mus, nav for
The things OF this life that they covet: they nav IN
money, in charm in health. Mrs. I.ydig's price has
been the last and it is price she will contin,a
10 pay.
Poets have sung Of me beauty and nagposn, NJ
This Spanish beauty; artists three countries nav
painted her, each portrayal auring than rho
other scholars nave paid astonishing tributes to hor
mental and artistic talents society a; 0rst ~
sagonistic then coldy indifferent now pays homage "a
her genius in leadership. "
Mrs Lydis As brioc. very we'll understood the dr
hcuities that lay before her. did she seek tho
guet SIDE OF lie and avoid society and its antagon
ISM! NO indeed she had the courage of her span
ish grandfather. who fought give Cuba IFS freedom
ana she raced her difficulties with the determination