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HEROINES OF 
 HISTORY 
 
 TYPICAL HEROINES 
 OF MYTHOLOGY 
 OF SHAKESPEARE 
 OF THE BIBLE 
 
 BY 
 
 FRANK M. BRISTOL 
 
 Tit- 
 Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 
 THE ABINGDON PRESS 
 
 NEW YORK CINCINNATI 
 
 ttB 
 
I 
 Copyright, lOM, by 
 
 FRANK M. BllISTOL 
 
To 
 
 Nellie, My Wife. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 
 WOMAN-HEROIC IN MYTHOLOGY 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. Mythology, its Origin, Development, and Influence . 1 1 
 
 II. The Heroine-Mother: Thetis, Hecuba, Latona. .. . 21 
 
 III. The Heroine-Daughter: Antigone, Iphigenia 34 
 
 IV. The Heroine-Wife: Andromache, Alcestis, Penelope. 44 
 
 PART II 
 WOMAN-HEROIC IN SHAKESPEARE 
 
 I. Shakespeare's Genius in the Dramatic Realm 77 
 
 II. The So-called Heroines: Juliet, Ophelia, Beatrice, 
 
 Rosalind 84 
 
 III. The Heroine-Daughter, Miranda, Cordelia 93 
 
 IV. The Heroine-Mother: Constance, Volumnia 108 
 
 V. The Heroine- Wife: Portia, Lady Macbeth, Her- 
 
 mione, Imogen, Desdemona 118 
 
 PART III 
 WOMAN-HEROIC IN THE BIBLE 
 
 I. The Scriptural Type of Heroism 163 
 
 II. The Heroine-Mother: Eve, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, 
 
 Jochebed, Hannah 170 
 
 III. The Heroine-Wife: The Ideal Home, Sarah, Deborah, • 
 
 Huldah, Abigail, Esther, Ruth 203 
 
 IV. The Supreme Woman-Heroic Mary: — The Mother 
 
 of Jesus .' 270 
 
 7 
 
PART I 
 
 WOMAN-HEROIC 
 IN MYTHOLOGY 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 MYTHOLOGY, ITS OEIGIN, DEVELOPMENT, 
 AND INFLUENCE 
 
 The heroic element in woman's character 
 receives more or less emphasis in all forms of 
 literature and in every period of history. 
 Wherever found it is one and the same vir- 
 tue. But it may be associated with very 
 dissimilar mental qualities and very unlike 
 ethical notions in different individuals, races, 
 and ages. The historic heroine may differ 
 widely in her moral and mental entirety from 
 any heroine of poetry or romance — any crea- 
 tion of the imagination. The heroine of the 
 Bible may not as a type correspond in the 
 unity of her womanhood to the Greek heroine 
 of mythology. But when we find the strong, 
 splendid virtue of heroism in historical or 
 fictitious, in real or ideal, in scriptural or 
 mythological character, it is ever one and the 
 same thing. 
 
 It will not be insisted upon that we accept 
 
 the heroine on her heroism alone as the ideal 
 
 woman. No woman can be ideal without it, 
 
 but other virtues must unite Avith heroism to 
 
 constitute the perfect woman. We are not 
 11 
 
12 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 claiming that the merely heroic mother, or 
 that the merely heroic daughter or wife 
 measures up to the full standard of the per- 
 fect mother or daughter or the ideal wife. 
 But without this heroic element the charac- 
 ter of the woman, whatever her relation may 
 be, can never reach perfection. In the ideal 
 mother, daughter, wife, woman there must 
 blend the sevenfold virtues of heroism, purity, 
 love, faith, intelligence, modesty, and devo- 
 tion, as blend the seven primary colors of 
 the prism in the pure white ray of light. 
 
 As Hebrew character, life, and civilization 
 developed under the influence of inspired 
 standards and ideals of virtue, so the Greeks 
 were very largely educated by the ideals of a 
 mythology which was practically their re- 
 ligion. The mythological characters making 
 up the Greek pantheon were doubtless the 
 product of a long and subtle process of evolu- 
 tion, and they were composite myths at that. 
 In one character there would seem to meet 
 and mingle a historic personality and an in- 
 terpretation of some natural phenomenon and 
 an ethical law or moral principle. The com- 
 posite whole would be the personification of 
 a great physical force, a law of nature, an 
 influence in the material universe, like light 
 or darkness^ or the life principle of the vege- 
 
MYTHOLOGY 13 
 
 table world, or the sun, tlie moon, the sea- 
 sons, or the controlling power of the sea, the 
 presiding genius of the heavens, or the dark 
 and mysterious forces of the underworld. 
 Here is the sun-god — Apollo; here is Nep- 
 tune of the sea; here is Aurora of the dawn; . 
 here is Iris of the rainbow; here is Flora 
 of the world of bloom; here is Ceres of the 
 harvests; here is Pomona of the orchard and 
 the fruits. Among the lesser myths are found 
 those charming goddesses who preside over 
 the realms of human thought and study rather 
 than over the great forces of the outer ma- 
 terial world. Urania represents the genius 
 of astronomy, Clio of history, Euterpe of 
 music, Calliope of epic poetry, Melpomene of 
 tragedy and Polyhymnia of sacred song. 
 
 In this mythology we seem to find an evo- 
 lution proceeding in the imagination of a 
 race; a law or phenomenon of nature seems 
 to evolve into a personality, and that person- 
 ality into a hero or heroine, that hero or hero- 
 ine into a national ideal, that ideal into a 
 god or goddess, to be assigned a place in the 
 pantheon of the prevailing cult. Or an eth- 
 ical principle originally set forth didactically 
 comes to assume a form in the popular imag- 
 ination, is personified, then deified, and finally 
 worshiped. Or, again, some traditional per- 
 
14 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 sonage may grow on the imagination of a 
 people and come to be so exalted by the eulo- 
 gies of priests, the songs of poets, and the 
 advice of parents to their children as to as- 
 sume godlike proportions, and finally to be- 
 come so great and mysteriously potential in 
 awakening individual emulation, in exciting 
 public praise and kindling national pride and 
 faith, as to command the admiration, then the 
 veneration, and then the adoration of the peo- 
 ple. Not wholly unlike this may have been 
 the origin and evolution of the heroes and 
 heroines, the gods and goddesses of the Greek 
 and Roman traditions and mythologies. In 
 an age to which science was unknown, and 
 even when philosophers were as children in 
 their knowledge of the laws, forces, and chem- 
 ical processes of the physical universe, it will 
 not appear altogether irrational that the peo- 
 ple with their priests and poets should give 
 an occult meaning to the forms and processes 
 of life, to the movements of the heavenly 
 bodies, and to the origin, nature, and influence 
 of the world-elements. To their imagination 
 all nature seemed to feel and think; every 
 star, every rainbow, every dewdrop, the dark- 
 ness, the wind, the light seemed to incarnate 
 intelligence; every tree, flower, vine was ani- 
 mated with a spirit. And the very souls of 
 
MYTHOLOGY 15 
 
 men and women departing from the body at 
 times become reincarnated in flowers and 
 trees. The doctrine of the transmigration of 
 souls has come down to our modern thought 
 through the fascinating tales of Ovid's Meta- 
 morphosis. Who does not recall the melan- 
 choly fate of Dryope, who for what seemed 
 the most innocent act of gathering some pur- 
 ple flowers at the water's edge for her prat- 
 tling babe was transfixed, her feet taking 
 root in the earth; her whole body from her 
 feet to her head was gradually changed into 
 a tree — a metamorphosis which her sister 
 and parents could not by all their tears and 
 pleadings check. She had ignorantly plucked 
 a flower of the nymph Lotis and left the stem 
 bleeding. This nymph had herself been changed 
 into this flower while escaping her would-be 
 ravisher. 
 
 The radiantly beautiful Daphne was thus 
 pursued by the infatuated Apollo, but flying 
 from his presence she pursued a hopeless race 
 against her lover, who as he Was aboiit to 
 seize her was horrified to see her flowing hair 
 turn to leaves, her outstretched arms become 
 branches, her body take on bark, her feet to 
 root themselves in the ground and her beauti- 
 ful form change to a tree. "You shall be 
 my tree," cried Apollo. "Your leaf shall not 
 
16 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 wither nor fade. From your branches shall 
 be gathered wreaths for the brows of heroes 
 and conquerors." Daphne became the laurel. 
 
 Apollo transformed the blood of Hyacin- 
 thus into a flo^^er. Apollo conceived a strange 
 passion for the beautiful youth and was acci- 
 dentally the cause of his death. While play- 
 ing at quoits Apollo hurled a quoit which 
 struck Hyacinthus in the forehead. The head 
 of the beautiful boy fell drooping from his 
 shoulder as he sank to the earth. Apollo, 
 accusing himself of the accident, promised to 
 immortalize the stricken youth in song, and 
 turned his flowing blood into the purple Hya- 
 cinth, the flower of Apollo's favor. 
 
 Perhaps no fable of that mythologic lore 
 had a greater beauty to our youthful imagin- 
 ation when first we entered this fascinating 
 realm of literature than the story of Philemon 
 and Baucis. It is an old Phrygian legend 
 reciting the incidents of the origin of a cer- 
 tain linden tree and oak. In a ripe and beau- 
 tiful old age this pious couple were meta- 
 morphosed, and she the linden tree became 
 and he an oak. 
 
 Thus have the objects of nature, and espe- 
 cially the trees and flowers, become the habita- 
 tions of spirits departed or the incarnation 
 of some form of human genius or some ex- 
 
MYTHOLOGY 17 
 
 pression of human faculty or virtue. Or thus 
 has the imagination of an unscientific age 
 tried to formulate in story the origin of those 
 natural objects which are most intimately 
 and sentimentally associated with the world's 
 common feeling, and thus, some will argue, 
 did mythology develop. 
 
 It is quite evident that corruptions grew 
 up with this mythology, which was originally 
 a purer form of worship than the idolatry 
 which deified graven images and worshiped 
 forms of wood and stone. 
 
 When the people made gods and goddesses 
 who were like themselves, or degraded them 
 to personifications of passions even more sen- 
 sual and bestial than were their own, what 
 wonder that the pantheon became a chaos and 
 an anarchy of contrary and contending moral 
 forces, an Augean stable of corruption? As 
 the people became more and more corrupt 
 and vicious, it was inevitable that their gods 
 and goddesses, their heroes and heroines should 
 become more and more like themselves, im- 
 pure and depraved. But take those heroines 
 of the Greek mythology, those goddesses — and 
 goddesses because originally heroic, virtuous 
 principles or beneficent, helpful laws of na- 
 ture — take those heroines at their best, free 
 from the weaknesses and vices with which they 
 
18 HEEOINES OF HISTOEY 
 
 came to be clothed, and they have lessons to 
 teach all ages. 
 
 If we look for the heroism of intellect in 
 that old system of myths, we shall find it 
 personified in feminine character. Athena 
 or Minerva represents the devotion of pure 
 intellect to the control and guidance of the 
 world's affairs. She was the patroness of 
 the arts of industry and agriculture and de- 
 fensive warfare. There is not only the heroism 
 of intellect but also the heroism of purity per- 
 sonified in this goddess. Only the chaste, the 
 pure, the virtuous were originally permitted 
 to worship at Athena's shrine. It was under 
 the patronage of this goddess, who sprang 
 from the brain of Zeus, that Athens came to its 
 storied splendor, the seat and center of art, 
 philosophy, and song. And the highest, clean- 
 est art, the most rational and ethically noble 
 philosophy, the sanest, sublimest, and most 
 perfect literature were produced when the 
 Hellenic genius was dominated by the cult 
 of moral purity and intellectual power as sym- 
 bolized in the Parthenon — the temple and 
 shrine of Athena. 
 
 As Athena, or Minerva, represents, the hero- 
 ism of intellect or heroic and beneficent intel- 
 lectuality and culture, so Hera, or Juno, 
 represents the heroism of happy, innocent, and 
 
MYTHOLOGY 19 
 
 useful activity. Here is the heroine or goddess 
 who with all her love for nature and the 
 world of life and activity, is the protectress 
 of the sanctity of marriage. Here is the true 
 heroine of the home life of that pagan world. 
 
 Artemis, or Diana, personifies the heroism 
 of chastity and virtue. At this shrine youth, 
 innocence, modesty found favor. Here too 
 they found illumination and inspiration. In 
 the original representations both of art and 
 poetry, as well as of tradition and philosophy, 
 this heroine was of spotless, immaculate char- 
 acter and reputation, an ideal, commanding 
 the veneration of Greek and Eoman woman- 
 hood. 
 
 Here was a true heroine-worship. Was it orig- 
 inally anything more than a very praiseworthy 
 emulation of the virtues of which these hero- 
 ines, who became to the popular imagination 
 goddesses, were the supposed embodiment and 
 personification? Were these goddesses at one 
 time real women and historic heroines? Did 
 they somewhere and some time act a noble 
 part? Did they confer blessings upon their 
 country and people? Did they lift up before 
 them high standards of virtue? Did they 
 become martyrs to great principles? Were 
 they the saints of the old pagan calendar? 
 Was mythology in its genesis and in its sim- 
 
20 HEEOINES OP HISTORY 
 
 plest forms anything more than a canoniza- 
 tion of these heroines of the prehistoric time? 
 Was it this even before its gods and goddesses 
 became the personifications of the great na- 
 ture-forces, the effort of the imagination to 
 explain a universe which is only now begin- 
 ning to have an explanation in science? 
 
 iTry to look beyond the myth to that pos- 
 sible reality, that true, high-minded, self-sac- 
 rificing benefactress, that great-souled hero- 
 ine, that woman there in the dim, far distance, 
 acting a part that made her glorious, made 
 her immortal. 
 
CHAPTEE II 
 
 THE HEROINE-MOTHER 
 
 Thetis 
 
 Brushing aside all the nonessential and 
 false elements that have gathered about these 
 characters, we see this one great, sublime idea 
 presenting itself to the student of mythology 
 — the heroism of usefulness, the heroism of 
 benefaction. We find heroines among moth- 
 ers, wives, and daughters of the ancient tra- 
 dition. They are represented as mortals and 
 as immortals, divine and semidivine in nature, 
 as the case may be. Thetis was of divine birth 
 - — ^"A goddess and the daughter of a god" — 
 beautiful beyond compare. But though she 
 was worthy of alliance with the gods, even 
 with Jove himself, she was fated to marry a 
 mortal, because it was prophesied that her son 
 would be so great as to eclipse the fame of 
 her husband. None of the gods, therefore, 
 though bewitched by the transcendent charms 
 of Thetis, would marry her and run the risk 
 of having to assume a position of inferior 
 greatness to his own issue. The gods did 
 not seem to know, what history proves, that 
 
 21 
 
22 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 every truly great man has been greater than 
 his father. Had men acted on the principle 
 of the gods who feared to marry Thetis, there 
 never would have been a Homer, a Plato, a 
 Themistocles, a Csesar, a Shakespeare, a 
 Dante, a Raphael, a Napoleon, a Washington, 
 a Lincoln. Thetis, therefore, married a mor- 
 tal, and not a very reputable mortal at that. 
 Peleus had a very bad record. But there 
 sprang from this union "Achilles swift of foot, 
 the first of Grecian heroes." 
 
 The devotion of Thetis to her marvelous 
 son forms one of the most inspiring chapters 
 of old Greek tradition. Her immortal nature 
 enabled her to divine the future, and to fore- 
 see not only the hardships and dangers of the 
 Trojan War, but also the death of her splendid 
 Achilles should he accompany the Greeks to 
 Troy. She used all her powers of persuasion 
 to prevent his joining the Grecian forces. With 
 the gods and goddesses the element of patriot- 
 ism had no influence. They were neither 
 Greeks nor Trojans, but superior to both. 
 Their sympathies were often divided, gods 
 against gods; and a god or goddess had the 
 divine right to change his or her sympathies 
 from one side to another at will. Thetis was 
 not sufficiently interested in the quarrel be- 
 tween Menelaus and Paris over the unfaithful 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 23 
 
 Helen to sacrifice her great son for either. 
 But Achilles, at first inclined to follow his 
 mother's advice, finally yielded to the solici- 
 tations of Ulysses and his companions in arms 
 and joined the Greeks, to become the most 
 brilliant warrior before the walls of Troy and 
 the real hero of the Iliad. In the quarrel 
 which arose between Achilles and Agamem- 
 non, the commander-in-chief of the Grecian 
 forces, over a fair captive who had been taken 
 as one of the spoils of war, and on account of 
 which misfortune had come to the Grecian 
 arms, Thetis fully sympathized with Achilles 
 and agreed with him in his purpose to resign 
 and return home. But this mother was not 
 willing to have the matter rest there with 
 her son disgraced. If Achilles was content 
 to sulk, sheathe his mighty sword, and with- 
 draw his Myrmidons from the Grecian forces, 
 Thetis was not satisfied to let this quarrel 
 terminate with her son's passing into oblivion 
 while Agamemnon continued to win battles, 
 spoils, and fame. 
 
 Through the influence of Jove, who secured 
 the defeat of the Greeks in an engagment 
 with the Trojans, she forced the Greeks to 
 urgently recall Achilles. When her son heard 
 of Hector's victory over Patrocles, through 
 whose persuasion he had consented to rejoin 
 
24 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 Agamemnon with his invincible Myrmidons, 
 he determined to seek Hector in shigie com- 
 bat and avenge the death of his dearest friend. 
 In this great duel, Achilles wore an armor 
 which his mother had persuaded Vulcan to 
 forge. It was absolutely invulnerable, and the 
 shield was of such beautiful design and work- 
 manship that its description forms one of the 
 most charming passages of Homer's immortal 
 epic. 
 
 It was thus that at every critical period of 
 Achilles' life his mother, Thetis, was his 
 guardian angel. She had championed his 
 cause against the unjust Agamemnon. She 
 had saved him from the humiliation and dis- 
 grace in which that quarrel would otherwise 
 have terminated. She had secured the armor 
 for him which made him invincible in battle. 
 She had inspired him with the magnanimity 
 which, while it comforted Priam and consoled 
 Troy, rescued his own name from odium and 
 from the execration of posterity. She had 
 been to the greatest hero of Greek tradition 
 his wisdom, light, and inspiration. But, alas ! 
 it was destined that the death of Achilles 
 should be the result of an oversight on the 
 part of his very mother when she was secur- 
 ing for him what she supposed would be the 
 divine attribute of invulnerability. When he 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 25 
 
 was an infant she immersed him in the River 
 Styx, holding him by the heel. Of all his 
 body his heel where his devoted mother held 
 him alone remained vulnerable. After the 
 death of Hector Achilles fell in love with the 
 sister of his most bitterly hated enemy, with 
 Polyxena, the beautiful daughter of Hecuba 
 and King Priam, the sister of Hector. Apollo 
 revealed to Paris, the brother of Polyxena, 
 the vulnerable part of Achilles' body, and 
 while the conqueror of Hector was in Apollo's 
 temple arranging for his alliance with Poly- 
 xena the god guided a poison arrow from the 
 bow of Paris to the vulnerable spot. Thus 
 Paris avenged the death of his brother Hec- 
 tor. And Thetis had to endure the unspeak- 
 able sorrow of seeing her son die from a wound 
 which her inadvertence had made possible. On 
 the death of Achilles his mother, still cherish- 
 ing his memory, wished to dispose of his won- 
 derful armor which she had secured for him 
 from Yulcan. She left it for his old comrades 
 to decide who was most worthy to receive and 
 wear it. The honor fell to Ulysses, the hero 
 who had persuaded Achilles to engage in the 
 war that ended with the fall of Troy. Near 
 to Achilles as one of the noblest figures of the 
 Iliad stands his heroic mother, the immortal 
 Thetis, 
 
26 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Hecuba 
 But if it were possible, the mother 
 of Hector, the Trojan warrior, was a greater 
 heroine than the mother of Achilles. Thetis 
 and Hecuba! One a goddess born, the other 
 but a mortal ! The devotion of Hecuba to her 
 hero son and to all her children — Paris, Poly- 
 dore, Cassandra, Polyxena — presents one of 
 the most exalted chapters in the dramatic and 
 epic literature of the Greeks. A mortal, though 
 of royal blood, she had not the attributes by 
 ^^'hich she could influence the gods to favor 
 her ambitions; she could not mother a demi- 
 god such as Achilles. Her noble Hector was 
 but mortal like herself and had no divine en- 
 dowment. She could not persuade a Jove to 
 execute her desires. She had no access to 
 Vulcan, that her son might be clad for battle 
 with terrifying and invulnerable armor. In 
 calamity she could not, as could Thetis by 
 virtue of her divine nature, rise superior to 
 grief, withdraw from earthly scenes and im- 
 merse herself in celestial cares and heavenly 
 influences. She bore her trials, her sorrows, 
 her infinite losses and her woeful destiny not 
 as a goddess but as a woman. Alas! it was 
 her sad fate to be the mother of Paris. It 
 is one of the mysteries of Grecian legend that 
 Helen is more grievously blamed than Paris 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 27 
 
 for the dire calamities of the Trojan War. 
 "For there is no man abhors not Helen." 
 Rarely is a harsh word spoken of Paris in the 
 lines of the tragic poet, while upon Helen's 
 name the vials of both Trojan and Grecian 
 wrath are poured. 
 
 But it was left for Hecuba, the mother of 
 Paris, to blindly overlook her own son's mis- 
 doing in her rage over the baneful influence 
 of Helen. None of the calamities that have 
 befallen her or Troy seem in her mind due to 
 the act of Paris in which he violated the an- 
 cient law of hospitality and ruined the home 
 of Menelaus. Helen alone is blamed: 
 
 by her beauteous eyes was Troy, 
 That prosperous city, with disgrace o'erthrown. 
 
 But true it was that this greatest heroine of 
 the Iliad, Hecuba, had to suffer the thought 
 that if she was the proud mother of Hector, 
 the noblest hero of the Phrygian host, she was 
 also the mother of Paris, whose act had 
 brought the Greeks in arms against old Troy. 
 This, however, was the honor that crowned the 
 heroine-brow of Hecuba, and her immortal 
 fame came to her from this, that she was the 
 
 Mother of Hector, that brave chief, whose spear 
 Once pierced the Grecian squadron, 
 
28 HEROINES OF HISTOEY 
 
 and when lie falls before the prowess of 
 Achilles, 
 
 he dies, among the brave 
 Esteemed the bravest. 
 
 Ever does this noblest mother of the Phrygian 
 race speak of her sons and daughters with 
 holy pride and tenderest affection. In turn, 
 her children always address her with venera- 
 tion and speak of her in language expressive 
 of filial love and gratitude. It was upon this 
 mother that the greatest ills and woes of 
 Ilium's ruin fell. The crime of Helen and, 
 let us say, of Paris cost her more than any 
 other mortal. She lost all that once made her 
 happy, proud, and great. 
 
 Her husband, sons and daughters, royal pal- 
 ace and country lost, she is doomed to become 
 the slave of Ulysses, and at last to be meta- 
 morphosed into a dog ! Of all who lost wealth, 
 royalty, children, kingly consort, dignity, and 
 finally personal identity in that long war, who 
 suffered more than Hecuba? She lived to 
 see all her loved ones torn from her, to grow 
 aged in her misery, to be insulted, degraded, 
 enslaved, and at last transformed into a bark- 
 ing beast. She had looked upon the mangled 
 corpse of her proud Hector borne through the 
 streets of Troy. She had seen the assassin 
 strike her kingly Priam down even at the 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHEE 29 
 
 shrine of Jupiter. She had with broken heart 
 bound up for funeral rites the bruised form of 
 Hector's son, her last hope, her grandchild, by 
 whom she fondly dreamed the walls of Troy 
 would rise again. She had seen Andromache, 
 her Hector's widow, borne captive to the Gre- 
 cian tents. Her fair and loving daughter 
 Polyxena had been torn from her and im- 
 molated on the tomb of Achilles. Her Cas- 
 sandra too was doomed to exile. She had suf- 
 fered the loss of Polydore, her youngest son, 
 and even of Paris, cause of all her woes. Old, 
 infirm, alone, she stands homeless, husband- 
 less, childless, countryless, throneless, friend- 
 less, helpless, the most shamefully, revenge- 
 fully treated, the most severely punished, un- 
 chivalrously insulted, most ignobly doomed, 
 and yet the bravest, most self-sacrificing, and 
 heroic mother and woman of ancient tradition. 
 It is a strange turn that the epic and dramatic 
 writers give to affairs when they doom this 
 heroine to so terrible a fate and permit Helen 
 to return to Greece and to her husband's arms 
 and rise to happiness and honor ! But it was 
 the Greeks, not the Trojans, who wrote the 
 epics and tragedies, and they cannot be ex- 
 pected to reverence even so noble a heroine 
 as the mother of Hector. Her sorrow was that 
 she was the mother of Paris; her glory was 
 
30 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 that she was the mother of Hector. From 
 her illustrious motherhood came her heroism, 
 and in that heroism, that mother-heroism, 
 lives her immortal fame. 
 
 Latona 
 
 We have insisted that, as a rule, the phil- 
 osophy of a great man's greatness is to be 
 found in the character of his mother. And 
 that mother rarely if ever escapes the trials 
 and calamities which test and prove her hero- 
 ism. Few of the mighty men of history have 
 been born of the daughters of ease and luxury. 
 It is quite remarkable that when we study 
 these heroes, gods and demigods of mythology, 
 we find it is often the case that their mothers 
 were heroic souls and were forced to endure 
 hardships and make sacrifices like mortals, 
 and we find them devoting their energies and 
 affections to the nursing, training, and devel- 
 opment of their children like mortal mothers. 
 The pride of Thetis in Achilles, and her de- 
 votion to him, is hardly less humanly tender, 
 affectionate, and heroic than that of Hecuba 
 for Hector and her other children. 
 
 Perhaps, however, larger elements of trial, 
 of courage, and self-sacrifice in contending 
 with adversity are to be found in the life of 
 Latona, the mother of Apollo, than in the life 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 31 
 
 of Thetis. While Hector was but a mortal, 
 though of royal blood, and Achilles was only 
 a demigod with a goddess for a mother but 
 a mortal for a father, Apollo was well-nigh a 
 full-fledged god. Zeus, or Jupiter, was his 
 father, and Latona, the daughter of a Titan, 
 was his semidivine mother. To have been the 
 mother of this, the most splendid of all the 
 mythological deities, raised Latona to an em- 
 inence in popular thought, if not in the pan- 
 theon, hardly inferior to that held by Venus, 
 Juno, and Minerva. 
 
 Apollo belongs to a higher class of beings 
 than Achilles, Hector, Ulysses, Agamemnon, 
 and such heroes of the Trojan War legend. 
 He is the most glorious and beneficent of the 
 gods. He is the mythic god of light, the sun- 
 god. But in the intellectual rather than the 
 merely physical sense he shines forth — radi- 
 ant with truth. He is the ruling divinity of 
 the muses. He is the inspiration of poetry and 
 music. His emblem is the lyre rather than 
 the sword, and he rules in the realm of peace, 
 happiness, and the achievements of genius. 
 His worship was the purest cult known 
 to the Greeks. His twin sister, Diana, was 
 the most austerely chaste goddess of the whole 
 pantheon, worthy indeed to be the divine sis- 
 ter of Phebus Apollo, the purest and loftiest 
 
 & 
 
32 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 conception of the myth-creating imagination. 
 So exalted was Latona in the popular mind 
 as the mother of Apollo and Diana that in 
 the annual festivities of Thebes and Delphi, 
 when the people assembled with incense and 
 garlands to pay their tows at the altars of 
 this god and goddess, they included her with 
 her divine children, and paid no less honor 
 to her than to them. 
 
 Latona was of such extraordinary beauty 
 that she incurred the jealous hatred of Juno, 
 who had her banished to wander upon the 
 earth in quest of a home and country for her 
 children. The heroic mother went forth from 
 the abode of the gods carrying her twin born 
 infants in her arms. In hunger and thirst, 
 footsore and weary, her very children fam- 
 ishing and suffering with her, she sought a 
 place of rest among the islands of the ^Egean 
 where at last Delos gave her a welcome and 
 a home. In her sufferings for her children 
 and in her devotion to them Latona proved 
 herself a mother heroine of most exalted great- 
 ness. If, as we may suppose is true, the mythic 
 deities, like mortal men, owed their character 
 to their mothers' training and influence, then 
 what honor is due Latona for the training of 
 Apollo and Diana, the most highly intellectual 
 and chastely moral deities of the Greek pan- 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 33 
 
 theon and the noblest national ideals of Hel- 
 lenic genius and character. Among the im- 
 mortals no heroine-mother gave to that most 
 splendid civilization of antiquity children of 
 equal virtue, power, and greatness. The 
 Greeks in the best period of their wonderful 
 development, in the brightest age of their his- 
 tory, in the culminating glory of their art, 
 philosophy, and literature, owed more to 
 Apollo than to any other god, and derived 
 more inspiration from his oracles than from 
 any other shrine of worship. Hence the 
 Greeks' veneration for Latona, by whose suf- 
 ferings, hardships, self-sacrifices, and careful 
 training Apollo had come to be their sun, their 
 light, their glory. And even now, with the 
 old mythology without an oracle, a shrine, a 
 worshiper, or a deity in the earth, Latona 
 lives in the imagination of the world as an 
 ideal conception of heroic motherhood; the 
 mother of Apollo is as imperishable a memory 
 as is that god who was the light of Greece. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE HEROINE-DAUGHTEE 
 
 Antigone 
 
 There are not wanting examples of filial 
 heroism in those old Greek traditions which 
 compare most favorably with any presented 
 by the fiction, poetry, and drama of modern 
 literature. Antigone, the daughter of CEdi- 
 pus, has justly been compared to Cordelia, the 
 faithful and heroic daughter of King Lear 
 and one of the most perfect creations of 
 Shakespeare's genius. 
 
 CEdipus, the king of Thebes, 
 
 whose luckless skill 
 That intricate enigma did unfold, 
 And slay the sphinx who chanted it, 
 
 has been reduced to the most abject misery by 
 a series of misfortunes in which he and his 
 house seem foreordained by cruel fate to utter 
 ruin. 
 
 Unwittingly had CEdipus slain his own 
 father, married his own mother, and become 
 the father of children who were his own half 
 brothers and half sisters! This intricate and 
 horrible plot is worked out by Sophocles in 
 34 
 
THE HEEOINE-DAUGHTEE 35 
 
 the drama of CEdipus Tyrannus. "V^Tien the 
 revolting truth was revealed to CEdipus that 
 he had, though unwittingly, killed his own 
 father and married his own mother, he was 
 ready and willing to suffer any punishment 
 that might be inflicted upon him. Heart- 
 broken by the dreadful revelation, his wife, 
 really his mother, took her own life. At sight 
 of her, CEdipus plucked the golden pins from 
 her garment and stabbed his eyes sightless! 
 And thus went he forth a wanderer, shunned 
 by men as one accursed of heaven. Forsaken 
 and avoided by both gods and mortals, he 
 found one only comforter, one guide and nurse, 
 one true inseparable companion — Antigone. 
 In her pathetic grief she cries : 
 
 "My sire, 
 What Grecian, what Barbarian, or what chief 
 In ancient days illustrious, who that sprung 
 From human race, hath e'er endured such ills 
 As thou hast done, such public griefs endured?" 
 
 Her mother dead by her own hand, and her 
 two brothers slain, the cup of her sorrow seems 
 filled to overflowing, yet she turns to her poor 
 father, the blind, dethroned king, and with 
 a filial tenderness addresses him : 
 
 "0 my sire. 
 Into what hopeless misery art thou plunged! 
 For thee far more than for the dead I moan." 
 
36 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Casting from her lieart lier affianced lover, 
 she makes the heroic resolve: 
 
 "My miserable father in his flight 
 I will attend." 
 "I am resolved to share his death." 
 
 To her father's expression of approval she 
 affectionately replies : 
 
 "How can I wed, while you, my father, roam 
 A solitary exile?" 
 
 And when he laments his misfortunes, she 
 with a noble spirit of self-sacriflce puts the 
 sweetly tender query: 
 
 "May not I also be allowed to take 
 A part of your afflictions?" 
 
 When the stricken and blindly groping CEdi- 
 pus assures his daughter that by the oracle 
 of Apollo he is to die in Athens, he piteously 
 pleads, 
 
 "But hasten, and minister with duteous zeal 
 To thy blind father, since to share my plight 
 Was thy most earnest wish." 
 
 Then tenderly Antigone replies, 
 
 "My aged sire, 
 Into a wretched banishment go forth: 
 O give me that dear hand, for I will guide 
 Your tottering steps, as prosperous gales assist 
 The voyage of the bark." 
 
 As she goes forth a Avanderer, leading the 
 blind and fallen king on his journey to dis- 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 37 
 
 tant Athens, does not every admiring reader 
 of the old tragedy exclaim with grateful CEdi- 
 pus, 
 
 "How is thy soul 
 With matchless generosity endued!" 
 
 In the drama of CEdipus Coloneus the long 
 and weary journey of the sightless wanderer 
 terminates, and, faithful to the end, Antigone 
 devotedly attends him. She is his light, his 
 guide, his nurse, his comforter. When he 
 passed from the earth away, thus ran the 
 messengers' report: 
 
 "After short space we turned, and saw far off 
 Only the king's self, holding up his hand 
 Over his face, so as to shade his eyes. 
 As if some sight of terror had appeared, 
 Awful, intolerable to gaze upon; 
 Then, in a moment, without interval. 
 We saw him kneel, worshiping earth and heaven. 
 The abode of gods, both in one act, together. 
 But he — what death he died, save Theseus' self 
 There lives not any mortal who can tell. 
 For neither any fire-fraught thunderbolt 
 Rapt him, from heaven, nor whirlwind from the sea 
 Stirred up to meet the moment; but some guide 
 Sent from above, or depth of the earth beneath 
 Opening to take him, finally, without pain.'" 
 
 Looking back upon the sad experience of 
 those wanderings in exile, Antigone could but 
 rejoice for him : 
 
38 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 "In whose way 
 Nor war nor ocean lay, 
 But viewless regions rapt him home 
 Sudden, by some mysterious doom." 
 
 But the memory of that companionship of 
 service and suffering, of filial duty and self- 
 sacrifice was precious to this noble heroine. 
 When this daughter, who had been faithful 
 to the end, came at last to suffer the penalty 
 of her sisterly devotion in giving honorable 
 burial to her brother, Polynices, she looked 
 upon death as joining the band of kindred 
 gone before, saying, 
 
 "I come, cherishing this hope especially, 
 To win approval in my father's sight." 
 
 Such was the filial heroism of Antigone. 
 But the ages have not proven all her sad 
 words prophetic ; when facing death she said, 
 
 "Friendless, unwept, unwed, 
 I, sick at heart, am led 
 The way prepared for me; 
 Day's hallowed orb on high 
 I may no longer see; 
 For me no tears are spent. 
 Nor any friends lament 
 The death I die." 
 
 No, not friendless, not unwept. Through 
 ages noble souls in reading have become thy 
 friends; for thee tears have been spent, and 
 to this day, O daughter, faithful daughter- 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 39 
 
 heroine of CEdipus, sister-heroine of Polynices, 
 friends, eternal friends lament the death you 
 died. 
 
 Antigone, without boasting but in perfect 
 naivete, uttered a prophecy when she said of 
 her filial devotion to the doomed and wretched 
 CEdipus : 
 
 "Such conduct 'midst my father's woes shaU make 
 My name illustrious." 
 
 Yes, and her name is illustrious wherever 
 woman has honor and her name is known. An- 
 tigone, the martyr to her father's dutiful 
 service, the ideal of sisterly devotion, the par- 
 agon of filial heroism ! 
 
 Iphigenia 
 Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon, by her 
 final though reluctant surrender to the de- 
 mands of the oracle of Diana, deserves to rank 
 among the filial and patriotic heroines of 
 Greek legend and tragedy. It was the sacri- 
 fice of this virgin daughter of the commander- 
 in-chief of the Grecian fleet that made possible 
 his success and fame, the fall of Troy and 
 the triumph of the Greeks. The Argive ships 
 were becalmed in the port of Aulis, and Diana, 
 who had been offended on account of Aga- 
 memnon's having killed, in hunting, a sacred 
 stag, demanded the sacrifice of the chieftain's 
 
40 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 daughter as a condition upon wliicli she would 
 send the favoring gales and make possible the 
 sailing of the fleet. Agamemnon, in his great 
 love for Iphigenia, refused to have her led 
 to the sacrificial altar. His brother, Mene- 
 laus, the husband of the unfaithful Helen, 
 upbraided the chief, and charged him with 
 treason, and accused him of a lack of brotherly 
 devotion to the cause which had inspired the 
 expedition against Ilium. Agamemnon wav- 
 ers between his love for his daughter and his 
 duty to his country. He finally resolves to 
 sacrifice his daughter to propitiate Diana and 
 insure the success of the expedition. But in 
 his perplexity he resorts to deception in se- 
 curing the presence of his daughter, who, he 
 pretends, is to be married to the godlike 
 Achilles. Iphigenia receives the letter and 
 comes in response to her father's summons, 
 as she and as her mother suppose, to marry 
 Achilles. Now Agamemnon is resolved, for 
 fear of the wrath of the Greeks and the mutiny 
 of the fleet, to carry out his purpose and yield 
 to the demands of Diana. Of course when the 
 deception which Agamemnon had practiced 
 became known it came as a shock to Iphigenia, 
 to her mother, and to Achilles. Clytemnestra, 
 the mother, and the gallant and chivalrous 
 Achilles try to prevent the sacrifice. But 
 
THE HEEOINE-DAUGHTEE 41 
 
 the overconfident son of Thetis finds himself 
 opposed by Ulysses, by his own Myrmidons, 
 and by the entire Grecian fieet, who demand 
 that the sacrifice of the fair virgin shall be 
 made, that the favor of Diana may be propiti- 
 ated. Iphigenia at first looks with horror 
 upon her father's proposal to slay her, and 
 all on account of the infidelity of Helen which 
 had precipitated this war. But finally the 
 heroism of her nature triumphs over fear. She 
 wonders that a father who had so dearly 
 loved her and whom she regarded with ten- 
 derest affection could entertain the thought of 
 sacrificing her. But seeing her father's agony 
 of mind and his sore perplexity, considering 
 how as commander-in-chief he will be held 
 responsible if this vast enterprise should fail, 
 and further thinking with patriotic concern 
 upon the disgrace which that failure would 
 bring to her country, she yields to fate : 
 
 "Hear then what to my mind 
 Deliberate thought presents. It is decreed 
 For me to die: this, then, I wish — to die 
 With glory, all reluctance banished far." 
 "For Greece I give my life." 
 
 As she is led to the altar of sacrifice, where 
 she is to save her father's honor and bring 
 glory upon her country, she bids the virgins 
 sing, "Success to Greece." 
 
42 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 In the chorus that greets her ears as she 
 goes to the fatal altar, prepared to die, she 
 hears the prophecy of Ilium's fall and the 
 triumph of her country's arms; and, what 
 must thrill her heroic soul with greatest pride 
 and joy, she hears the refrain: 
 
 "On Agamemnon's honored head, 
 Whilst wide the spears of Greece their terrors spread, 
 The immortal crown let conquest place. 
 With glory's brightest grace." 
 
 That heroic daughter, by yielding herself 
 a willing sacrifice to Diana, saved her country 
 and her father Agamemnon and vindicated 
 the honor of the womanhood of Greece. But, 
 strange to relate, IpHgenia was not slain by 
 her father at the altar of Diana, but as 
 Agamemnon lifted the fatal sword his daugh- 
 ter, wrapped in a cloud of mist, was caught 
 away, and 
 
 on the ground 
 Panting was laid a hind of largest bulk. 
 In form excelling; with its spouting blood 
 Much was the altar of the goddess dewed. 
 
 At sight of this, Oaldeas, the priest, knew that 
 Diana had interfered, and he exclaimed : 
 
 "This, rather than the virgin, she accepts, 
 . this she hath received 
 Of her free grace, and gives a fav'ring gale 
 To swell our sails, and bear th' invading war 
 To Ilium: therefore rouse, ye naval train, 
 Your courage. To your ships!" 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 43 
 
 Then forth the proud fleet sailed from Aulis. 
 Iphigenia was supernaturally borne away to 
 Taurus, there to serve in the Temple of Diana. 
 Thence, years later, escaping with her brother 
 Orestes, she returned to Greece bearing 
 
 Diana's holy image 
 Which fell from Heaven. 
 
 In reading this tragedy of Iphigenia in 
 Aulis, one is impressively reminded of that 
 awful and dramatic incident in the life of 
 Abraham. When he is about to slay his own 
 son Isaac upon the mountain altar as a sacri- 
 fice to God, suddenly his hand is stayed ; there 
 by the altar appears a ram, caught in the 
 thicket, which God designates as the victim 
 to take the place of Isaac. Surely, on that 
 occasion Abraham could not have felt greater 
 grief than crushed the soul of Agamemnon 
 before the altar of Diana, nor could Isaac 
 have manifested greater heroism as he awaited 
 the fatal stroke from his father's hand than 
 did Iphigenia as she lay upon the altar ready 
 to have her own heartbroken sire dispatch her 
 with the sword. She remains in the classic 
 legends of the Greeks a filial and a patriotic 
 heroine of transcendent virtue, an ideal for 
 the emulation of all time. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE HEROINE-WIFE 
 Andromache 
 
 Hectoe possessed in Andromaclie a wife 
 worthy of his own exalted nature. For this 
 hero, the hope and pride of Ilium, "The 
 Matchless Chief, the only prop of Troy," was 
 famed no less as a man of every manly virtue 
 possessed than as a warrior endowed with 
 every soldierly attribute. This wife of Ilium's 
 hero was Ilium's heroine. True, loyal wife 
 she was. All the domestic virtues centered in 
 her most womanly and wifely nature. Androm- 
 ache was the queen of Hector's home; she 
 was the pride of his eyes ; he was the idol of her 
 heart. "His white-armed spouse, the fair 
 Andromache," tells what her ambition was as 
 the wife of "the foremost man of Troy." 
 
 Nor is this the language of pride and haugh- 
 tiness, but the naive expression of most 
 womanly modesty : 
 
 "All that to prudent matrons gives a grace, 
 In Hector's house was ever my employ, 
 First, for in this to women blame is due. 
 Charged or not charged, to such as rove abroad, 
 I checked this wand'ring humor, and remained 
 At home, within my house; nor gay discourse 
 44 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 45 
 
 Of females there admitted, but intent 
 
 On ordering what was useful, deemed myself 
 
 Well occupied. With silence of the tongue 
 
 And cheerfulness of look I entertained 
 
 My husband: where my province to command 
 
 I knew, and when to yield obedience to him." 
 
 When by the sin and folly of Paris, her hus- 
 band's brother, the direful woes of war fell 
 upon peaceful Ilium, and his country placed 
 its hope and confidence in the defensive leader- 
 ship of "Hector, well-beloved of Jove," he 
 found in his Andromache a wife worthy in all 
 heroism to be the wife of Ilium's greatest hero. 
 Yet in her horror of war, and in her dread 
 and fear of the consequences of Hector's leav- 
 ing the walled city, entering the field, and con- 
 tending with the Greeks in open battle, she 
 but displayed a fond wife's most gentle in- 
 stincts and a loving mother's most praise- 
 worthy solicitude. In the quiet and matronly 
 discharge of her domestic duties, in her devo- 
 tion to her babe, son of her glorious Hector, 
 in her filial attentions to the aged Priam and 
 his queen Hecuba, she moved among her maids 
 the ideal wife, daughter, and mother in the 
 ideal home. But she watched with keen and 
 nervous interest the progress of the siege. She 
 listened for every word of news during those 
 days of anxiety, and was agitated with the 
 conflicting emotions of doubt and faith, des- 
 
46 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 pair and hope, grief and joy as the intelligence 
 of the varying fortunes of the conflict came to 
 her ears. So intensely anxious for her Hec- 
 tor's welfare would she become at times that, 
 folding her boy in her arms, she would leave 
 her home and hasten to the wall, thence to 
 scan the field if perchance she might in seeing 
 Hector still alive be assured and comforted. 
 
 One day as Hector came into the city and 
 hastened to his home, "the home of his peerless 
 wife," lo. 
 
 She with her infant child and maid the while 
 Was standing, bathed in tears, in bitter grief, 
 On Ilium's topmost tower. 
 
 Learning of her whereabouts, Hector hastened 
 back across the city, and 
 
 the Acuan gates were reached, 
 Whence was the outlet to the plain, in haste 
 Running to meet him came his peerless wife, 
 Eetion's daughter, fair Andromache. 
 
 Then was it that the wife poured forth her 
 heart in pleading that Hector might not ex- 
 pose himself in the open field where she seemed 
 to have the premonition that he would fall 
 and leave her and his child the victims of the 
 Argive's lust, revenge, and cruelty; 
 
 at his side Andromache, in tears. 
 Hung on his arm. 
 
THE HEKOINE-WIFE 47 
 
 She had lost father and mother, and she 
 laments : 
 
 "There were seven brethren in my father's house; 
 All in one day they fell, amid their herds 
 And fleecy flocks, by fierce Achilles' hand." 
 
 Then what a nobly pathetic plea she pours into 
 his ears : 
 
 "But, Hector, thou to me art all in one. 
 Sire, mother, brethren! Thou my wedded love! 
 Then, pitying us, within the tower remain." 
 
 No scene more touching, more nobly beautiful, 
 was ever created by the poet's imagination 
 than the parting of Hector and Andromache. 
 The hero in that moment of his sorest trial 
 felt and obeyed the promptings of true patriot- 
 ism. His loving wife pleaded for his safety, 
 but duty called him to the open field, and the 
 fate of Ilium might depend upon his decision. 
 He listened to his country's call. But at what 
 a sacrifice ! 
 
 Hector's farewell to Andromache is one of 
 the most touching and eloquent passages in 
 the world's literature. 
 
 Who can measure the heroism of Androm- 
 ache? What a loss and sacrifice were hers! 
 Think that the folly of Paris should cost the 
 life of Hector! Think that the infidelity of 
 Helen should cost the infinite sufferings, the 
 
48 HEROINES OP HISTOEY 
 
 cruel humilities, the great sacrifices of so per- 
 fect a wife, so majestic a woman, so noble a 
 heroine as Andromache ! 
 
 With her love, her tears, her faith, her pride, 
 her prayers, she followed her brave Hector as 
 he went forth to defend his home and country 
 against the Argive host. Hector and Achilles 
 met in single combat. "The prize at stake was 
 mighty Hector's life." And Ilium's hero fell 
 before the divinely armored Achilles! The 
 cruel conqueror bound his victim's feet to his 
 chariot, and leaving his noble head of glossy 
 hair bounding in the dust and dashing against 
 the stones, dragged him with fury before the 
 walls of Troy. At the dreadful sight all Troy 
 was terrified. Priam and Hecuba were frantic 
 with grief, and poor Andromache — "Backward 
 she fell, and gasped her spirit away." When 
 she recovered from the deadly swoon and 
 poured forth her lamentation, did Helen, faith- 
 less Helen, see and hear? Did she behold the 
 heroine-wife of Hector in that awful hour and 
 admire her loyalty, her love, and her very 
 misery? Did she see Hector fall and behold 
 his lifeless, mangled body dragged in the dust 
 before the walls of Troy and realize that her 
 sin had brought this woe? And did Androm- 
 ache's affection for Hector and her sorrow 
 over his death fill the faithless Helen's soul 
 
THE HEKOINE-WIFE 49 
 
 with remorse and shame? Did she behold her 
 own baseness by contrast accentuated as she 
 thought of the chastity, fidelity, and undying 
 love of Hector's heroine- wife? Ah, what a 
 contrast is here presented! Helen, the un- 
 chaste, unfaithful wife of Menelaus, wretched 
 cause of all the woes of Greece and Ilium ! 
 Andromache, the "peerless wife," "priceless 
 wife," the true, loving, chaste, 'heroic wife of 
 Hector ! 
 
 When, through the magnanimity of Achilles, 
 Priam was permitted to bear his son on a litter 
 into Troy, 
 
 nor man nor woman there was left 
 Within the city; ... to the gates in throngs 
 They pressed, to crowd round him who brought the dead. 
 
 In that awful moment, when, bruised and man- 
 gled, the hero lay upon the litter at the gates 
 of Troy, 
 
 The first to clasp the body was his wife 
 
 And honored mother; eagerly they sprang 
 
 On the smooth-rolling wain, to touch the head 
 
 Of Hector; round them, weeping, stood the crowd. 
 
 Weeping, till sunset; all the livelong day 
 
 Had they before the gates for Hector mourned. 
 
 The car which bore the noble corpse at last 
 proceeded to "Priam's lordly home," where 
 preparations were made to pay funeral honors 
 to the dead hero. 
 
50 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 They laid him on a rich-wrought couch, and called 
 The minstrels in. 
 
 In the dirge which was sung by a chorus of 
 women 
 
 Andromache the wail began. 
 
 The head of Hector clasping in her hands. 
 
 In that lament the heroine-wife gave voice to 
 feelings which proved her to be of kin with all 
 mankind. How natural, how wifely, how uni- 
 versally and eternally human is the lament ! — 
 
 "Thou to thy parents bitter grief hast caused. 
 Hector! but bitterest grief of all hast left 
 To me! for not to me was given to clasp 
 The hand extended from thy dying bed. 
 Nor words of wisdom catch, which night and day. 
 With tears, I might have treasured in my heart." 
 Weeping she spake — the women joined the wail. 
 
 How nobly faithful to the memory of her 
 hero did Andromache ever remain ! Though 
 by the fortunes of war she became a captive 
 to the Greeks, and was forced to wed one of 
 her country's conquerors, yet never in her 
 superb dignity, in the hallowed memory of 
 her first and only love and of the happiness 
 of her Ilium home, did she forget that she was 
 the wife of Hector. In that tender farewell had 
 not the hero assured his sorrowing Androm- 
 ache that if he fell in battle, even their 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 51 
 
 enemies would respect and honor her on ac- 
 count of her relations to him: 
 
 "Then they who see thy tears perchance may say, 
 'Lo! this was Hector's wife, who, when they fought 
 On plains of Troy, was Ilium's bravest chief!'" 
 
 Nor did she ever fail to boast when occasion 
 
 offered that she "was Hector's wife." Her only 
 
 hope and solace now was in her babe, the son 
 
 of Hector. But soon, alas ! he was to be torn 
 
 from her arms and sacrificed to Argive fear 
 
 and vengeance. As the awful premonition of 
 
 her son's fate took possession of her, still was 
 
 her pride in Hector manifest: 
 
 "Yes, thy father's worth 
 Shall kill thee, which to others is a shield 
 Yielding protection." 
 
 Yes, she knew that the Greeks were afraid of 
 Hector's son. A mighty nation stood in awe 
 of him and dared not permit him to grow to 
 man's estate, acknowledging that one only 
 man in whose veins flowed the noble blood of 
 Hector might some day overthrow the Argive 
 power and restore the ancient glory of ruined 
 Ilium! That widow's dream, that mother's 
 dream, alas ! was but a dream, the dream of a 
 heroine whose heart broke when her Hector 
 fell, and whose last hope for Hector's line 
 and for Ilium perished when the cruel, coward 
 Greeks tore from her mother bosom and put 
 
52 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 to death the son who was the only fruit of the 
 true, nndying love of her godlike Hector. 
 
 Andromache, live forever in the imagination 
 of the world, among the noblest heroines of 
 Troy, the "priceless," "peerless" wife of 
 "Ilium's bravest chief" ! 
 
 Alcestis 
 
 No heroine-wife of all the mythic legends 
 compares with Alcestis in her self-sacrificing 
 devotion to her husband. As chaste, as faith- 
 ful, as tender in affection as she were An- 
 dromache, the wife of Hector, and Penelope, 
 the spouse of Ulysses. But their heroism was 
 tested less severely than was hers. It is a 
 question as to which was the greater sufferer 
 — Andromache in her loss of Hector or Alces- 
 tis in the resignation of herself to death in the 
 place of her husband, Admetus. Whether to 
 lose one's husband or to die for one's husband 
 be the sorer trial of wifely heroism, it may be 
 idle to inquire. But it would seem that to the 
 world's thought no form of heroism is more 
 Christlike than that which inspires one to lay 
 down his or her own life as a willing ransom 
 and thus become a sacrificial substitute for 
 another. 
 
 It is true that we are here in the realm of 
 fiction, but where can the parallel of Alcestis 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 53 
 
 be found among the creations of modern or 
 ancient literature? We shall search the pages 
 of Shakespeare in vain to discover her heroic 
 equal. Euripides cannot be credited with the 
 creation of this transcendent heroine any more 
 than Shakespeare is to be credited with origi- 
 nating Portia, Imogene, or Hermione. Alcestis 
 belonged to the ancient legends, and upon the 
 old, old tradition, long familiar to the Greeks, 
 Euripides constructed his drama. 
 
 While we may easily imagine that an An- 
 dromache or a Penelope, an Imogene, Hermi- 
 one, or a Portia would have stood the severest 
 possible test of wifely heroism, not even shrink- 
 ing from death itself for her husband's life or 
 honor if duty had ever demanded such a self- 
 sacrifice, yet not one of them had her devotion 
 put to so extreme a test, whereas Alcestis was 
 subjected to that utmost trial and proved her- 
 self the most perfectly ideal heroine- wife in all 
 the world of literary tragedy. 
 
 Admetus as king of Thessaly became enam- 
 ored of Alcestis, the beautiful daughter of 
 King Pelias. From among her many suitors 
 he was chosen by her royal father on the con- 
 dition, which he alone met, of coming for her 
 in a chariot drawn by boars and lions. But it 
 was evidently a true and genuine love match. 
 No love can be deeper, more genuine and pure 
 
54 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 than that which Admetus cherished for his 
 incomparable wife. What deep and genuine 
 feeling is poured into the words by which he 
 honors her ! — 
 
 "For conjugal affection justly deemed 
 By me, by all, the noblest of her sex." 
 
 The tenderest phrase, the most impassioned 
 language, the whole range of manly eloquence 
 scarce meets the demand to express the full 
 deep dignity of his admiration and love. 
 Alcestis is to him "A wife with every excel- 
 lence adorned." The chorus of the tragedy 
 voices his feelings as it does the feelings of 
 all who knew her : 
 
 "the best of wives: 
 The sun in his wide course sees not her equal." 
 
 To Admetus is accorded the finest phrase when 
 to his lips the poet sets the tender words : 
 
 "in thee I live; thy love, 
 Thy sweet society my soul reveres." 
 
 Here is a love deeper and nobler than any sen- 
 sual passion, a love blending admiration, es- 
 teem, veneration, and reverence with the purest 
 emotions of the soul and the loftiest concep- 
 tions of a manly mind. Always Alcestis was to 
 him "The dearest, best of Avomen." That the 
 love and honor which Admetus had for his wife 
 was reciprocated by her the act which im- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 55 
 
 mortalizes her in legend and literature is the 
 full and splendid proof. 
 
 Over this domestic joy there came a cloud 
 threatening to wrap in gloom and night and 
 death the lives which had been united in an 
 ideal conjugal affection. Admetus was stricken 
 mth a fatal illness. With what tender solici- 
 tude Alcestis nursed her lover-husband, and 
 with what consternation she saw death ap- 
 proach may well be imagined. But good news 
 came to the stricken home and hope dawned 
 upon the gloom. Apollo, who for a year, as 
 punishment for shooting his arrows at the 
 Cyclops, herded the flocks of Admetus, came 
 to the rescue of the dying king. Through his 
 influence the Fates promised to spare Admetus 
 if he would find a substitute who would be 
 willing to die in his stead. At first the promise 
 was received with joy, and the condition ac- 
 cepted. But it gradually dawned upon Adme- 
 tus that he might have difficulty in finding a 
 substitute. Indeed, it soon looked as if it 
 would be impossible for him to meet the con- 
 ditions imposed by the Fates. He looked in 
 vain for a substitute among his soldiers, 
 courtiers, attendants, servants. Though his 
 father and mother were old and near the end 
 of life's journey, neither of them would volun- 
 teer to take his place. Here Alcestis, the 
 
56 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 heroine-wife, offers lierself as a substitute to 
 
 ransom liim : 
 
 His friends, his father, e'en the aged dame 
 That gave him birth, -were asked in vain; not one 
 Was found, his wife except; for him she willed 
 To die, and view no more the ethereal light. 
 
 Had the king but known that this would be 
 
 the outcome of his accepting the condition 
 
 demanded by the Fates, he would have refused 
 
 to purchase his own life at the cost of the 
 
 precious life of Alcestis. But the condition 
 
 that he furnish a substitute had been accepted ; 
 
 the bargain had been struck and could not be 
 
 recalled. With what grief he bowed to the 
 
 cruel will of the Fates ! How it lacerated his 
 
 heart to think that she whom he loved best 
 
 must die, and die for him! As he began to 
 
 mend, Alcestis began to decline. Watching 
 
 by her couch vdth breaking heart, he sobs : 
 
 "O thou poor sufferer, raise thee, leave me not; 
 Entreat the powerful gods to pity thee." 
 
 But with what a sweet devotion and with what 
 a sublime heroism Alcestis surrenders to her 
 fate!— 
 
 nor tear, nor sigh 
 Came from her, neither did the approaching ill 
 Change the fresh beauties of her vermeil cheek. 
 
 As death approached, having commended her 
 children to the heavenly care, having cast her- 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 57 
 
 self upon her marriage couch and kissed it 
 farewell, and having with kindly word and 
 gentle hand bidden the servants of her house- 
 hold farewell, she seems about to depart. To 
 her attending husband, who had assisted her 
 through the trying ordeal of visiting the famil- 
 iar rooms of the home for the last time, she 
 now sighs : 
 
 "No longer hold me up, hold me no longer. 
 Here lay me down: I have not strength to stand: 
 Death is hard hy; dark night creeps o'er my eyes." 
 
 The last soft, tender word that fell from her 
 lips as she became unconscious in the arms of 
 her husband was, "Farewell." 
 
 Admetus seemed worthy of such a wife. Had 
 it been -ndthin his power he would have saved 
 her, nor permitted her to die that he might 
 live. He expressed the manly sentiment of a 
 manly heart when, holding her to his bosom, 
 he cried, "0 lead me, by the gods, lead me 
 down with thee." He would have followed 
 her in death by the violence of his own hand 
 had not the very pledge he made his wife to 
 be a mother to her children prevented the 
 desperate act, and had not his attendants dis- 
 suaded him. 
 
 Though by divine interposition this heroine- 
 wife was restored to her Admetus, her self- 
 sacrificing devotion loses not a whit of its 
 
58 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 undying glory. Hercules, conquering death on 
 her behalf, and snatching her from the opening 
 jaws of the grave, presented her alive and 
 unharmed, radiant and happy, to her aston- 
 ished, skeptical, but finally believing and 
 rejoicing husband. This restoration, however, 
 must have deepened the impression of Alcestis' 
 heroism by inculcating the ethic of the divine 
 approval of such a noble virtue, while it gave 
 to Admetus the opportunity, let us hope, long 
 years of opportunity, to demonstrate his grati- 
 tude to that heroine--nife, to bestow upon her 
 every token of honor and affection and to enjoy 
 a love which for its purity and fathomless 
 depths could never have been revealed save 
 by the sacrifice it made to save his life. 
 
 Where among the heroines of legend or 
 mythology shall we find the equal of Alcestis? 
 The story of her wifely heroism has adorned 
 the poet's verse, added an ever-increasing 
 splendor to classic lore, and presented to the 
 ages as they have come and gone the highest 
 ideal ever created by tradition or imagination 
 for woman's emulation. It is not matter for 
 wonder that on such a theme Euripides should 
 have risen to his highest strains of eloquence. 
 Let it awaken within the heart of every gener- 
 ation a more just and worthy veneration for 
 that immortal poet, and for the age and people 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 59 
 
 that listened to Mm with unbounded admira- 
 tion and applause, that Alcestis was to him 
 and to the Greeks a beautiful character, an 
 incomparable woman, an ideal heroine-wife. 
 Euripides seldom, if ever, reached a loftier 
 flight ethically or artistically than in these 
 strophes and antistrophes of his tragedy of 
 Alcestis. 
 
 Penelope 
 
 Woman's wit in wifely devotion never 
 played a more fascinating and triumphant 
 game than in the trying experience of Penelope. 
 Modesty, virtue, fidelity, patience, and heroism 
 mingled harmoniously in this "great souled 
 Icarius' daughter." For her mental gifts and 
 moral attributes rather than for her physical 
 charms was she universally admired. 
 
 She was the idol of her father, one of the 
 princes of Sparta, and her filial devotion was 
 a proverb. To the maids of Sparta her char- 
 acter and manners became the ideal for emu- 
 lation. As may well be supposed, Icarius did 
 not look with favor upon the increasing num- 
 ber of her suitors. He could not anticipate 
 with any degree of reconciliation the time 
 when he should have to part with so dutiful 
 and loving a daughter and surrender her to 
 the man happily destined to secure her as his 
 wife. But Ulysses, who afterward distin- 
 
60 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 guished himself as one of the greatest heroes 
 at the siege of Troy, won the affection of the 
 chaste and gifted Penelope and led her a bride 
 to his distant home in Ithaca. When asked to 
 choose between her father and her lover she 
 dropped her veil over her face to hide her 
 blushes and thus betrayed her desire to become 
 the wife of Ulysses rather than remain un- 
 married in her father's house. Icarius, giving 
 his reluctant consent to the marriage, surren- 
 dered his daughter to Ulysses and built a 
 monument to her modesty. Of this happy 
 union was born Telemachus. On the organiza- 
 tion of the expedition against Troy, Ulysses 
 hesitated to join the Grecian forces, and the 
 strong tie that bound him to his home was the 
 love he had for Penelope and the son which 
 she had borne him. Yet was this son the 
 innocent cause of the long separation of his 
 father and mother by the departure of Ulysses 
 for the war. To escape leaving his home and 
 separating from his beloved wife and child, 
 Ulysses feigned insanity. He sowed salt in 
 the field and yoked an ox and an ass together 
 to plow it, thus trying to make the impression 
 that he had lost his reason. But Palamedes, 
 his friend, suspected that Ulysses was only 
 pretending to be insane, and to test him he 
 laid the little Telemachus on the field before 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 61 
 
 the plow, thus endangering the child's life. 
 When Ulysses saw his infant son lying in the 
 way of his plow he stopped, turned aside his 
 ill-matched team, and saved the boy from harm 
 — which act revealed that he was only sham- 
 ming madness. Thereafter he had no excuse 
 for refusing to join his countrymen in their 
 expedition, and after due consideration he 
 came to the patriotic conclusion that even at 
 so great a sacrifice as that of parting with 
 his devoted Penelope and his beloved boy he 
 must obey the voice of duty and at his coun- 
 try's call march with Ms compatriots against 
 Ilium, 
 
 Ulysses was absent twenty years : ten years 
 at the siege of Troy and ten years more spent 
 in his wanderings to reach home after the war. 
 The Odyssey celebrates these wanderings of 
 Ulysses as the Iliad sets forth his exploits at 
 the siege of Troy. Immortal fame had crowned 
 the achievements of this hero of the Trojan 
 War. Among gods and men he had won a 
 deathless name: "Wise Ulysses," "Renowned 
 Ulysses," "Divine Ulysses," "Jove-bred Ulys- 
 ses." 
 
 But how long and sad and anxious were 
 those years of separation to the loyal Pene- 
 lope ! What the fate of her noble Ulysses was 
 she could not know. Waiting and watching. 
 
62 HEROINES OF HISTOEY 
 
 patiently hoping, day after day, year after 
 year, what a trial of her faith, what a test of 
 her devotion ! Though other soldiers who had 
 survived had long since returned from Troy — 
 fathers to their children, sons to their parents, 
 lovers to their sweethearts, husbands to their 
 wives — her Ulysses came not. Yet was she 
 faithful to him. Did not she suffer with him 
 for the glory of Greece? Nay, were not her 
 trial and heroism as great as those of her 
 soldier husband? No blare of trumpets, no 
 clash of arms, no marshaling of hosts, no glit- 
 tering forests of spears, no ptean of battle, no 
 shouts of victory stirred her blood and ani- 
 mated her soul. Simply waiting and waiting, 
 dreaming and dreaming, hoping and hoping, 
 fearing and fearing, weeping and weeping, 
 longing and longing! O, the heroism of it! 
 Was it not a higher, nobler heroism than was 
 demanded of any chief that fought or fell 
 under the walls of Troy? 
 
 Penelope honored Ulysses with an un- 
 bounded admiration of his worth and great- 
 ness. To her thought no other man measured 
 up to the fullness of his manly stature. She 
 saw in her Ulysses, whom she had lost by the 
 decrees of heaven, 
 
 A husband, that of all the virtues bore 
 
 The palm among the Greeks, and whose renown 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 63 
 
 So ample was that Fame the sound hath blown 
 Through Greece and Argos to her very heart. 
 
 It was this pi'oud mother's just ambition that 
 her son, Telemachus, should in all his virtues 
 resemble his father, and it was her hope that 
 when he came to manhood 
 
 Beholders should affirm, "This man doth grow 
 Like the rare son of his matchless sire. 
 His goodliness, his beauty, and his fire 
 Of soul aspired to." 
 
 Through all the long years of Ulysses' absence 
 
 Penelope never ceased to grieve nor could any 
 
 voice of friend, divine or human, assuage her 
 
 sorrow. She could not banish her loved one 
 
 from her thoughts, nor could she think of him 
 
 without weeping bitter tears. Pallas informed 
 
 Ulysses of the sorrow of Penelope : 
 
 "Who for thy absence all her desolate life 
 Dissolves in tears till thy desired return." 
 
 Though twenty years are passed since she bade 
 
 her husband farewell, her love has not grown 
 
 cold nor has her grief abated: 
 
 But, for her lord's sad loss, sad nights and days 
 Obscure her beauties and corrupt their rays. 
 
 Often in fond imagination or in sweet dreams 
 she saw her absent one, 
 
 and to her love appeared 
 Her lord so freshly, that she wept, till sleep, 
 By Pallas forced on her, her eyes did steep 
 In his sweet humor. 
 
64 HEEOINES OP HISTORY 
 
 An infinite pathos breathes in her words as 
 she acknowledges that her woes are all or- 
 dained by powers divine : 
 
 "Heaven's stern decree 
 With many an ill hath numbed and deaded me. 
 He took life with him, when he took my hand 
 In parting from me to the Trojan strand." 
 
 But there came to this wife a severer test 
 and trial of her heroism than that of her long, 
 lonely, and patient waiting for her beloved. 
 Ulysses had won her heart and hand against 
 a host of eager suitors. He had been married 
 but one short year when the parting came. 
 Now in his absence the old suitors and many 
 new ones lay siege to the heart of Penelope. 
 Her wooers came in a multitude, servants and 
 all numbering over four hundred. They take 
 possession of the home of Ulysses and daily 
 feast at his board, demanding the richest wines 
 and most delicious viands. For years they im- 
 pose their insulting and hateful presence upon 
 the palace, exhausting the resources of the 
 fields and flocks and vineyards of the absent 
 lord to satisfy their gluttonous appetites. 
 Each of the scores of wooers claims the right 
 to succeed Ulysses in the affections of his wife. 
 In this unseemly rivalry, which was a wrong 
 to Ulysses and an insult to his faithful and 
 sorrowing wife, many arguments were ad- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 65 
 
 vanced that may have suggested sad question- 
 ings in the mind of Penelope. Long had her 
 Ulysses been absent; no word had come from 
 him, no message of love and assurance. Was 
 he still living? Had he fallen in the long ten 
 years' siege? Had he forgotten her? Would 
 he ever return? Her wooers importuned her 
 to forget Ulysses and each one presented his 
 claims upon her affections and sought her 
 hand in marriage. But, heroine-wife that she 
 was, she brought into exercise all her wit and 
 wisdom in resisting the influences that were 
 at work to quench her hope of Ulysses' return, 
 undermine her affection for him, and uproot 
 that wifely fidelity which all the years of sepa- 
 ration had but deepened and strengthened in 
 her heart. But how contemptible they all 
 seemed in her eyes beside her incomparable 
 Ulysses! She abhorred the very thought of 
 marrying any one of those many insulting 
 wooers. She would wait for her husband's 
 return even to the last moment of her life. 
 She repelled the advances of her many suitors, 
 yet did they persecute her with their unwel- 
 come attentions. At last, to gain a little respite 
 from their tormenting importunities, her 
 woman's wit invented the famous ruse which 
 has ever since been associated with her name. 
 Men of noble lineage and high station, men 
 
66 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 of wealth, of talent, of handsome face and 
 graceful form paid her attention and solicited 
 her hand. Still in her heart of hearts she 
 despised them all as she compared them in 
 mind with her Ulysses. 
 
 After she had tried many arts of evasion 
 and had long resisted by every honorable de- 
 vice their demand that she come to a decision, 
 she falls upon this ruse. It becomes her duty 
 to weave a funeral canopy for Laertes, the 
 father of Ulysses. Busily and constantly as 
 a sacred obligation she weaves the fabric, and 
 when pressed with unusual ardor to make her 
 choice of a husband and marry, she makes the 
 promise that when this sacred duty shall have 
 been performed, and when the canopy she is 
 weaving is finished, she will make her choice. 
 Content with this promise, her suitors ceased 
 to torment her and each waited in blissful 
 anticipation of the day when the canopy would 
 be completed and he would happily be the 
 chosen one. Penelope diligently wrought 
 upon the canopy, but what she wove by day 
 she stealthily unraveled by night, and thus for 
 three years she kept her tormentors at bay. 
 
 This same story of her ruse did Penelope 
 recite to Ulysses on his return. By such in- 
 ventions did she prove her faithfulness to her 
 husband. Hers was a fidelity and wifely 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 67 
 
 heroism too tender, patient, and exalted to be 
 called pagan; hers was a character which 
 seems too perfect, too nearly ideal to have been 
 created by the ancient imagination. Again 
 and again does the devoted wife put off the 
 day of choice in her undying love for her ab- 
 sent husband, but her insolent wooers grow 
 still more clamorous and imperative. With 
 the flight of time their arguments against the 
 possibility of Ulysses' return become more 
 plausible. The day approaches when, accord- 
 ing to the direction left by Ulysses on his part- 
 ing from Penelope, she may claim the right to 
 take another husband on the supposition that 
 he is dead. Said he, "Your son to man's state 
 grown, wed whom you Avill." Telemachus has 
 grown to manhood. How long, how long has 
 this heroine- wife waited for her lord's return ! 
 Five years have crept away, ten years! The 
 war is now an old story. Where is Ulysses? 
 Fifteen years — O how long! Twenty years — 
 Telemachus a man! Is Ulysses dead? All 
 argue that he is dead. Penelope mourns him 
 as dead, but still is true to his memory, and 
 only with a breaking heart can think of mak- 
 ing choice of another lord from among the 
 detested wooers who have well-nigh ruined 
 Ulysses' estate. 
 
 As the time approaches when Penelope will 
 
68 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 be absolved from all ber marital obligations 
 to Ulysses not only do her wooers become more 
 and more importunate, but her parents and 
 ber own son urge ber to tbe celebration of 
 what she thinks of as "those abhorred nup- 
 tials" with one of tbe hateful wooers whom she 
 cannot but loathe and despise. It is pitiful 
 to hear her tell Ulysses, though she knew not 
 it was be, bow she suffered : 
 
 "My parents bore 
 Continued hand on me to make me wed; 
 My son grew angry that so ruined 
 His goods were by them." 
 
 Her friends resolved to terminate her delays 
 and make her marry one of her wooers. But 
 she has no intention of marrying, whether 
 Ulysses be alive or dead; 
 
 but her words 
 Bear other utterance than her heart approves. 
 
 It has been prophesied that Ulysses will 
 return, and the report has come that he still 
 lives and has been seen in distant lands. Fear 
 and hope alternate in the mind of the per- 
 plexed and grieving Penelope. She manifests 
 the deepest interest in any news that comes 
 to ber of her dead or wandering hero. Tele- 
 machus has been inspired by Pallas to go 
 abroad in search of bis father. His departure, 
 without Penelope's consent or knowledge. 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 69 
 
 sadly grieves her. And when she learns that 
 her hated and detested wooers have formed a 
 conspiracy to assassinate him, the fear and 
 sorrow of her soul become Avell-nigh unbear- 
 able. Struggling, and still struggling, like a 
 true heroine against the importunities of her 
 wooers, her friends, and her parents, she puts 
 off the day of choice until her wit suggests 
 another plan of escape. Telemachus has re- 
 turned with news of his father, and Ulysses 
 himself has by an accident found his native 
 land. Father and son meet. But they agree 
 that the father's presence shall remain un- 
 known until such time as shall be most oppor- 
 tune for him to trap the wooers who have so 
 wronged him and insulted his wife and mete 
 out to them such punishment as they deserve. 
 Ulysses is so changed in appearance by the 
 touch of Minerva that he appears to be 
 
 at all parts like a poor 
 And sad old beggar. 
 
 He is so disguised that neither his son nor 
 his faithful old swineherd Eumseus recognizes 
 him. He soon reveals himself to Telemachus. 
 Later, as an old beggar, he gains an audience 
 with his own Penelope, whom he finds eager 
 to hear the news which he brings from her 
 Ulysses. Nothing can be more touching than 
 
TO HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 the interview of Penelope with this supposed 
 old beggar, but in reality her own long-absent 
 husband. He tells her of Ulysses. Describes 
 his dress which she had made for him and by 
 the recital brings the tears gushing from her 
 eyes. She tells him, not knowing it is her 
 own husband, how she had mourned for her 
 Ulysses, how she had been tormented by her 
 wooers, how she had fought against them and 
 by every possible ruse had avoided choosing 
 a husband from their number. It is amazing 
 that Ulysses could have endured this interview 
 without unfolding himself and clasping his 
 long-suffering and heroic Penelope to his 
 bosom. But he is to have not only vengeance 
 on his and her hateful enemies, he is also 
 to have another proof of Penelope's loyalty. 
 While she never felt a temptation to accept a 
 single one of her Avooers, nor allowed her affec- 
 tions for Ulysses to grow cold or her hope of 
 his return to her, if alive, to withdraw its 
 sweet light from her heart and life, neverthe- 
 less to gain time and keep her tormentors at 
 bay as long as possible without rousing their 
 suspicions, she at last made pretense of yield- 
 ing and coming to a decision as to whom of 
 her admirers she would choose as a husband. 
 
 Penelope's inventive genius furnishes her 
 with a scheme for testing the wooers which 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 71 
 
 proves their undoing and furnishes Ulysses 
 with an opportunity for wreaking vengeance 
 upon them. This, then, is her proposal to the 
 assembled and expectant wooers : 
 
 "Hear me, ye wooers, that a pleasure take 
 To do me sorrow, and my house invade 
 To eat and drink, as if 'twere only made 
 To serve your rapines; my lord long away, 
 And you allowed no color for your stay 
 But his still absence; striving who shall frame 
 Me for his wife; and since 'tis made a game, 
 I here propose divine Ulysses' bow 
 For that great masterpiece to which ye vow. 
 He that can draw it with least show to strive, 
 And through these twelve ax-heads an arrow drive, 
 Him will I follow, and this home forego 
 That nourished me a maid, now furnished so 
 With all things fit, and which I so esteem 
 That I shall still live in it in my dream." 
 
 The wooers came to the trial of their 
 strength and skill. Telemachus and Ulysses 
 prepared to make this the occasion for their 
 attack upon the wooers, although their plan 
 was kept a secret from Penelope. Precaution 
 had been taken to remove all other weapons, 
 including those of the contending wooers, 
 from the room. The trial began. The bow of 
 Ulysses was produced from the armory where 
 long it had rested unused. Each proud, ex- 
 pectant wooer seized the mighty bow in turn 
 and tried to bend it and fit it to the string. 
 
72 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Not one of all that company could bend the 
 great Ulysses' bow; every vaunting but now 
 crestfallen wooer failed. But in that company 
 stood tbe beggar, the butt of the company's 
 ridicule. When all had ignominiously failed 
 he asked for the privilege of testing his 
 strength; he thought he could bend the bow 
 and adjust the string and send the arrow 
 through the twelve ax-heads. His request was 
 greeted with derisive laughter. Penelope de- 
 fended the beggar in his request, not knowing 
 him other than as the beggar who had talked to 
 her of her Ulysses and thereby gained her 
 good will. Telemachus, who presided over 
 the contest, now saw the moment was at hand 
 for action. With pretended anger he ordered 
 his mother from the room ; sent signal to have 
 all the doors fastened. While the wooers were 
 cracking their jokes at the beggar's expense, 
 by the order of Telemachus, his faithful swine- 
 herd, Eumseus, handed him the bow. 
 
 When the wise Ulysses once had laid 
 His fingers on it, and to proof surveyed 
 The still sound flight it held, as one of skill 
 In song, and of the harp, doth at his will, 
 In tuning of his instrument, extend 
 A string out with his pin, touch all, and lend 
 To every well-wreathed string his perfect sound, 
 Struck all together; with such ease drew round; 
 The king the bow. Then twanged he up the string, 
 That as a swallow in the air doth sing 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 73 
 
 With no continued tune, but, pausing still, 
 Twinks out her scattered voice in accents shrill; 
 So sharp the string sung when he gave it touch. 
 Once having bent and drawn it. Which so much 
 Amazed the wooers, that their colors went 
 And came most grievously. . . . 
 Then took he into hand, from off the table 
 The first drawn arrow, . . . this one 
 He measured by his arm, as if not known 
 The length were to him, rocked it then, and drew ; 
 And through the axes at the first hole, flew 
 The steel-charged arrow. 
 
 Yes, the beggar was Ulysses ! And instantly 
 throwing aside his rags and revealing himself 
 to the astonished wooers, 
 
 He, frowning, said, "Dogs, see In me the man 
 Ye all held dead at Troy." 
 
 Then fell the mighty hero upon his enemies, 
 and with the other arrows slew them, and with 
 Telemachus by his side using swords when 
 arrows were all spent he wreaked full ven- 
 geance on the villains who had persecuted his 
 wife with their hateful attentions and tried 
 by every wicked machination to shake her 
 fidelity, destroy her peace of mind, and bring 
 eternal reproach upon her fair name. 
 
 Happy indeed was the reunion of Ulysses 
 and Penelope! The revelations came so sud- 
 denly and were so amazing that Penelope 
 could not at first believe it true that her hus- 
 band had returned. Telemachus was in the 
 
74 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 secret, as was the old swineherd Eumseus; 
 and even Ulysses' old nurse had recognized 
 him by a scar on his body. Poor Penelope 
 hesitated and at first acted coolly toward 
 Ulysses. But when the proof was given and 
 the full truth dawned upon her, she welcomed 
 him to her arms. 
 
 He wept for joy, t'enjoy a wife so fit 
 
 For his grave mind, that knew his depth of wit. 
 
 And held chaste virtue at a price so high. 
 
 If Ulysses came back to his dear wife with 
 all the honors of splendid exploits resting 
 thick upon him to fill her with still greater 
 admiration and love for her hero husband, he 
 also returned to a wife who had proven her- 
 self a superlative, incomparable heroine in 
 her devotion to him, who had by severest trials 
 demonstrated her fidelity and had shown her 
 worthiness to be the recipient of such love, 
 honor, and veneration as only a great soul 
 like his own could feel and bestow. Heroic 
 Penelope, worthy wife, faithful wife, heroine- 
 wife of the great hero Ulysses ! 
 
PART II 
 
 WOMAN-HEROIC 
 IN SHAKESPEARE 
 
 75 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 SHAKESPEAEE'S GENIUS IN THE DEAMATIC 
 EEALM 
 
 If we look outside the Scriptures for the 
 greatest master of the laws of nature and 
 character, we shall call that monarch in the 
 realm of delineation, Shakespeare: Shake- 
 speare, "the dear son of memory and great 
 heir of fame," who forgot to write his auto- 
 biography, and wrote the biography of every 
 other character in this multitudinous world. 
 When Coleridge calls him "the guide and 
 pioneer of true philosophy," and Goethe re- 
 gards him as a "celestial genius, who mingles 
 with us only to make us in the gentlest manner 
 acquainted with ourselves," we learn what a 
 position Shakespeare has gained among the 
 intellectual thrones of the world. 
 
 These dramatic productions of Shakespeare's 
 genius are so many magnificent pictures 
 crowded with characters drawn as nearly as 
 art can draw them to the correct proportions 
 of nature. They are neither Lilliputians nor 
 giants of disordered dreams, but the creation 
 of the most penetrative and comprehensive, 
 the most synthetic and the most analytic poet 
 77 
 
78 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 of humanity. If you would know the mythic 
 gods and goddesses, go to Homer or Hesiod; 
 if you would know angels and devils, go to 
 Milton; if you would know monstrosities, go 
 to Ovid or Dante ; if you would know man and 
 woman, go to Shakespeare. But do not demand 
 more of Shakespeare than art and imagination 
 have the power to create. 
 
 Perhaps too enthusiastic praise may be 
 given to Shakespeare for originality and 
 creative genius. He created but few of the 
 leading characters of his plays; not one, in 
 fact, of the most conspicuous personages of his 
 tragedies leaped from his own imagination. 
 He went to history for Ctesar, Coriolanus, 
 Antony and Cleopatra, Macbeth and Lady 
 Macbeth, Richard III, Henry VIII and 
 Catherine of Aragon. He found in romance 
 his Shylock and Portia, Romeo and Juliet, 
 Othello and Desdemona, Hamlet and Ophelia. 
 Nevertheless, who but a Shakespeare could 
 have rescued these romantic characters from 
 literary oblivion? Who but a Shakespeare 
 could have clothed these historic personages of 
 Plutarch and of the English Chroniclers with 
 the dramatic immortality which they now 
 wear? Not only is Shylock in the world's 
 estimation "the Jew that Shakespeare drew," 
 but Hamlet is the Dane that Shakespeare 
 
SHAKESPEARE'S GENIUS 79 
 
 drew; Richard III is the Richard that Shake- 
 speare drew; Henry VIII and Wolsey are the 
 Henry and Wolsey that Shakespeare drew. 
 We see these historic characters, whether 
 English, Greek, or Roman, through Shake- 
 speare's eyes. 
 
 It may be that for one thing Shakespeare 
 has not been sufficiently praised — for his 
 superlative wisdom in selecting characters to 
 people his drama. In a survey of the whole 
 wide field of romance and history we can 
 scarcely find a character neglected that could 
 have lent itself to a noble Shakespearean de- 
 lineation. This poet undoubtedly selected the 
 most instructive personages for the illustra- 
 tion of his moral principles. And, although 
 his ethical method is negative rather than 
 positive, warning rather than idealizing, he 
 has presented to our imagination and con- 
 science the life-portraits of men and women, 
 who, of all others in romance and history, 
 should deter us from pride, jealousy, revenge, 
 ambition, unbelief, misanthropy, cruelty, and 
 tyranny. 
 
 If we look for ideals in Shakespeare, they 
 are to be found, if at all, in his heroines. 
 There are but few heroes in Shakespeare's 
 plays. Nearly every hero is a subordinate 
 character. In the true sense of the word 
 
80 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Hamlet is not a hero, nor is Shylock, Antonio, 
 Othello, Macbeth, Richard III, Timon, or 
 Henry VIII. Even with the characters of 
 Csesar, Brutus, Coriolanus, and Richard II 
 before us, we must still believe that Shake- 
 speare would make us see more of the heroic 
 in the nature of woman than of man. It may 
 be justly claimed that this poet is a more 
 consummate master in the interpretation of 
 the heroine than of the hero. There are not 
 wanting critics who insist that his female 
 characters are the more perfect, even from the 
 viewpoint of dramatic art. 
 
 For reasons which inhere in the nature of 
 things those characters which are the most 
 perfectly and exquisitely drawn cannot be the 
 most striking, powerful, and awe-inspiring. 
 Kings, warriors, statesmen, men of affairs, 
 hold a larger, more conspicuous place on the 
 scene of historic and dramatic action than 
 do women of any station. This was true at 
 least in Shakespeare's time, and in the times 
 and ages of which his drama is the mirror. 
 
 But coming into the realm of Shakespeare's 
 most powerful dramatic mastery, we find him 
 to be a multiminded worker. Now he paints 
 with the delicate, accurate pencil of a Raphael, 
 again with the bold grandeur of a Michael 
 Angelo; now with the sweet tenderness of a 
 
SHAKESPEARE'S GENIUS 81 
 
 Correggio, again with the strong, severe tones 
 of a Ribera. Now he is as minute in detail as 
 a Da Vinci, and again he has the breadth and 
 abandon of a Salvator Rosa. Now he is as 
 ideal and sensitive as a Corot, and again he is 
 as rich and splendid as a Titian. Now he is 
 as refined and spiritual as an Angelico, and 
 again he is as glowing and sensuous as a 
 Rubens. But what forms spring into immortal 
 color upon the canvas of his comedy and 
 tragedy ! 
 
 Shakespeare is not always looking for, nor 
 is he always painting, the heroic; he quite as 
 often delineates the very antithesis of heroism. 
 Shall we say that this is meant to accentuate 
 that virtue? One thing must be said of the 
 women of this Shakespearean drama — they 
 are always women. They may be strong, intel- 
 lectual, forceful, dominating, virtuous, heroic, 
 or they may be weak, silly, soft, vicious, 
 wicked, unnatural, but they are always women. 
 Strong women or weak women, bright women 
 or stupid women, good women or bad women, 
 sensible women or light-headed women, natural 
 women or unnatural women, they are still 
 women. Even Kate, the shrew, is feminine; 
 Lady Macbeth, the murderess, is feminine; 
 Queen Anne is feminine; Cleopatra is femi- 
 nine. Even if wicked women are wickeder 
 
82 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 than wicked men, and cruel women crueler 
 than cruel men, yet in their very wickedness 
 and cruelty the women of Shakespeare are 
 forever women. 
 
 It must be admitted that Shakespeare's 
 world of heroines is far removed from the 
 common walks of life, and they who act their 
 parts in spheres above this ordinary world of 
 reality, of which our average humanity knows 
 but little in actual experience, are exceptional 
 women placed in exceptional environments, 
 created by imagination, poetry, and romance. 
 This greatest poet since the world began 
 never saw the poetry of our common life, al- 
 though he himself sprang from that common 
 life. He never found a heroine among the 
 daughters of poverty, the sisters of toil, the 
 queens of the humble cottage. 
 
 Shakespeare's so-called heroines are ever 
 engaged in romantic activities, and, whether 
 in comedy or tragedy, are almost invariably 
 chosen from high station. Juliet is the fair 
 patrician of Verona; Portia is the wealthy 
 heiress of Belmont ; Ophelia is the daughter of 
 a Lord Chamberlain; Lady Macbeth is the 
 wife of the Thane of Cawdor; Constance is 
 the Duchess of Bretagne, and Isabella, the 
 Duchess of Vienna; Volumnia is a haughty 
 Roman patrician; Imogen is a princess, as is 
 
SHAKESPEAEE'S GENIUS 83 
 
 also Rosalind; Hermione is the wife of 
 Leontes, king of Sicilia, and of royal descent, 
 and Perdita is her daughter, hence also royal 
 in lineage; Cleopatra is an Egyptian queen. 
 The historical plays are crowded with duchess- 
 es, princesses, and queens. As there is little 
 democracy, so there is little modernity in these 
 heroines. Indeed, to modernize is to destroy 
 the romantic. Keats, with his Greek-like soul, 
 hated the prism that destroyed the mystery 
 and poetry of the rainbow as others hate the 
 modernity that destroys romance. Shake- 
 speare's heroines live in other lands and in by- 
 gone ages. Several are Italians, moving in the 
 golden atmosphere of southern ideality ; others 
 belong to the ancient and mysterious days of 
 Rome and Egypt. Such British characters 
 as Lady Macbeth, Cordelia, and Imogen live 
 in the nebulous, fabulous days of Britain, and 
 even in days as remote as the time of Christ. 
 We make exception of Shakespeare's historical 
 plays, and of the women of those plays, since 
 they are not in reality the creations of his 
 brain, but belong to the written and authentic 
 chronicles of the nations. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE SO-CALLED HEEOINES 
 
 Juliet 
 
 Let us keep in mind the true idea of hero- 
 ism — that it is noble, virtuous, kind, generous, 
 magnanimous, devoted, helpful, self-sacrific- 
 ing. It may, therefore, be said that true hero- 
 ism should inspire admiration, but never pity 
 and commiseration. Nevertheless, with all 
 the tears that have been shed over Juliet and 
 Ophelia, evidence of their having been too soft 
 and sentimental, too weak-willed, too charac- 
 terless to be real heroines, they are still and 
 forever will be heroines to the imagination of 
 the sentimental, heroines of poetry, romance, 
 fancy — theatrical heroines. It is a misuse of 
 words and a confounding of ideas to call 
 Juliet a heroine, and to think of her as such. 
 It is precisely the heroic element that is lack- 
 ing in her moral constitution. It is her beauty 
 that betrays us into a false or fictitious judg- 
 ment of her character. Her physical charms 
 hide her moral weakness. She does not lack 
 refinement, and she possesses a modicum of 
 intellect, but by false education, due to the 
 age and to the manners of the time, her intel- 
 84 
 
THE SO-CALLED HEROINES 85 
 
 lect has become subordinate to her imagina- 
 tion, and her imagination to her passion. She 
 has no high ideal of life to lure her to worthy 
 aims and noble endeavorings. She is sweet, 
 gentle, tender, soulful, confiding, but not 
 strong, self-reliant, well-poised. Life to her 
 is not duty; it is passion, and selfish passion 
 at that. It is not a womanly strife and mis- 
 sion, a purpose and mastery, a responsibility 
 and a task, a thing of conscience and account- 
 ability. It is a dwelling in the honeysuckle 
 of self-gratifying love, sipping its intoxicat- 
 ing sweets and fainting with its delicious fra- 
 grances, and dying when deprived of them. 
 Juliet loves for love's sake. Purpose, aim, 
 duty, responsibility are not in her brief vo- 
 cabulary, or they all spell one thing to her — 
 Romeo. Self-destruction in her case is a con- 
 fession, a confession and a revelation of her 
 intellectual limitations, of her failure to even 
 know that life is a vast moral problem, a con- 
 fession and a revelation of a volitionless emo- 
 tional system; of her deficiency in high eth- 
 ical sense. Juliet is sadly out of balance in 
 the make-up of her mental and spiritual wom- 
 anhood. She is capable of loving too unthink- 
 ingly, too self-sacrificingly, too all-absorbingly. 
 The normal woman was not made for such 
 love. But had she lived, Juliet would have 
 
i86 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 been forever what she had become — a living 
 suicide. She had slain her spiritual being, 
 immolated her very self-hood on the altar of 
 passion. She had shut her eyes and soul to 
 all the world save Romeo; there was no hu- 
 manity, no divinity but Romeo. That was the 
 suicide of her highest moral self. True love 
 demands no such sacrifice as this, that one 
 must bury her soul in the grave of a passion- 
 ate infatuation. Self-destruction is not self- 
 sacrifice, and is not true heroism. Had it 
 been the aim and purpose of Juliet in loving 
 Romeo, and in marrying him, and finally in 
 taking her life to unite the families that were 
 united over her dead body, there might have 
 been an element of heroism in her life and 
 character. But she dreamed no such dream 
 as that of reconciliation, and those old, falsely 
 educated families of Verona were not again 
 united in friendship because Juliet or Romeo 
 had willed it and had sacrificed themselves to 
 effect it; hence the result of that double sui- 
 cide was not a justification of the crime, much 
 less a proof of the heroism and virtue of it. 
 Can a suicide be a heroine? Can a heroine 
 be a suicide? 
 
 Ophelia 
 Ophelia was never mentally well. She had 
 a pale soul, a fragile, wraithlike individuality. 
 
THE SO-CALLED HEROINES 87 
 
 She was never in full command of herself, nor 
 even dreamed that she belonged to herself. 
 As daughter and as lover her will was never 
 her own. With her, love did not rise to a 
 great passion; it was a malady; it had not 
 intellect enough to be a passion. Her will, 
 her imagination, her love were all abnormal. 
 She was but a frail reed shaken by the wind, 
 with no volition but to bend to the wind, to 
 bend and bend and — break. She was so deli- 
 cate a flower that the gentlest touch of sun or 
 frost must wither her life. Hamlet, that con- 
 scienceless intellect, had but to breathe upon 
 her heart to crush it. 
 
 Insanity was as inevitable in Ophelia's case 
 as was suicide in the case of Juliet. Indeed, 
 this love affair was not the cause, but only 
 the occasion of the frail girl's insanity. She 
 would have gone insane had she never met 
 Hamlet. Some other alfair would have fur- 
 nished the occasion or condition; that mind 
 was doomed to eclipse. It must needs be that 
 evils come, but woe unto him by whom they 
 come ! Woe to the Hamlet by whom Ophelia's 
 poor heart breaks and Ophelia's mind gives 
 way! It is infinitely pathetic. But is it 
 heroic? Is heroism ever pathetic? Poor, 
 poor child ! If to Juliet we give our sighs, 
 to Ophelia we give our tears. But heroism 
 
88 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 demands higher, saner tribute than tears and 
 sighs. There is nothing highly and nobly 
 ideal in this poor Ophelia, yet is she called one 
 of Shakespeare's heroines. Who has ever de- 
 sired to emulate her and become an Ophelia? 
 Who has ever felt, when in the presence of 
 Ophelia, that this was a strong, noble, healthy, 
 and truly admirable personality? Who can 
 honestly say: "Ophelia is my heroine"? 
 
 Beatrice 
 
 We come into a more wholesome atmosphere, 
 where sighs and tears give way to smiles and 
 laughter, in the presence of Beatrice. Hero- 
 ine? Yes. If gayety, pertness, wit, high temper, 
 willfulness, a saucy tongue, abundant animal 
 spirits, and a girlish, but not too sentimental 
 love for a not oversentimental Benedick, are 
 stuff for the making of a heroine, here you 
 have her. A stage heroine, I grant you. This 
 woman will never commit suicide for any man, 
 never. We are not so sure that she may not 
 drive some man to commit suicide for her. 
 
 "There's little of the melancholy element in her, my 
 lord: she is never sad but when she sleeps, and not 
 ever sad then; for I have heard my daughter say, she 
 hath often dreamed of unhappiness, and waked herself 
 with laughing." 
 
 Insanity? Impossible! She has too much 
 good sense and, let us say, too much nonsense 
 
THE SO-CALLED HEEOINES 89 
 
 ever to go mad. She may lose her temper, 
 
 but not her mind. 
 
 Leonato. You will never run. mad, niece. 
 Beatrice. No, not till a hot January. 
 
 With her, love is all right, but it is not worth 
 killing one's self for, nor worth giving up 
 one's sanity for. In fact, she never thinks 
 of love as anything but a very sensible, whole- 
 some passion, and there remains a lot to live 
 for even if a love affair goes wrong. Well 
 may one ■«dsh that this fresh, buoyant, rosy- 
 cheeked soul of laughter might have been near 
 when Juliet began to think life was no longer 
 worth the living, just to laugh the suicidal 
 sentimentality out of the viciously educated 
 girl. And this cheerful, happy Beatrice might 
 have saved poor Ophelia if she could but have 
 inoculated her with her own cheerful view 
 of life, and her sensible philosophy of love. 
 Beatrice is not a deep-river soul; she is just 
 a careless, laughing brook of crystalline de- 
 light. She is genuine, true, awfully sensible, 
 chic, and clever. She has a conscience easily 
 gotten on with. She has a willful will, quite 
 her own, and she has brains, but not so many 
 ounces as to make her very profound. Her 
 imagination is well within the control of a 
 womanly discretion. She is not a dreamer, 
 not a sentimentalist or idealist. She is ex- 
 
90 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 quisitely feminine and has a lively wit — more 
 wit than humor ; yet is her nature full of sun- 
 shine. She is incomparably interesting when 
 in love. In matrimony? She will undoubt- 
 edly be very, very interesting. But if you run 
 across Benedick, ask him. It may well be 
 asked. Can Beatrice be placed among the hero- 
 ines? What has she sacrificed or suffered? 
 AVhat great, strong, courageous, aspiring, self- 
 forgetful emotions dominate her being? What 
 sore trial does she encounter? What brave re- 
 solve does she form? What joy or comfort or 
 self-gratification does she surrender for an- 
 other's salvation, or for the common good? 
 But, if to have caught the good will of the 
 romantic and the sentimental ; if to have made 
 the world look on the sunny side of life's 
 mysterious picture; if to have made the sad 
 and melancholy laugh the subtle medicine of 
 good cheer into their souls, is to have made 
 this humanity love her and emulate her happy 
 way of living and of loving, then may many 
 a woman or many a man most justifiably say, 
 "Beatrice is my heroine." 
 
 Rosalind 
 
 The atmosphere is growing sweeter, purer, 
 and more wholesome still, as we enter the 
 world of the fresh, vivacious, impulsive, and 
 
THE SO-CALLED HEROINES 91 
 
 sanely sentimental Rosalind. She is a wood- 
 land nymph, a poetical creation of such stuff 
 as dreams are made of — lovers' dreams. Of 
 course you will not meet a Rosalind except 
 in poems; she is altogether romantic and 
 ideal. She never walks up Broadway or 
 down Pennsylvania Avenue. She does not 
 make afternoon calls, nor does she at- 
 tend the season's functions. She lives on 
 Romantic road near the wild wood of poesy, 
 where the sweet streams of laughter cross the 
 flowery meadows of delight, far up in the 
 beautiful land of imagination. Do not ask 
 too much of her reflective powers; she never 
 sits still or stands still long enough to reflect 
 very seriously. Life is a joy to her, but not 
 a duty. Love too is joy; it's fun. Hurrah 
 for love ! And love is such a sane thing. Sui- 
 cide? Insanity? Nonsense! Rosalind is too 
 healthy in mind and morals, in brain and 
 body for that. It is quite unnecessary for 
 people to go mad about love, and healthy, 
 properly educated people don't. People who 
 live out of the parlors and drawingrooms, who 
 breathe the pure, out-of-doors ozone, and who 
 know the trees and brooks and the flowers 
 and stars by name and subtle kinship, who 
 are familiar mth the deer and squirrels and 
 the butterflies and the birds and the wind 
 
92 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 and rain and sunshine and with healthy- 
 minded men and women, cannot go mad with 
 love. Love is food, not poison. Love is san- 
 ity, not madness. Love is life, not death. Love 
 should not make a fool of a man or a woman ; 
 it should make of him a more manly man, 
 of her a more womanly woman. Love is nat- 
 ural, normal, rational, noble, Rosalindish. 
 
 This pretty Rosalind has no high ideals of 
 life, except that it's very sweet and jolly, very 
 wonderful and lovely to live. Does she think 
 that it is all of life to live? Well, so it is, 
 if one live the real life, the full, complete, 
 abundant life. Rosalind has no motive in her 
 living, except it be just to love and be 
 loved, to be pure and true and happy, as the 
 bird has no conscious motive when it sings, 
 or the flower when it blooms, or the sweet star 
 when it shines. But the birds sing for our 
 ears, and the flowers bloom for our eyes, and 
 the stars shine to make our dark skies splen- 
 did; and we live, motiveless or not, for the 
 great world in which we live. If life were 
 nothing more than this free, happy-go-lucky 
 existence of careless, happy lovers, then might 
 Rosalind become the model and the heroine 
 of every pure, sweet girl, who would pass her 
 life away in the sunshine of laughing ideality. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 
 Miranda 
 
 With what a multitudinous imagination is 
 this Shakespeare endowed ! So many heroines 
 of love has he created for us, or dramatically 
 delineated! And what an infinite variety of 
 characters is here! But these people of his 
 creative fancy are as dissimilar as are people 
 in the world about us, as unlike each other as 
 God's men and women are, and have been 
 from the beginning. How can a poet create 
 a Juliet, an Ophelia, a Beatrice, a Rosalind, 
 and do more — create a Miranda? Well, genius 
 is about as inexplicable as divinity; it is as 
 like divinity as anything that pertains to the 
 soul-stuff of a man. 
 
 In The Tempest, Miranda is a robust, 
 healthy child of nature, a splendid girl, happy 
 as the birds that sing above her head, sweet as 
 the flowers that swing their censers at her feet, 
 pure as the stars that laugh their glory on her 
 hair. Society has not spoiled her. Happy soul, 
 she does not know what society means. Physi- 
 cally and mentally she is a well girl. She has 
 
 93 
 
94 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 not been contaminated by the salon, nor cor- 
 rupted by the frivolities of her own sex. So 
 innocent is she of all guile, so unsophisticated 
 withal, that she does not suspect the sweet 
 naivete of her confession to Ferdinand, though 
 it reveals the very philosophy of her beauty 
 of countenance, form, and soul. 
 
 "I do not know 
 One of my sex; no woman's face remember, 
 Save from my glass, mine own; nor have I seen 
 More that I may call man, than you, good friend, 
 And my dear father." 
 
 This unspoiled girl, ideal in her filial devo- 
 tion, and in the pure innocency of her love for 
 the noble Ferdinand, and who knew nothing 
 of those hypocritical blandishments and flat- 
 teries of social life, which spoil simplicity and 
 naivete with affectations and deceitful arts 
 of coquetry, may well have elicited from her 
 lover that sincere acknowledgment, which 
 constitutes her the paragon of Shakespearean 
 womanhood, the purest goddess in the pan- 
 theon of his brain, the most admirable, lov- 
 able creature in all the teeming paradise of his 
 luxuriant imagination. 
 
 "Full many a lady 
 I have eyed with best regard; and many a time 
 The harmony of their tongues hath into bondage 
 Brought my too diligent ear. For several virtues 
 Have I liked several women; never any 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 95 
 
 With so full soul, but some defect in her 
 Did quarrel with the noblest grace she owed 
 And put it to the foil. But you, O you, 
 So perfect and so peerless, are created 
 Of every creature's best!" 
 
 All ! here, if ever need shall be for heroism, 
 here may be found the rare combination of 
 virtues, which she must needs possess, who, 
 when duty calls, will act the heroine. Not 
 that Miranda's unquestioning obedience and 
 worshipful devotion to her father, who has be- 
 come but little less than a god to her filial im- 
 agination, not that her most innocent, frank 
 and womanly confession of love for Ferdinand, 
 constitute heroism. But one so pure, chaste, 
 intelligent, well-balanced, healthy in body and 
 mind, one so natural, strong, ingenuous, sym- 
 pathetic, dutiful and womanly in every way, 
 could not refuse to make any self-sacrifice that 
 love or duty might reasonably demand of sane 
 and high-souled womanhood. If she is not 
 the heroine, it is because she has not, as yet, 
 had occasion to prove it. She is the ideal 
 heroine in all the sweet and noble possibilities. 
 How infinitely superior is this happy, healthy, 
 unspoiled, unaffected, frank-hearted, splendid 
 girl to the soft, sighing, falsely educated 
 Juliet, or the poor, frail, all-too-confiding 
 Ophelia! How much more valuable to the 
 world is such a woman! How incomparably 
 
96 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 more valuable is the love of such a woman 
 to any man braver than a Romeo, or more 
 evenly balanced than a Hamlet! Here shall 
 we find in happy combination all that may be 
 demanded of woman in the heroism of life, 
 in the duties and devotions of daughter, sister, 
 wife, and mother. 
 
 Nothing finer has the poet done than in 
 the portrayal of Miranda's filial love, ad- 
 miration, and reverence. True, she had 
 seen no other man until Ferdinand appeared 
 to rouse the latent passion of which she did 
 not know her woman nature was possessed. 
 But had she known all wise, great men — all 
 warriors, courtiers, princes, kings — scarcely 
 could she have known such another man as 
 Prospero. That father was himself her 
 ideal of a man. He taught her by his own 
 combination of high virtues what to expect 
 and demand of every man in character. But 
 had not this lesson, taught her by her father's 
 own nobility, made it difficult, if not impos- 
 sible, for any other man to measure up to 
 the ideal, which in its perfection must needs 
 first excite a woman's admiration before it 
 can inspire her love? It may be argued that 
 Miranda's love for her father, her daughterly 
 awe of his poAver and high virtues, her glad 
 obedience, deference, and worshipful rever- 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 97 
 
 ence were not moral qualities that had ever 
 been put to the test by the influences of 
 worldly frivolities, by the fierce currents and 
 counter currents of fortune, or by the tempta- 
 tions of social life. It is not the aim of the 
 poet to portray this daughter-heroine under 
 the trying ordeal of adverse circumstances, 
 but to show the beauty of daughterly love and 
 loyalty unspotted from the world, in its orig- 
 inal unspoiled sweetness and nobility, leaving 
 us to imagine from what a high, divinely 
 beautiful ideal of filial duty and devotion the 
 blandishments and hypocrisies of worldly so- 
 ciety may drag a woman, if they once get their 
 grip upon her holy naturalness. If Miranda 
 was never called upon to act the part of the 
 daughter-heroine, nevertheless no doubt of her 
 heroism can exist in our mind, and occasion 
 only is required to bring forth in glorious 
 manifestation every virtue of the heroine. 
 That father cannot ask of such a daughter any 
 act of devotion, which she has not the heroism 
 to render. It is well now and then to look 
 upon a heroine who has not to suffer and to be 
 sacrificed, if in her presence we are conscious 
 of the strength and goodness of her person- 
 ality, and feel that though she may never be 
 called upon to prove it by deeds, she is never- 
 theless a heroine. 
 
98 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 Cordelia 
 
 We see the test of filial loyalty more fully 
 manifest and more startlingly accentuated in 
 the sublime tragedy of King Lear, where 
 yawns the awful, fathomless chasm between 
 the unnatural Goneril and Regan and the in- 
 comparably true, honest, self-sacrificing hero- 
 ine, Cordelia. Here filial love is put to the 
 test, to the severest, unkindest, most cruel 
 test. 
 
 King Lear of Britain was advancing in 
 years, and as he felt the burden of royal affairs 
 press more and more heavily upon him, he 
 proposed to divide his kingdom among his 
 daughters. 
 
 "Know that we have divided 
 In three our kingdom; and 'tis our fast intent 
 To shake all cares and business from our age. 
 Conferring them on younger strengths, while we 
 Unburdened, crawl toward death." 
 
 It evidently was the purpose of the king 
 to bestow these realms according to desert 
 based upon his daughters' love for him. Or, 
 in truth, his generosity was to be measured 
 by their flattery. Two daughters, Goneril 
 and Regan, were most rhetorical and extrava- 
 gant in their expressions of love, going beyond 
 the bounds of truth and sincerity, and indulg- 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTEE 99 
 
 ing in the most fulsome and inconsiderate 
 flattery. It greatly tickled tlie pride of this 
 silly old king to hear these bombastic avowals 
 of impossible affection. But modest, high- 
 minded Cordelia, the other daughter, listening 
 to such declarations, which she knew to be 
 nothing but insincere flattery, resolved that 
 she would not enter a contest so humiliating 
 and ignoble. She loved her father too tenderly 
 and sincerely to make a fool of him and a de- 
 ceiver of herself by claiming that she loved him 
 to the exclusion of all others, even of a future 
 lover or husband. Moreover, she was not 
 skilled in dissimulation and the art of flattery. 
 She loves more than she can express, hence she 
 resolves: "What shall Cordelia do? Love, 
 and be silent." She is not lacking in filial 
 tenderness and deep emotion, but her womanly 
 instincts, her high sense of honor, her appre- 
 ciation of what is due the dignity and majesty 
 of a king inspire her with a horror of an ap- 
 peal to his vanity for any personal gain of 
 wealth or power. Hence she is perfectly frank 
 in her confession, muttered to herself: 
 
 "My love's 
 More ponderous than my tongue." 
 
 Goneril and Regan were already highly mar- 
 ried, the former to the Duke of Albany, the 
 
100 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 latter to the Duke of Cornwall. Two suitors, 
 the duke of Burgundy and the king of France, 
 were rivals for the hand of Cordelia. The suc- 
 cessful suitor might expect a rich dowry with 
 the fair lady, at least her rightful share in 
 the division of the kingdom. And such a 
 dowry had Cordelia the right to expect she 
 would be able to bestow upon her chosen lord. 
 The flattering tongues of deceitful and ambi- 
 tious Goneril and Regan had won for them 
 most generous proportions of the king's do- 
 main. Finally it is Cordelia's turn to tell 
 the king how much she loves him. Swollen 
 with silly vanity by the flatteries of his other 
 daughters, he turns expectantly to his favorite 
 Cordelia. 
 
 Lear. Now, our joy, 
 
 Although the last, not least, to whose young love 
 
 The vines of France and milk of Burgundy 
 
 Strive to he interested; what can you say to draw 
 
 A third more opulent than your sisters? 
 
 Cordelia. Nothing, my lord. 
 
 Lear. Nothing? 
 
 Cordelia. Nothing. 
 
 Lear. Nothing will come of nothing: speak again. 
 
 Cordelia. Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave 
 
 My heart into my mouth: I love your 
 Majesty, 
 
 According to my bond; nor more nor less. 
 Lear. How, how, Cordelia! mend your speech a 
 
 little 
 
 Lest it may mar your fortune. 
 
THE HEROINB-DAUGHTEE 101 
 
 Cordelia. You have begot me, bred me, loved me: I 
 Return those duties back as are right and 
 
 fit; 
 Obey you, love you, and most honor you. 
 Why have my sisters husbands, if they say 
 They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed, 
 That lord whose hand must take my plight 
 
 shall carry 
 Half my love with him, half my care and 
 
 duty; 
 Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters, 
 To love my father all. 
 
 Lear. But goes thy heart with this? 
 
 Cordelia. Ay, my good lord. 
 
 Lear. So young, and so untender? 
 
 Cordelia. So young, my lord, and true. 
 
 The king was in a rage. His inordinate van- 
 ity had been stung by Cordelia's dignity and 
 frankness. She would not insult him by flat- 
 tering words. He imagined, what she could 
 not imagine, that flattery was the measure of 
 honor, duty, reverence, and love. In his wrath 
 the king disinherited Cordelia. Burgundy 
 at once revealed his base and ambitious char- 
 acter by withdrawing his suit, showing that 
 his love was to be measured by her dowry, 
 not by Cordelia's personal worth. The king 
 of France, Avith nobler spirit, still pressed his 
 suit and in his admiration cried : "She is her- 
 self a dowry." 
 
 After bidding her father farewell the disin- 
 herited Cordelia departed, and in her depar- 
 
102 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 ture, poor illusioned Lear lost the only daugh- 
 ter that truly loved and honored him. Having 
 surrendered his power and possessions to his 
 false and flattering daughters Goneril and 
 Regan, and Albany and Cornwall having as- 
 cended to the control of the kingdom, the old 
 king soon began to reap the harvest of his 
 pride and folly. His daughters began to de- 
 grade and humiliate him, ceased to treat him 
 with filial respect, no longer recognized his 
 royalty, stopped at no insult, and virtually 
 closed their doors upon him. It was soon- 
 manifest that these unnatural daughters 
 poisoned their husbands with a contempt for 
 their father and instigated them to intrigue 
 for his destruction. The conditions which the 
 king made as to his own rights and privileges 
 were finally repudiated by these ungrateful 
 children and he was denied the honor of a cer- 
 tain stipulated number of servants, attend- 
 ants, and followers and was reduced to abject 
 dependence upon his daughters' niggardly 
 bounty. His presence was no longer welcome ; 
 the insults of those who should have honored 
 him were no longer endurable. Departing 
 from their homes, he went forth a wanderer, 
 without shelter from the storm, and for com- 
 panions his fool and what appeared to be a 
 beggar and a madman. The ingratitude and 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 103 
 
 cruelty of his flattering and favored daughters 
 so enraged him and so preyed upon his feelings 
 that reason forsook him, while his motley garb 
 and crown of weeds and straw and his inco- 
 herent mutterings told the sad story of his 
 pitiable imbecility. Then was it that Cor- 
 delia, disowned and disinherited Cordelia, 
 heard of her father's condition with deepest 
 emotions of pity and sorrow. 
 
 The unnatural daughters who had treated 
 Lear with such brutal indignity were soon at 
 enmity with each other. Albany and Cornwall 
 were scheming each against the other for the 
 supremacy, and were bent on the capture and 
 destruction of the old king, inspired by the 
 fiendish Goneril and Regan. 
 
 The cruel treatment which Lear had visited 
 upon that true and loyal daughter never for 
 a moment quenched her love and veneration. 
 Queen that she was, and he but a dethroned 
 king and lunatic, the companion of fools and 
 beggars, her heart yearned to serve him in 
 his humiliation and misfortune. 
 
 In the meantime Cordelia had married the 
 king of France, and the French army invaded 
 England to thwart the unholy and ambitious 
 intrigues of Goneril and Regan in their effort 
 to destroy King Lear and seize all power. 
 When Cordelia is informed that the British 
 
104 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 are approaching and a battle is imminent, she 
 replies : 
 
 " 'Tis known before; our preparation stands 
 In expectation of them. O dear father, 
 It is thy business that I go about; 
 Therefore great France 
 
 My mourning and importune tears hath pitied. 
 No blown ambition doth our arms incite. 
 But love, dear love, and our aged father's right; 
 Soon may I hear and see him!" 
 
 This is the daughter who conld not ignobly 
 flatter her poor old father even for so vast a 
 proportion of his kingly realms as he was 
 ready to bestow upon her for it. She who 
 could not express her love in words now ex- 
 presses it in deeds more eloquent than lan- 
 guage. For his sake and in obedience to the 
 promptings of her filial love and veneration, 
 ignoring and forgetting his humiliation of 
 her, she inspires her royal husband to take 
 up arms against Lear's ungrateful and trai- 
 torous daughters and their husbands, Albany 
 and Cornwall. 
 
 It is learned that Lear is in Dover, the 
 camp of the French army. Search is made 
 for him at the request of Cordelia and he is 
 found and conveyed to a tent in the camp 
 where Cordelia sees him, praying as she looks 
 upon his sad condition, 
 
THE HEROINE-DAUGHTER 105 
 
 "O you kind gods. 
 Cure this great breacti in his abused nature." 
 
 As he sleeps she bends over him and tries to 
 
 waken him by her caresses: 
 
 "O my dear father! Restoration hang 
 Thy medicine on my lips, and let this kiss 
 Repair those violent harms that my two sisters 
 Have in thy reverence made!" 
 
 When he awakes bewildered, she asks him 
 
 tenderly, "Sir, do you know me?" He takes 
 
 her for a spirit and 'would kneel before her, 
 
 but she pityingly cries : 
 
 "O, look upon me, sir. 
 And hold your hands in benediction o'er me: 
 No, sir, you must not kneel." 
 
 His mind seems to clear a little and he 
 
 realizes the meaning of Cordelia's request, but 
 
 feebly replies : 
 
 "Pray, do not mock me: 
 I am a very foolish fond old man. 
 Fourscore and upward, not an hour more nor less; 
 And, to deal plainly, 
 I fear I am not in my perfect mind." 
 
 Still do the clouds slowly clear away; the 
 light, as at the dawn, creeps into the darkness 
 of his mind. He looks into his Cordelia's face ; 
 he seems to recognize her, yet he fears to 
 say it: 
 
 "Do not laugh at me; 
 For, as I am a man, I think this lady 
 To be my child Cordelia," 
 
106 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 to which Cordelia replies: "And so I am, I 
 am." 
 
 What scene more tender, noble, and pathetic 
 has either Shakespeare or any other dramatist 
 ever depicted! In all the wide realms of ro- 
 mance where is the filial affection and heroism 
 of a daughter more exquisitely, more tenderly, 
 yet more magnificently portrayed? But, alas! 
 it remains for this noble Cordelia to further 
 prove her filial heroism by a devotion that 
 reaches its climax in martyrdom. In this, one 
 of the most sublime tragedies of literature, 
 death follows death in rapid.succession. Corn- 
 wall is killed by his servant; both Goneril and 
 Eegan prove false to their own husbands ; and 
 then Goneril poisons Eegan and stabs her- 
 self to death. Lear and Cordelia have been 
 captured and imprisoned with the order that 
 they be speedily dispatched. Though this or- 
 der is countermanded by Albany, whose sym- 
 pathies have been with Lear, and a messenger 
 is sent in all haste to prevent the execution 
 of the order, it is too late. Poor Cordelia has 
 been hanged in the prison, and the messenger 
 meets Lear bearing forth her dead body in his 
 arms from the prison where he had slain her 
 hangman. And there, bending over her poor 
 lifeless form, trying to resuscitate her, once 
 more his reason reels. But death comes to his 
 
THE HEEOINE-DAUGHTER 107 
 
 relief as, bowed upon the form of that daugh- 
 ter who loved him too deeply for words and 
 too sincerely for flattery, he falls asleep for- 
 ever, his hoary head at rest upon the bosom 
 in which no cruelty, no unkindness of his, and 
 no pride or ambition of this world could ever 
 quench the sweet and holy fire of filial love 
 and devotion. 
 
 Of all the daughters of Shakespeare's drama, 
 Cordelia is the most perfect heroine in her 
 devotion to the honor and majesty of her 
 father, in her sweet injury-forgetting mag- 
 nanimity, and in the depth and honesty of her 
 self-sacrificing love. 
 
 Against the dark background of her sisters' 
 ingratitude, flattering deceitfulness, and base, 
 unnatural cruelty, shine the daughterly faith- 
 fulness, the high-minded, unfaltering devotion, 
 and the tender, heart-breaking solicitude of 
 Cordelia, with a splendor that awes imagina- 
 tion beyond the power of sighs and tears, and 
 becomes something so sublime that pity of 
 her seems an insult to soul-greatness. Poor 
 Cordelia ! No, no, our lips refuse to form the 
 unworthy lament. Poor Lear, poor Lear ! But 
 great, noble, glorious Cordelia ! Happy, beau- 
 tiful Cordelia! Saint Cordelia! Paragon 
 and patron of the daughter-heroines of ro- 
 mance ! 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE HEROINE-MOTHER 
 Constance 
 
 There may be found in tlie artistic de- 
 mands of the drama itself the reasons why 
 woman, as daughter or mother, does not lend 
 herself to keenly interesting dramatic repre- 
 sentation or to great variety of poetical and 
 romantic situations. Be that as it may, we 
 find not a single one of Shakespeare's greatest 
 plays, whether comedy or tragedy, that de- 
 rives its interest from any situation into 
 which dramatic art may have placed a mother, 
 or from which it may have rescued her. 
 
 If we except Volumnia and Constance, 
 where are the great mothers in these comedies 
 and tragedies? Constance of Bretagne in her 
 devotion to the political interests of her 
 son, Arthur, is truly a majestic character. 
 All the resources of her powerful nature — 
 love, passion, intellect, ambition, pride, elo- 
 quence, the instinct of royalty — are conse- 
 crated to Arthur's rights, and to the estab- 
 lishment of his claims on the Duchy of Bre- 
 tagne and the throne of England. She is 
 108 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 109 
 
 one woman against a host of warriors, cour- 
 tiers, princes, and kings, wlio are plotting the 
 downfall and ruin of her "pretty Arthur." 
 And what a magnificent war she wages against 
 Arthur's powerful enemies! But though her 
 weapons be the most various and trenchant 
 that ever a royal woman wielded, and her 
 championship of her son's legitimate claims 
 could never have been excelled by the passion- 
 ate and eloquent devotion of a royal mother, 
 she struggles against fearful odds and she 
 struggles in vain. In reality, she had fought 
 the injustice and cruelty of three Mugs — 
 Henry II, Richard Coeur de Lion, and John — 
 and all to bring fair Arthur into possession 
 of his own. It was the great struggle of a 
 great mother, but of a mother too whose 
 maternal affection was tinged with romantic 
 superstition and royal ambition. Constance 
 had doubtless caught the spirit of her people, 
 and had come to see in her Arthur the reincar- 
 nation of the hero of the Round Table, or the 
 other Arthur, who was to come in fulfillment 
 of the prophecies. She therefore invested his 
 personality with a romantic, if not a super- 
 natural, character. She saw in him a beauty, 
 greatness, and power that were not his, save 
 to imaginations that dreamed dreams and saw 
 visions. Her love was not simply a mother 
 
110 HEROINES OP HISTOEY 
 
 love ; it was a royal-mother love — the affection 
 of a mother who thought in terms of crowns, 
 scepters, and thrones. One mother may ex- 
 haust her imagination by dreaming that her 
 boy will become a good mechanic, a prosperous 
 farmer, a skillful physician, or a distinguished 
 lawyer. Constance could dream of nothing 
 for her son but sovereignty, dominion, empire. 
 She was born to such dreams. And we can 
 imagine that no mother of royal blood was 
 ever more heroically devoted to the honor and 
 glory of her son than was she to the ducal and 
 kingly exaltation of Arthur. 
 
 But is not the heroic element in the maternal 
 affection diminished, if not tainted, by the 
 ambition of Constance, and does not that ambi- 
 tion contain a good-sized proportion of self- 
 interest, which becomes very manifest in her 
 passionate eloquence and in her final disap- 
 pointment and despair? Heroism is absolutely 
 disinterested. Was the enthusiasm, the 
 motherly devotion, the almost hysterical am- 
 bition of Constance as absolutely disinterested, 
 for instance, as Cordelia's daughterly devo- 
 tion? Did she for Arthur's sake eliminate 
 self, sacrifice self as completely as Cordelia 
 eliminated and sacrificed self and all self- 
 interest for her father-king? That Shakespeare 
 has drawn a most imposing figure in the 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 111 
 
 character of Constance, a woman of power, 
 unbending will, higli ambition, passionate 
 eloquence, vast mental resource, keen sensi- 
 bility, haughty pride, and indomitable courage, 
 is conceded. And that all this woman's attri- 
 butes were bent on one achievement, conse- 
 crated almost fanatically, certainly frantically, 
 if not monomaniacally, to the royal advance- 
 ment of her son, is gloriously evident in this 
 play. That Constance, however, thought only 
 of Arthur's rights and glory, and that in all 
 her intensity of devotion to his promotion she 
 completely effaced herself, is not so clearly 
 evident ; but that the heroic element is wholly 
 destroyed by what of self-interest and personal 
 royal pride and ambition Constance may have 
 injected into the struggle will not be claimed. 
 She was a heroic mother, whose grandeur and 
 majesty were worthy of even a higher aim and 
 purpose than the coronation of her Arthur, 
 and of a higher heroism than her magnificent 
 struggle to be honored as the mother of a king. 
 
 VOLUMNIA 
 
 It is quite worthy of reflection that we have 
 to go into the historical region to find the 
 mother-heroine. Although Shakespeare works 
 as much romance as is permissible into the 
 delineation of the characters of Constance and 
 
112 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 Volnmnia, these characters are nevertheless 
 historical; and in the case of Volumnia the 
 poet has not departed to any great extent 
 from Plutarch. Is this a confession on the 
 part of Shakespeare that, while his genius was 
 capable of creating a purely romantic and 
 ideal lover, wife, and even daughter, it never 
 attempted to create the ideal mother? In all 
 these plays, what woman that is purely ro- 
 mantic or ideal in conception and entirely the 
 creation of the poet's imagination approxi- 
 mates as nearly to the perfection of a mother 
 as Miranda does to the perfection of a daugh- 
 ter, or as Portia does to the perfection of a 
 wife, or as Rosalind does to the perfection of 
 a sweetheart? Volumnia is a historical per- 
 sonage, but as he has done with Cleopatra and 
 with Constance, Shakespeare has clothed her 
 with a degree of romance that brings her 
 character within the limits of this discussion. 
 
 Here is a mother with whom modernism is 
 not familiar, just as modernism is not familiar 
 with collosi, parthenons, and triumphal 
 arches. It may be objected that Volumnia as 
 a dramatic character has no message for the 
 motherhood of this age, as, indeed, Constance 
 has not, and all because the world has passed 
 beyond the necessity for a Coriolanus, and is 
 no longer interested in Arthur and his ilk. If 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHEE 113 
 
 we can succeed in translating ourselves to the 
 fifth century before the Christian era, and in 
 adjusting our ways of thinking to the environ- 
 ment that conditioned the achievements of 
 Coriolanus, we may be able to appreciate the 
 mother-heroism of Volumnia. But to trans- 
 late this matron to London, Paris, Berlin, 
 Washington, or even Saint Petersburg in this 
 twentieth century of the Christian era, would 
 be as intolerable an anachronism as it would 
 be to transfer Egyptian hieroglyphics to a 
 modern newspaper, a Greek trireme to the 
 Atlantic mail service, or the Temple of Diana 
 to Central Park, New York city. 
 
 Here is a mother to bear and nurse a Roman 
 general, a mother to be thought of as we think 
 of Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, or of 
 Olympia, the mother of Alexander the Great, 
 or of the traditionally austere and patriotic 
 mothers of Sparta. Here is a mother who 
 wastes no tears over her "pretty Arthur," but 
 with the instincts of the lion's dam training 
 her whelps to sniff the air for blood, she glories 
 in bearing sons for battlefields, and laughs 
 with pride to see them borne back to her in 
 their dented war-harness crimsoned with their 
 own hearts' price of victory. It was a tender 
 tribute Benjamin West paid his good Quaker 
 mother, when he said, "Her kiss made me a 
 
114 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 painter." But it is a different spirited mother 
 that can say to her son, 
 
 "Thou hast said 
 My praises made thee first a soldier." 
 
 Keep in mind that those old Roman ideals 
 were consistent with Roman genius of the 
 hardy, republican days. 
 
 It was this ideal Roman mother that boasted 
 she had let her son, when he was tender-bodied, 
 "seek danger, where he was like to find fame." 
 Her exultation over his prowess in battle even 
 at that tender age reveals a characteristic of 
 motherhood which it would take the old 
 Roman sentiment to appreciate. 
 
 "To cruel war I sent him; from ■whence he returned, 
 his brows bound with oak. I tell thee, daughter, I 
 sprang not more in joy at first hearing he was a man- 
 child than now in first seeing he had proved himself 
 a man." 
 
 It was for such a mother's imagination to 
 create for itself such an ideal of a son ; and to 
 fashion her Marcius to that iron ideal was the 
 ambition of Volumnia. But that military 
 ideal of manhood, that manhood of battle and 
 "terrible swift sword," belonged to the old re- 
 publican ideal of patriotism, of country, of 
 civilization, of Roman supremacy. Volumnia 
 was true to that ideal when, with an eloquence 
 
THE HEEOINE-MOTHER 115 
 
 and patriotism worthy of any age that ever 
 was or ever shall be, she said : 
 
 "Had I a dozen sons, each in my love alike, and none 
 less dear than thine and my good Marcius, I had rather 
 had eleven die nobly for their country than one volup- 
 tuously surfeit out of action." 
 
 In Volumnia we find a higher and more 
 disinterested mother-devotion than any of 
 which Constance was capable. The Roman 
 mother's ambition for her son's greatness was 
 animated by a patriotism that raised it to a 
 sublime virtue, far above any to be found in 
 the nature of Arthur's mother. Volumnia 
 would have her son become great for Rome's 
 glory. What were crowns and thrones, hered- 
 itary claims and Mngly titles, that danced 
 before the ambitious eyes of Constance, but 
 cheap baubles, compared with the splendid, 
 patriotic vision of her country's glory, of 
 Rome's supremacy, that inspired Volumnia in 
 fashioning the character of Coriolanus? To 
 bring her "pretty Arthur" to a throne, Con- 
 stance would sacrifice the peace of Bretagne, 
 and for his sake she let her people perish and 
 her country waste its blood and treasure. But 
 for Rome's glory Volumnia lived and trained 
 her son to greatness, and in her country's good, 
 for which his greatness wrought such splendid 
 deeds, she had reward. Nay, she let her son 
 
116 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 perish to save Rome, and gloried that he by 
 perishing was great enough to save his coun- 
 try. The proud consciousness of being the 
 mother of Coriolanus, the hero and saviour of 
 Rome, she would not have exchanged for all 
 the hereditary titles that the world's "pretty 
 Arthurs" may claim and sacrifice their coun- 
 try's life to win. After all, is not Volumnia's 
 deep and soul-mastering conception of the 
 identification of her son's life with her coun- 
 try's destiny, an eternally noble virtue and 
 attitude of heroic motherhood? Is not the 
 patriot-mother the mother-heroine? And 
 should not the son of such a mother exult in 
 the spirit that bears and trains and conse- 
 crates him to the greatness and glory of his 
 country? To Coriolanus Volumnia was "the 
 most noble mother in the world." So great, 
 august, majestic was she in his thought, that 
 when she bowed to him in her supplication 
 for Rome, he exclaimed with a noble venera- 
 tion, 
 
 "My mother bows; 
 As if Olympus to a molehill should 
 In supplication nod." 
 
 No higher proof of a mother's heroism can 
 be imagined than Volumnia's training of 
 Coriolanus to be a great Roman for Rome's 
 glory, and then sacrificing him on the altar 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 117 
 
 of a lofty patriotism to save Rome. And no 
 higher tribute could be paid to such heroic 
 motherhood than was paid Volumnia in the 
 self-sacriflcing, Rome-saving, but mother- 
 honoring act of Coriolanus. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE HEEOINE-WIFE 
 
 POETIA 
 
 The most interesting characters in Shake- 
 speare's drama are wives. Beauty, wealth, and 
 elegance combined with genius and mental 
 accomplishments do not often clothe the strong 
 and self-sacrificing character of a heroine. If 
 the poets are too prone to array their heroines 
 in the splendid attributes that appeal to the 
 plebeian imagination, and represent all the 
 patrician embellishments of ciilture as the im- 
 mediate jewels of the heroic sovl, in the char- 
 acter of Portia Shakespeare has succeeded 
 beyond all others in showing that the noblest 
 womanhood and highest heroism may be very 
 consistent with an aristocratic breeding. He 
 has succeeded in portraying a woman adorned 
 with all the graces, refinements, and advan- 
 tages of honor, riches, beauty, high birth, wit, 
 intellectuality, education, and the world's 
 flattery and applause, without being spoiled 
 by them. He gives us a charming portraiture 
 of a woman possessing all that a woman can 
 wish for, aspire to, or possess, who, instead 
 of becoming the slave and victim of their in- 
 118 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 119 
 
 fluence Tipon her diviner self, is capable of 
 subordinating them to an intuitive purity, a 
 refined and exquisite sense of feminine pro- 
 priety, and the dictates of a sweet will which 
 maintain in her heart that most exalted and 
 exalting consciousness of which woman can 
 virtuously boast — "queen o'er myself." 
 
 Among these portraits drawn by Shake- 
 speare Portia wears a beauty and a grace su- 
 perlative. Most fortunate of men, Bassanio, to 
 have wooed and won so fair a lady, such an 
 incomparable woman, such a perfect incarna- 
 tion of wit and wisdom, beauty and sense, 
 sentiment and virtue! The wives of Shake- 
 speare's plays are the most highly finished 
 creations of his genius. And in the wifely 
 relations of woman, the poet finds full scope 
 for his powers in the illustration of the virtues 
 of highest feminine heroism. It may not be 
 so apparent that Portia is a heroine as that 
 she is simply a most gifted and intellectual 
 woman, a passionate lover of Bassanio, and 
 that she is his true, affectionate, and admiring 
 wife. Nevertheless, is there not a fine, sweet 
 self-abnegation, an absolutely pure and un- 
 selfish heroism in a strong, superior woman 
 surrendering herself unreservedly to the will 
 of him whom she loves? To become a wife 
 woman becomes a heroine- With what self- 
 
120 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 abandon does Portia surrender all to Bassanio 
 — her great wealth, her estates, her name, 
 herself ! 
 
 "Myself and what is mine, to you and yours 
 Is now converted." 
 
 But beautiful as she is, rich, accomplished, 
 patrician-souled, what an heroic love is hers 
 that she can say to Bassanio, 
 
 "And all my fortunes at thy feet I lay, 
 And follow thee, my lord, through all the world." 
 
 But to be still more worthy of him whom she 
 loves, of the man whose wife she is to become, 
 she has a most heroic ambition. It is the old, 
 old story of a true woman's merging her own 
 destiny in the destiny of her lover-husband. 
 To exalt him, and herself in him, she depre- 
 ciates all the splendid gifts which she brings 
 to his enrichment in her possessions and her 
 personality and longs to be more, infinitely 
 more, than she is for his sake. Is not this the 
 heroine in woman-life? And what words can 
 more eloqnently reveal the greatly loving soul 
 of such a heroine than the passionate confes- 
 sion of Portia : 
 
 "You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand. 
 Such as I am; though for myself alone 
 I would not be ambitious in my wish, 
 To wish myself much better, yet, for you, 
 I would be trebled twenty times myself; 
 
THE HBKOINE-WIFE 121 
 
 A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times 
 More rich; 
 
 That only to stand high in your account, 
 I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends, 
 Exceed account." 
 
 With what a dower would she enrich her hus- 
 band! With what a dower does she enrich 
 him! While the strongest virtues blend in 
 her character — intellect, philosophical acu- 
 men, logical sense, pride of birth, patrician 
 instinct, the love of learning, and the judicial 
 temper — yet does Portia remain sweetly, ten- 
 derly, domestically feminine. She is a rare 
 combination, indeed ; in her we see the beauty 
 of a Cleopatra, without the Egyptian's sensu- 
 ality; the virtue of an Isabella, without her 
 austerity; the wit of a Beatrice, without her 
 flippancy; the tenderness of a Juliet, without 
 her sentimentality; the clinging, confiding 
 devotion of an Ophelia, without her weakness 
 of will ; and the innocency of a Miranda, with- 
 out her rusticity. This strong-minded woman 
 has a most gentle disposition, and with all 
 her fine intellectual powers trained to high 
 thinking, she is capable of loving with a most 
 ardent soul. If she lives in the same mental 
 atmosphere as a Madame de Stael, a Harriet 
 Martineau, a George Eliot, she dwells in a 
 warmer soul-clime and is not stifled, as they 
 would be, by the sweetest perfumes of the 
 
122 HEROINES OF HISTOEY 
 
 Arabia of romance and love. She is not cold 
 and masculine, but is so warmly feminine, 
 that among the real historic women of great 
 intellect, we do not find her equal, and we 
 shall search the world of romance and poetry 
 in vain to discover her parallel. Here is a 
 woman who is not conscious of any unwomanly 
 humiliation, when with her queenly intellectu- 
 ality, her superb self-command, her aristo- 
 cratic training, her noble will, her sparkling 
 wit, and her radiant beauty, she yields to the 
 womanly promptings of her womanly in- 
 stincts, and gives herself, all her rich, abun- 
 dant and splendid self, to the man whom she 
 loves, and whom she is proud to call her lord. 
 Yes, there is a very sweetly subtle element of 
 heroism in this. For such a woman to become 
 a wife, in all the tender devotion and self- 
 effacement of a true wife, is to be a heroine. 
 The very genius of Portia accentuates the 
 heroism of her being so wifely a wife, so com- 
 pletely and unreservedly absorbed in the man 
 whom she so highly honors as her husband, 
 the ideal of her heart's affection, the comrade 
 of her life. 
 
 If the trial scene in the Merchant of Venice 
 reveals the subtlety of her mind, the opulence 
 of her learning, the righteous balance of her 
 judgment, the strength of her reason, the 
 
THE HEKOINE-WIFE 123 
 
 eloquence of her tongue, and the majesty of 
 her character, it does not leave us simply ad- 
 miring her accomplishments. Eather does it 
 remind us of the fact that she has conde- 
 scended to act this role wherein she displays 
 her genius from the promptings of wifely 
 affection. Portia is a representative heroine- 
 wife. For they live and move and have their 
 being in the divine world of marriage, the 
 earthly heaven, we call home, these tran- 
 scendent creatures, these superlative women, 
 these true, pure, self-sacrificing wives of the 
 sons of men. 
 
 Lady Macbeth 
 
 Is it possible for the imagination to project 
 upon the canvas of pure ideality a consistent 
 portrait of a wicked heroine? Is such a con- 
 ception possible as a woman lost to every 
 virtue but fidelity to her husband's bed and 
 to her husband's greatness? And if so, may 
 such a creature become heroic, truly heroic, 
 in her mad ambition for her husband's honor? 
 In the sacrifice of all the sweet and tender 
 feelings of her sex, all the gentlest, holiest 
 instincts of womanhood to that almost savage, 
 diabolical ambition, may she become a hero- 
 ine? Can there be a fiendish, murderous 
 heroism? There can be such an ambition. 
 
124 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 But is it possible for such, an ambition to 
 become heroic, or to possess any real element 
 of heroism? If so, then even a Lady Macbeth 
 may have had back of and underneath all her 
 ambition and wickedness a heroic spirit. We 
 cannot read this masterpiece of Shakespearean 
 tragedy without amazement that a wife would 
 so completely sacrifice herself, so nearly un- 
 sex herself, so deliberately demonize herself 
 for another's promotion to a throne, as Lady 
 Macbeth is made to do, that her husband may 
 become king of Scotland. There is nothing 
 weak, sensual, or contemptible in this woman. 
 She is powerful, fierce, commanding — the in- 
 carnation of wile and will, the embodiment of 
 daring and determination — though she is 
 physically a small, rather delicate woman. 
 Masculine? No; she is a form of devilish 
 femininity. She tries her utmost to unsex 
 herself, to be unfeminine and mannish in the 
 execution of her ambitious purposes, but she 
 cannot. She is a woman, a bad, wicked, am- 
 bitious, fiendish, lost woman, but a woman. 
 Therein lies the subtle art of Shakespeare. 
 There is no inconsistency in this character. 
 In real life when a woman becomes ambitious 
 it is with a woman's ambition; when she be- 
 comes angry it is with a woman's anger; when 
 she scolds she scolds like a woman; when she 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 125 
 
 raves she raves like a woman; if she swears 
 she swears like a woman ; if she plots she plots 
 like a woman. So Shakespeare never forgets 
 that Lady Macbeth is a woman, nor can we 
 forget it. She thinks nothing, says nothing, 
 attempts nothing mannishly. Her nature, her 
 instincts, however depraved they may become, 
 are never masculine ; they are always feminine. 
 Therein lay her power and her influence over 
 Macbeth; that influence was a woman's in- 
 fluence. No other could have driven Macbeth 
 to the fate that ruined him. He might have 
 resisted — nay, he would have resisted — the 
 demoniacal ambition and murderous sugges- 
 tions of any man. But a woman, a wife with 
 a woman's wit and a woman's will, with a 
 wife's affection, and a wife's devotion to what 
 she dreamed to be his highest destiny, he could 
 not resist. Is there not to be found in this 
 wreck and ruin of a once majestic womanhood 
 a single imperishable jewel of wifely heroism? 
 When the tomb of the venerable Bede was 
 opened, there upon his breast lay a ring; the 
 flesh of the hand that had worn it was a little 
 heap of dust. At the skeleton neck of a dead 
 and mummied queen has hung a ruby or sap- 
 phire, which shone still with undiminished 
 luster in the earth and ashes, to which death 
 had dissolved the once beautiful body. The 
 
126 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 priceless jewel of heroism is still sMning there 
 in the dead, ruined, self-sacrificed and self- 
 damned womanhood of Lady Macbeth! It 
 would seem that before the temptation came 
 upon them to win the throne of Scotland at 
 any cost, a strong and tender affection united 
 Macbeth and his wife. And even during the 
 horrible development of this tragedy, expres- 
 sions of endearment pass between them. She 
 hails him, "Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!" 
 But even more tenderly, forgetting all titles 
 and dignities, she seems fond of the expression, 
 "My husband." After receiving his letter she 
 reveals her appreciation of Macbeth's natural- 
 ly tender nature; when meditating upon what 
 his letter conveys, she says: 
 
 "Yet do I fear thy nature; 
 It is too full o' the milk of human kindness 
 To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great; 
 Art not without ambition, but without 
 The illness should attend it: what thou wouldst highly, 
 That wouldst thou holily." 
 
 This is, indeed, a high compliment paid to 
 Macbeth by his wife. She has proven the 
 natural gentleness of his nature, and has ex- 
 perienced all those endearing attentions, all 
 those amiable relations of which only a man 
 "full o' the milk of human kindness" is cap- 
 able. She does not imagine him capable of 
 catching the nearest way to the throne, which 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 127 
 
 to her devilish purpose lies througli blood. 
 Quite a pathetic tone fills her words of wifely 
 complaint as she finds the sins which they 
 have committed are gradually separating 
 them, and his brooding upon the horrors of 
 his crimes seems to drive from Macbeth's mind 
 all thoughts of her, as they are surely quench- 
 ing forever all tender affections and turning to 
 gall that "milk of human kindness" of which 
 his nature was at one time full. It may have 
 been this loss of what once made them happy 
 in each other's confidence and love that 
 prompted the wretched wife to moan: 
 
 "Naught had, all's spent, 
 Where our desire is got without content; 
 'Tis safer to be that which we destroy 
 Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy." 
 
 Here Macbeth enters, and with a tender tone 
 of chiding she addresses him : 
 
 "How now, my lord! why do you keep alone, 
 Of sorriest fancies your companions making?" 
 
 This reveals on her part a desire for his com- 
 panionship, which she feels she is losing. Her 
 solicitude for his mental condition after Dun- 
 can's murder, and especially after the murder 
 of Banquo, shows an affection that even their 
 crimes cannot destroy, while her woman na- 
 ture melts with pity as she beholds his con- 
 dition at the banquet, where the ghost of Ban- 
 
128 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 quo appears. After that appalling scene in 
 which Macbeth by his almost frenzied fear was 
 in danger of divulging their crimes, she does 
 not upbraid him. All the unnatural harshness 
 with which she chided him for his cowardice 
 and hesitation and urged him on to commit 
 murder, seems now to have forsaken her, and 
 left her tenderly solicitous. Realizing his 
 well-nigh insane condition, she gently admon- 
 ishes him: "You lack the season of all na- 
 tures, sleep." It is the last word she speaks 
 to him in the tragedy. It is a word of kind- 
 ness spoken with a breaking heart to the man 
 for whom she has sacrificed all, and all in 
 vain. Before the crimes which they had com- 
 mitted had filled Macbeth with the fear and 
 horror which destroyed his love for his wife 
 and made him quite indifferent to her death, 
 he was accustomed to greet her as "Love," 
 "My dearest love," "Dear wife," and "Dearest 
 chuck." 
 
 This once gentle-spirited man, though brave 
 soldier, this kind and affectionate husband 
 and this ruddy cheeked, quick-witted, elo- 
 quent, imperial-willed little wife, whom her 
 husband fondly called his "dearest chuck," or 
 chick, were most unreservedly devoted to each 
 other. Shall we say too unreservedly devoted 
 to each other? If the same may not be said 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 129 
 
 of Macbeth, surely it must be said of Lady 
 Macbetli, that her ambition was not a selfish 
 ambition. She does not seem to have dreamed 
 of her own honor, nor can we think that for 
 her own promotion to a throne she could so 
 abjectly, so criminally have sacrificed herself. 
 It was for her husband, and, psychologically 
 mysterious as it all is, it was for her love of 
 him that she ruined her own life, sacrificed 
 her own soul, immolated her own womanhood. 
 Call it a barbaric, a savage, a demoniacal hero- 
 ism, if you will, but it was a heroism for all 
 that, a misguided heroism. It was that which, 
 when sanctified and guided by judgment, in- 
 telligence, conscience, and the fear of God, 
 makes the world's grandest heroines and most 
 noble heroes, but which, when imsanctified 
 and unbridled by conscience, truth, and holy 
 purpose, makes possible such a tragedy as the 
 ruin of Lady Macbeth, and her once brave, 
 gentle, and devoted consort. 
 
 Lady Macbeth was not a coarse-fibered, nat- 
 urally base-minded, cruel woman. She was 
 quite the reverse. She was a loving wife, and 
 had been a tender mother. Nothing is more 
 impressively emphasized in this tragedy than 
 the fact that she had to pray for the cruelty 
 to do a base deed. Crime did not seem nat- 
 ural to her; it was unnatural. And before 
 
130 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 she could commit it she must herself become 
 unnatural. It was not in her woman nature 
 to be cruel ; her rosy cheeks are a physiological 
 revelation of a psychological condition — 
 health of mind, no less than health of body. 
 She had by nature a happy, contented, kindly 
 disposition. Criminal women, as a rule, do 
 not have rosy cheeks. Before she could com- 
 mit a horrible crime she felt that the super- 
 natural powers — infernal, if you please — must 
 first unsex her. No naturally cruel, criminally 
 inclined woman would stop to ask for super- 
 natural power to become cruel and murderous. 
 Moreover, it forces itself upon us all through 
 the development of these ambitious plots that 
 Lady Macbeth is constantly "screwing her 
 courage to the sticking point." She is in an 
 abnormal state of nervous tension, of excite- 
 ment bordering on hysteria, if not out and out 
 insanity. It is not a naturally vicious, brutal 
 woman that refuses to slay Duncan because 
 he looks like her father. Ah, there the true, 
 gentle woman asserts herself, the woman that 
 cherishes the memory of her father, and is so 
 touched and melted by the face that looks like 
 his that she rushes from the chamber of the 
 sleeping king and confesses, 
 
 "Had he not resembled 
 My father as he slept, I had done't." 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 131 
 
 Such resemblance would not have affected 
 to pity a hard, debased, and naturally crim- 
 inal nature. No, Lady Macbeth would have 
 struck Duncan the fatal blow and never 
 thought of or cared for his resemblance to her 
 father had she been a vicious, cruel woman 
 by nature. That little redeeming incident 
 shows that she is not her real and natural 
 self in all this horrible business. Again, 
 while she is under this fearful and abnormal 
 strain, keeping her own courage screwed to 
 the sticking point by sheer force of will, the 
 tension becomes so great that her nerves snap 
 and even her power of volition fails. This 
 could not take place save in a sensitive soul. 
 A coarse-grained, hard, brutal woman would 
 not faint upon hearing Macbeth describe the 
 murder of Duncan as Lady Macbeth fainted. 
 In sighing, "Help me hence. Ho!" and in 
 fainting, that poor creature revealed feelings 
 still existing in her heart which were a credit 
 to her womanhood. And, finally, remorse 
 such as only a woman with a tender conscience 
 can feel overcomes her. Does reason forsake 
 its throne? No; for one moment reason re- 
 turns to its throne. By an almost superhuman 
 effort Lady Macbeth has defied reason, she 
 has crushed conscience beneath the heel of 
 her iron will; she has strangled her natural 
 
132 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 affection; she has silenced the voice of judg- 
 ment; she has quenched the light of heaven, 
 and now she reels to the verge of insanity, 
 but she catches herself for an instant, poises, 
 erect, majestically conscience-smitten before 
 she plunges into the abyss. Reason returns, 
 her soul rises, grand. God-fearing, judgment- 
 stunned. Then that little "spark of celestial 
 fire," conscience, flames up fitfully; it is all 
 that is left of her ruined womanhood! 
 that walking and muttering in her sleep! O 
 that little hand with its blood-stains, its 
 "damned spots" that will not wash out as 
 she once vainly imagined they would ! O that 
 smell of crime and murderous death from 
 which "all the perfumes of Arabia" will not 
 sweeten her little hand! Poor woman! She 
 is a woman, after all, and, pray as she 
 would, no power in heaven or hell could quite 
 unsex her. 
 
 The last dreadful act of self-destruction, 
 conscience alone made possible. Had she been 
 a hard, calloused, criminally inclined, and nat- 
 urally depraved woman, conscience would not 
 have stung her with remorse, that little hand 
 would not have terrified her with its ineradi- 
 cable stain, its foul odor of murder. Had 
 she not had still living within her heart a con- 
 science, that heart could not have broken. 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 133 
 
 Conscienceless hearts do not break. O that 
 Lady Macbeth had for one brief moment 
 
 "Stood erect 
 Caught at God's skirts and prayed"! 
 
 But no, she stood erect, a woman, conscience- 
 appalled, and hence not far from the King- 
 dom, almost redeemed, but then she faltered, 
 staggered, and plunged from God to doom — 
 a suicide on the bloody altar of an insane 
 ambition for her husband's greatness! 
 
 What a misguided devotion was hers ! Had 
 she not fallen a prey to the wicked lust of 
 power, had she but directed her extraordinary 
 mental resources, her quick intelligence, her 
 presence of mind, her superb self-control, her 
 tremendous will power, her absolute self- 
 effacing devotion to her husband's advance- 
 ment, and her original tenderness of con- 
 science, wifely affection, and valor of tongue 
 to promoting the highest interests of her hus- 
 band "holily," she might have proven herself 
 one of the most renowned heroines of romance 
 or history. And, had she so elected, she might 
 have made the titles "Glamis" and "Cawdor" 
 as proud in glory as those of any king, and 
 the name "Macbeth" as immortal in the 
 world's admiration as it now is and ever will 
 be in universal infamy and execration. 
 
134 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Heemionb 
 
 No test of wifely heroism can be more se- 
 vere than the cruel ordeal which the unfounded 
 suspicion of a jealous husband may impose 
 upon her, and which her very nobility of na- 
 ture demands that she shall endure. No ad- 
 verse circumstance, no loss of place or fortune, 
 no danger of physical harm, no, not even death 
 itself can put as fierce and terrible a trial 
 upon a woman-soul as her own husband's sus- 
 picion and false accusation of infidelity. Great 
 indeed is the womanhood that can bear it, 
 sufi'er it, and forgive it. Did ever husbands 
 treat their wives with more cruel cruelty than 
 did Leontes, Posthumus, and Othello? Did 
 ever wives suffer more heroically under cru- 
 elty than Hermione, Imogene, and Desde- 
 mona? 
 
 In the charming play of The Winter's Tale 
 Shakespeare represents Hermione, the wife of 
 Leontes, the king of Selicia, as falling under 
 her husband's jealous suspicion. In his "dis- 
 eased opinion" she has been criminal in her 
 familiarity with Polixenes, king of Bohemia, 
 the lifelong friend of Leontes and now a visitor 
 at his court. No one doubts the queen's fidel- 
 ity but he. All — lords, ladies, servants — re- 
 gard these suspicions as "dangerous unsafe 
 lunies i' the king." Hermione seems to think 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 135 
 
 it beneath her dignity as a woman, wife, and 
 queen to deny the base charges of her lord, 
 or even to take them seriously. But, finally, 
 roused to the sad appreciation of the king's 
 seriousness and of the wrong which his accu- 
 sation places upon her, she replies, but with 
 a tenderness that expresses loving pity rather 
 than bitterness and anger : 
 
 "Should a villain say so, 
 The most replenish'd villain in the world 
 He were as much more villain: you, my lord, 
 Do but mistake." 
 
 Polixenes hastily flees to save his life, though 
 manfully protesting his innocency and the un- 
 sullied honor of the queen. Hermione is 
 thrown into prison. There her child is born. 
 When the babe is presented to the king 
 as his child he cruelly disowns it; orders it 
 from his presence, and commands that with 
 its mother it be burned! But, softening in 
 his feelings, he finally bids one of his lords, 
 Antigonus, to bear the child beyond the lim- 
 its of his dominions to some strange distant 
 region and, 
 
 "leave it. 
 Without more mercy, to its own protection 
 And favor of the climate, . . . some place 
 Where chance may nurse or end it." 
 
 In due time the queen is brought to trial 
 for the infidelity and treason with which she 
 
136 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 is falsely charged. But Apollo haying been 
 consulted, this sealed-up oracle was opened 
 and read in the court of justice: "Hermione 
 is chaste; Polixenes is blameless; Leontes a 
 jealous tyrant; his innocent babe, truly be- 
 gotten ; and the king shall live without an heir 
 if that which is lost be not found." 
 
 Leontes impiously denounces the oracle as 
 false. Suddenly the news comes that his 
 young son, Prince Manillius, has died, griev- 
 ing for his mother. At the report Hermione 
 swoons, and apparently dies. She is borne 
 from the court and the intelligence comes that 
 she has indeed expired in grief. As these 
 woes gather thick and threateningly about 
 him, remorse smites the king. He has of- 
 fended Apollo by his profane treatment of 
 the oracle. 
 
 He awakes from his jealous hallucination, 
 repents of the grievous wrongs he has done 
 his wife and infant child, and looks with 
 broken contrite spirit upon what he regards as 
 his poor dead wife, foully murdered by his own 
 cruelty. In fact, however, Hermione only 
 fainted, was borne to the home of Lady Paul- 
 ina, her faithful and heroic defender, guar- 
 dian, and adviser. There the king saw his 
 queen, still in her swoon, and he was deceived 
 into thinking she was dead. It is a strange 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 137 
 
 story, but sixteen years pass ere the king is 
 undeceiyed. Hermione lives in secret com- 
 panionship with Lady Paulina. In the mean- 
 time the babe that was carried away to Bo- 
 hemia by Antigonus, fell into the hands of a 
 kindly shepherd, in whose cottage she grew 
 to young womanhood. Perdita was her name, 
 and she was "the most peerless piece of earth, 
 I think, that e'er the sun shone bright on." In 
 course of time it chanced that Florizel, the 
 son and heir of King Polixenes, saw and fell in 
 love ^Yit'h. the shepherd's daughter. He was so 
 infatuated that he did not consider her low es- 
 tate, but was determined to marry her. His 
 father objected, fumed, raved, and threatened. 
 Hence the couple ran away to Sicily. In the 
 meantime the good old shepherd revealed what 
 had been found with this changeling when he 
 picked up the precious bundle in the pasture 
 where Antigonus had left it. With the babe 
 was "the mantle of Queen Hermione's and her 
 jewel about the neck of it, the letters of Antig- 
 onus found with it, which they knew to be 
 his character." Then the very likeness of 
 Hermione was stamped upon the beautiful 
 features of Perdita. The revelation comes to 
 both Leontes and Polixenes, who meet in joy 
 and reconciliation with Perdita and Florizel, 
 the daughter of the Sicilian king, and the son 
 
138 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 of the king of Bohemia, happily united in their 
 presence. And now it is reported that Julio 
 Romano, the famous Italian artist, has ex- 
 ecuted a marvelously lifelike statue of Her- 
 mione for Lady Paulina. This statue Leontes 
 is most anxious to look upon, as is Perdita, 
 who has mourned with broken heart since she 
 heard of her mother's tragic fate. When all 
 are assembled in the gallery, the curtain is 
 removed from the statue, and so lifelike in- 
 deed does the marble form appear that it 
 seems to breathe. Leontes is spellbound in its 
 presence, and as he looks upon the form that 
 seems to be living, expressions of love and con- 
 trition break from his lips. He will not let 
 the curtain close upon the statue. As he 
 stands transfixed, a thrilling climax is reached 
 in the scene and incident. Paulina bids the 
 statue descend from its pedestal, when lo ! the 
 living Hermione steps down, falls upon the 
 neck of her lord, Leontes, and reveals herself 
 as his still noble, loving, and forgiving wife. 
 And here mother and daughter meet, in fond 
 embrace, each as having risen from the dead. 
 
 Imogen 
 
 Medieval tradition furnishes the material 
 for the play of Cymbeline, which presents to 
 our admiration one of the noblest, sweetest 
 
THE HEKOINB-WIFE 139 
 
 heroines of dramatic literature. Imogen, the 
 daughter of Cymbeline, the king of Britain, 
 has fallen in love with and married Post- 
 humus Leonatus, "a poor but worthy gentle- 
 man." It was the cherished desire of the 
 queen, who was Cymbeline's second wife, that 
 Cloten, her son by a former husband, should 
 marry the fair princess. This union also 
 seemed to be a consummation as devoutly to 
 be wished by the king. Hence Imogen's mar- 
 riage to Posthumus so enraged the queen that 
 she determined to do away with the princess 
 by poison. The king likewise was so incensed 
 that he banished his impecunious son-in-law, 
 who sought refuge in Italy. Before parting, 
 the newly wedded lovers plighted their faith 
 anew, sealing their ardent love by gifts of 
 rare value. Imogen presents a precious jewel, 
 with the words : 
 
 "Look here, love; 
 This diamond was my mother's; take it, heart; 
 But keep it till you woo another wife 
 When Imogen is dead." 
 
 Posthumus clasped around his lady's arm 
 a golden bracelet and departed. In far-off 
 Italy Posthumus fell in company with one 
 lachimo, a villainous Italian, who offered to 
 lay a wager that the wife of whose beauty and 
 virtue Posthumus had proudly boasted was not 
 
140 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 all that he took her to be, but was, like all 
 women, susceptible to the influences by which 
 any gallant might seek her favor. "I will lay 
 you ten thousand ducats to your ring, that 
 commend me to the court where your lady is, 
 with no more advantage than the opportunity 
 of a second conference, and I will bring from 
 thence that honor of hers which you imagine 
 so reserved." Posthumus fell into the trap 
 and foolishly accepted the proposition, wager- 
 ing the very ring which his wife had presented 
 him as a pledge of her eternal fidelity. 
 
 lachimo proceeded to England, bearing let- 
 ters of introduction and commendation to Im- 
 ogen from her husband. On his arrival he 
 sought and obtained an interview with the 
 princess. Muttering to himself, 
 
 "Boldness be my friend! 
 Arm me, audacity from head to foot," 
 
 the yellow lachimo began his attack by try- 
 ing to undermine Imogen's confidence in her 
 own husband. He insinuated that the life of 
 Posthumus in Italy was far from what the 
 life of a faithful husband absent from his wife 
 should be. Then by soft blandishments he 
 tried to secure her favor and boldly attempted 
 to take liberties with her, which she repulsed, 
 to his chagrin. Finally, convinced that she 
 was proof against all his arts of seductive gal- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 141 
 
 lantry, he apologized, and, owning that her 
 Posthumus was not as he had represented, but 
 was a true and loyal husband, and, withal, a 
 man of noble spirit and superior attributes, 
 he regained her confidence. But now he in- 
 vents a ruse by which to obtain circumstantial 
 evidence which he may use to convince Post- 
 humus that he has been unduly familiar with 
 his wife. He has failed to shake Imogen's 
 fidelity, but is determined to win the wager 
 by foul and infamous trickery, even though it 
 cost the infinite suffering of his innocent vic- 
 tims. Hiding himself in a chest, which Imo- 
 gen consented to have brought to her room 
 for safe keeping, thinking that it contained 
 precious jewels, when night came on, and the 
 princess had fallen asleep, the villain crept 
 out of concealment and took a memorandum 
 of the contents of the sleeping apartments. 
 Then he stealthily unclasped and appropriated 
 the golden bracelet which Posthumus in part- 
 ing from his bride had placed upon her arm in 
 token of his love and in pledge of his undying 
 loyalty. Armed with these seemingly strong 
 and convincing evidences of his unwarranted 
 familiarity with Imogen, this rascally 
 lachimo returned to Italy and easily per- 
 suaded Posthumus that his wife had proven 
 unfaithful. Whereupon the distracted and 
 
142 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 jealous husband gave lachimo the diamond 
 ring wliicli had been wagered, and bade him 
 also keep the golden bracelet which he had 
 brought to Italy with the false claim that the 
 princess in her infatuation had taken it from 
 her own arm and given to him. Posthumus, 
 now fairly inoculated with the virus of jeal- 
 ousy, resolves upon revenge; his love turns 
 to hatred and he becomes as cruel as he was 
 formerly tender and affectionate in all his 
 feelings and purposes toward the gentle and 
 innocent Imogen. His poisoned mind brooded 
 upon the ways and means for entrapping and 
 destroying her. He wrote to the old servant, 
 Pisanio, to persuade him to kill the princess. 
 And now two assassins are bent on her destruc- 
 tion — the wicked queen and her own husband. 
 Nay, another has vowed to destroy both her 
 honor and her life : Cloten, the despicable and 
 rejected suitor, is a third would-be assassin. 
 Posthumus invented a most unmanly and cruel 
 subterfuge to secure the death of his pure and 
 unsuspecting wife. He wrote her a letter full 
 of affectionate expressions, bidding her meet 
 him at Milford Haven, scene of certain mili- 
 tary movements in the conflict between the 
 Romans and Britons. Pisanio was to accom- 
 pany her, and, all unknown to her, he was 
 there to dispatch her with his sword and send 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 143 
 
 to Posthumus her handkerchief stained with 
 her own lifeblood. Imogen is filled with 
 transports of joy in anticipation of meeting 
 her beloved Posthumus, and, innocent of any 
 suspicion as she is unconscious of any 
 wrongdoing, and ignorant of her husband's 
 jealousy, she is all eagerness to hasten to the 
 rendezvous. "0 for a horse with wings," she 
 cries. Arrived at Milford Haven, Imogen 
 looks eagerly but in vain for her beloved. A 
 strange foreboding finally seizes her, as she 
 scans the now serious face of the old servant, 
 Pisanio. 
 
 "Where is Posthumus?" Her heart seems to 
 sink within her as she asks the question. Pi- 
 sanio revealed the wicked, heartless plot 
 against her life, but refused to execute the 
 will of Posthumus. He handed Imc^en the 
 letter which he had received from hei husband, 
 in which he accused her of infidelity. Stunned 
 by the false and cruel charge, for a moment she 
 seemed to meditate self-destruction, but catch- 
 ing herself in all the courage, faith, and dig- 
 nity of her pure and innocent womanhood, 
 she sighed, 
 
 "Against self-slaugLter 
 There is a prohibition so divine 
 That cravens my weak hand." 
 
 Pisanio could not, nor would he, slay the 
 
144 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 innocent and foully slandered girl, and she 
 was too heroic and womanly to slay herself. 
 But what is to become of her? That is the 
 question with both Imogen and Pisanio. The 
 old servant suggested to his mistress that she 
 might disappear, and he would send her blood- 
 stained handkerchief to Posthumus, to sat- 
 isfy him that she had been slain. Then she 
 might disguise herself as a boy, secure service 
 with the Roman general Lucius, and by some 
 means get near Posthumus in Italy, where 
 she might fondly hope to see him, and pos- 
 sibly convince him of her innocence. The 
 suggestion appealed to her, and she agreed to 
 follow it. It was the act of a true heroine. 
 Young as she was, unaccustomed to the hard- 
 ships and dangers of the world, it took a 
 brave heart to face the trials that awaited her. 
 But her very purity, innocency, and unsuspi- 
 cious, confiding nature seem to have permitted 
 no thought of danger or evil consequence to 
 enter her mind. She assumed the attire of a 
 boy, and ventured alone into the great, strange, 
 rough, and tragical world. In the develop- 
 ment of the play Imogen is forced into many 
 trying and delicate situations. Wandering 
 about the country, she comes to a gloomy cave 
 which she enters ; there she finds food to satisfy 
 her hunger, and there she is discovered by 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 145 
 
 three rough mountaineers, who have long made 
 the cave their dwelling place. They treat her 
 kindly and accept her as a brother. In the 
 final outcome two of them prove to be her 
 own brothers, who were stolen in infancy. 
 She mingles with soldiers in camp, on the 
 march, and on battlefield; she serves the 
 Roman general as a page under the name of 
 Fidele; but never does this heroine compro- 
 mise her modesty or even reveal her femininity. 
 All who met her regarded her as a modest, 
 beautiful, and lovable boy. In the course of 
 events the Romans were defeated by the Brit- 
 ons. Posthumus, who seems to have softened 
 in his feelings and to have regained his love 
 for Imogen, was with the Roman army. He 
 soon decided, however, to desert the Romans 
 and to fight for Britain, for Imogen's sake. 
 Repentance and remorse were slowly crowding 
 out the bitterness, jealousy, and spirit of re- 
 venge which had long filled his heart. 
 
 Valiantly he fought for Britain, and much 
 had he to do with gaining the victory in that 
 final bloody battle. Strangely enough, in this 
 war Posthumus met lachimo in single com- 
 bat, worsted him and stripped Mm of all his 
 weapons. Then did the base Italian seem to 
 repent of the wrong which he had done, for as 
 he lay on the field, swordless and helpless, he 
 
146 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 became conscience-smitten and confessed to 
 himself : 
 
 "The heaviness and guilt within my bosom 
 Takes off my manhood: I have belied a lady. 
 The princess of this country, and the air on't 
 Revengingly enfeebles me." 
 
 After the decisive battle, in which the Brit- 
 ons were victorious, the Italian prisoners and 
 the defenders of Britain's cause were assem- 
 bled in the presence of Cymbeline. Among 
 them were Lucius, the Roman general, and his 
 page Fidele, or Imogen in disguise, Post- 
 humus, lachimo, Pisanio, the servant, and the 
 three mountaineers whom Imogen had met in 
 the cave. As soon as Posthumus was pre- 
 sented, Cymbeline ordered him to prison, not 
 knowing what he had done that day in his 
 own good cause. While in prison Posthumus 
 prayed for death to relieve him of the tor- 
 ments of his accusing conscience. 
 
 When it was revealed to Cymbeline that 
 Posthumus, disguised in the garments of a 
 humble peasant, had fought with greatest 
 courage and had helped the three mountaineers 
 win the battle in which the Romans were de- 
 feated, he ordered his release from prison. 
 Once more he stood with the other heroes and 
 with the prisoners, in the presence of his 
 father-in-law, the king. When the question 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 147 
 
 arose as to what treatment should be accorded 
 the captured enemies, Lucius, the Roman gen- 
 eral, made but one request. 
 
 "This one thing only 
 I will entreat; my boy, a Briton born. 
 Let him be ransomed: never master had 
 A page so kind, so duteous, diligent. 
 So tender over his occasions, true. 
 So feat, so nurse-like: let his virtue join 
 With my request, which I'll make bold your highness 
 Cannot deny: He hath done no Briton harm. 
 Though he have served a Roman: save him, sir. 
 And spare no blood beside." 
 
 Thus spake the Roman general in behalf 
 
 of the boy Fidele, who stood there — the lovely 
 
 Imogen in disguise. Cymbeline was strangely 
 
 moved as he looked down upon the boy. 
 
 "I have surely seen him: 
 His favor is familiar to me. Boy, 
 Thou hast looked thyself into my grace, 
 And art mine own. I know not why, wherefore. 
 To say, 'Live, boy': ne'er thank thy master; live: 
 And ask of Cymbeline what boom thou wilt. 
 Fitting my bounty and thy state, I'll give it; 
 Yea, though thou do demand a prisoner, 
 The noblest ta'en." 
 
 After a whispered conference with Cymbeline, 
 
 the page, turning to lachimo, says, 
 
 "My boon is that this gentleman may render 
 Of whom he had this ring." 
 
 Then Cymbeline breaks forth : 
 
 "That diamond upon your finger, say 
 How came it yours?" 
 
148 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Then and there the base Italian confessed: 
 
 "By villainy, 
 I got this ring." 
 
 Then the whole story of the diabolical plot 
 
 which he had invented and executed was told. 
 
 To the astonished and enraged Posthumus, 
 
 lachimo abjectly kneels: 
 
 "Take that life, beseech you. 
 Which I so often owe; but your ring first; 
 And here the bracelet of the truest princess 
 That ever swore her faith." 
 
 At the startling revelation made by lachimo, 
 Posthumus is overcome with sorrow, and, call- 
 ing down upon himself all curses, reproach- 
 ing himself as 
 
 "most credulous fool. 
 Egregious murderer, thief, anything, 
 That's due to all the villains past, in being, 
 To come!" 
 
 he breaks forth in sobs that shake his strong 
 and manly form : 
 
 "O Imogen! 
 
 My queen, my life, my wife! O Imogen, 
 
 Imogen, Imogen!" 
 
 Soon the truth is known. Imogen discloses 
 her identity, and rushes to the arms of her re- 
 morseful and repentant Posthumus in loving 
 and forgiving embrace. 
 
 This Imogen was a heroine if romance 
 ever created a heroine and to this day "is best 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 149 
 
 beloved in all the world of song and all the 
 tide of time." 
 
 Desdemona 
 
 Many a student of Shakespeare will claim 
 that Othello is the most awful and impressive 
 tragedy of this superlative dramatic poet. A 
 noble Moor, Othello, has won the affection and 
 has recently married Desdemona, the daugh- 
 ter of Brabantio, a Venetian senator. Young 
 and susceptible and, withal, "a most exquis- 
 ite lady," Desdemona was bewitched by 
 Othello's eloquent recitals of "the battles, 
 sieges, fortunes" he had passed. When the 
 enraged father discovered the marriage and 
 accused Othello of using witchcraft in winning 
 the affections of his daughter, the Moor con- 
 fessed : 
 
 "She loved me for the dangers I had passed, 
 And I loved her that she did pity them. 
 This only is the witchcraft I have used." 
 
 The father was reconciled to the situation, 
 and with his blessing the newly married, des- 
 perately in love with each other, started upon 
 what promised to be a happy life. But through 
 the machinations of lago, a fiend incarnate, 
 this union, wise or unwise, at least happy, 
 ended in most cruel tragedy. Ambitious to 
 secure official promotion, lago was maddened 
 
150 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 with another, one Cassio, who was appointed 
 Othello's lieutenant, while he was kept in 
 the humble position of a mere ensign-bearer. 
 To avenge Othello's partiality for Cassio, and 
 to secure Cassio's downfall and his own pref- 
 erment, lago enters into a most diabolical 
 program of ruin, involving reputation, char- 
 acter, happiness, honor, and life. 
 
 To undermine the reputation of Cassio, lago 
 proposes nothing less fiendish than an attack 
 upon the very honor of Othello's wife. He will 
 poison the Moor's mind with jealousy, and 
 thus ruin his happiness and the happiness of 
 "the sweetest innocent" Desdemona, while he 
 blasts the character of the lieutenant whose 
 position he covets. 
 
 "To get his place and to plume up my will 
 In double knavery — How, how? Let's see: 
 After some time, to abuse Othello's ear 
 That he is too familiar with his wife." 
 
 That he himself was jealous of Othello and 
 was bent on terrible revenge seems evident. 
 Into this happy life crept the viper of re- 
 venge, to poison it with suspicion, jealousy, 
 murder, death. While Desdemona was dream- 
 ing only of a future of domestic bliss most 
 cruel villainy was plotting the ruin of all her 
 happiness. It was when this beautiful girl, 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 151 
 
 the very soul of honor, the embodiment of 
 womanly sweetness, was breathing her hope 
 and confidence into the listening ear of her 
 Othello, that the demon lago was maturing 
 his plans. 
 
 "The heavens forbid, 
 But that our loves and comforts should Increase 
 Even as our days do grow!" 
 
 Alas, this blissful hope was soon to be 
 quenched in gloomy suspicion and black jeal- 
 ousy, lago poisons the mind of Othello with 
 the suspicion that Cassio, his lieutenant, is 
 too familiar with his wife. "Look to your 
 wife." The fiend stops at no limit. He gives 
 false and suspicious interpretations to every 
 act of Cassio. When the lieutenant is dis- 
 missed for becoming drunk by the very plot- 
 tings of lago himself, and solicits the good of- 
 fices of Desdemona on his behalf that she may 
 persuade Othello to restore him to office, the 
 fiend uses the incident to create jealousy in the 
 mind of the Moor. 
 
 Little by little the poison is injected, and 
 does its fatal work. And yet so innocent does 
 his Desdemona appear, and so unconscious is 
 she of any wrongdoing or of any suspicion 
 against her, that Othello seems again and 
 again to doubt the accusations and insinua- 
 
152 HEEOINBS OF HISTOEY 
 
 tions of lago. But so fertile is this scoundrel 
 in diabolical invention that one form of the 
 poison does not cease to work before another 
 is injected into the mind of the now jealous 
 and raging husband. Through his own un- 
 suspecting wife, lago secures a handkerchief, 
 which Desdemona drops by accident, a hand- 
 kerchief which Othello had given her as a 
 precious heirloom. lago sees that this hand- 
 kerchief is left in Cassio's room. Cassio picks 
 it up and hands it to Ms mistress to have the 
 pattern of it copied. lago informs Othello 
 that Desdemona has given this handkerchief 
 to Cassio. The jealous husband even sees it 
 in the possession of Cassio's mistress! This 
 further confirms his suspicion and kindles 
 anew his jealousy and rage. lago makes the 
 foulest accusations against Cassio and Desde- 
 mona, falsely telling Othello that he had heard 
 Cassio in his sleep use language that proved 
 his guilt and Desdemona's dishonor. This 
 Othello was now all too ready to believe. He 
 begins to treat his wife harshly and insult- 
 ingly. She is bewildered, but in her inno- 
 cency she does not, and she cannot, suspect 
 the cause. Grieved and astonished as she is, 
 she attributes her husband's irritability to the 
 cares and perplexities of his official duties. 
 But now the Moor is so fatally poisoned with 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 153 
 
 jealousy that all the hot blood of his race is 
 on fire with revenge. He commands lago to 
 assassinate Cassio, and he resolves to put his 
 own wife to death. 
 
 He demands the handkerchief of Desde- 
 mona, but she is unable to produce it. She has 
 lost or misplaced it. But she does not think 
 Othello's demand is serious enough to give 
 it any heed, and while he is demanding the 
 handkerchief she, all innocently, but to Othello 
 very suspiciously, is pleading that Cassio may 
 be restored to his favor. When the Moor's 
 jealous rage prompts Mm to strike his inno- 
 cent and ingenuous wife, she says with forgiv- 
 ing meekness and astonishment, "I have not 
 deserved this," and, leaving his presence with 
 bewildered mind, she sobs, "I will not stay to 
 offend you." 
 
 When he solicits another interview with her 
 and demands that she look him in the face, 
 so strange and fierce and suspicious an aspect 
 do his features wear that she is startled and 
 piteously cries, "What horrible fancy's this?" 
 
 As, at his command, Emilia, Desdemona's 
 friend, lago's wife, leaves the room, poor Des- 
 demona falls before the infuriated Moor. 
 
 "Upon my knees, what doth your speech import? 
 I understand a fury in your words, 
 Put not the words," 
 
154 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Othello cries, "Why, what art thou?" With 
 
 breaking voice she answers, 
 
 "Your wife, my lord; your true and 
 Loyal wife." 
 
 Still does the innocent Desdemona fail to 
 understand her husband's meaning; she even 
 thinks he is accusing her for some wrong her 
 father may have done him. "I hope my noble 
 lord esteems me honest." 
 
 When his further insinuations end with the 
 cruel exclamation, "Would thou hadst ne'er 
 been born," she sighs, "Alas, what ignorant 
 sin have I committed?" But with all these 
 insults heaped upon her, Desdemona utters 
 no bitter word of reproach. With the sweet 
 spirit of conscious innocency she denies all the 
 base, horrifying accusations of the insanely 
 jealous Moor, but still hopes to regain his 
 confidence and love. Alas, her hope is vain. 
 She has warning of Othello's intent to do her 
 injury, and retires to her couch, evidently sus- 
 pecting it will be never to rise again. Her 
 suspicions are well founded. The Moor stifles 
 and stabs his wife to death, after covering her 
 sweet face with tears and kisses. The cruel 
 deed is accomplished. But now as the alarm 
 of this foul murder summons all who hear it 
 into the presence of Othello, he learns the 
 horrifying truth that he has murdered his in- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 155 
 
 nocent wife. The plot of lago is unfolded to 
 his comprehension. Emilia, the wife of lago, 
 herself an innocent tool of her fiendish hus- 
 band, explains all the suspicious circumstances 
 which had been used to poison Othello's mind, 
 and when, in justification of his awful deed, 
 the Moor cried, "She was as false as water," 
 the brave Emilia replied, with spirit : 
 
 "Thou art rash as fire to say, 
 That she was false. O, she was heavenly true." 
 
 As Othello becomes convinced of his terrible 
 mistake, of the awful cruelty of his murderous 
 deed, he can but cry in anguish and self-re- 
 proach, "O fool, fool, fool !" Then, asking for 
 the world's charitable judgment, "Of one who 
 loved not wisely but too well," 
 
 "of one whose hand, 
 Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away. 
 Richer than all his tribe," 
 
 he smote himself with the same dagger that 
 was stained with the blood of his pure, con- 
 fiding, innocent Desdemona. He fell upon the 
 very bed where she lay, breathing out his life 
 with a confession of his love. 
 
 Poor Desdemona ! Not only was her heroism 
 put to a severer test than either that of Imogen 
 or Hermione by the jealousy of her husband, 
 but, alas ! she also suffered all they could have 
 suffered, and did not live to enjoy the happi- 
 
156 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 ness of her vindication, but suffered murderous 
 death at the hand of him to whom she was 
 true and faithful, before he found out the vil- 
 lainy that had been perpetrated on him by 
 lago, or discovered the awful injustice of his 
 jealousy. Othello is a tragedy; it ends in 
 catastrophe, in death. A Winter's Tale is a 
 comedy, ending happily, as Cymbeline may 
 also be considered. We rejoice over the 
 triumphant vindication of Imogen and Her- 
 mione, and, in spite of the dramatic power 
 of the tragedy of Othello, we can but wish 
 the Moor had discovered the plot of lago 
 before it was too late, and could have received 
 his wife, fully vindicated to his joyful arms, 
 before he choked and stabbed her to her 
 death. Of course we are aware of Desde- 
 mona's innocency all the while, and know how 
 unfounded is Othello's jealousy, and we rejoice 
 in her purity and fidelity. But, realizing the 
 injustice of Othello's suspicion, we cannot re- 
 sist the feeling — "The pity of it, O the pity of 
 it! Will not some good angel of happy cir- 
 cumstance tell the truth, unmask the hideous 
 plot, thwart lago's wicked cunning, and save 
 this sweet woman, this innocent and faithful 
 wife?" But no, it is the purpose and art of 
 the poet to carry to its tragic climax of conse- 
 quence lago's villainy and Othello's unfounded 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 157 
 
 suspicion. Our sympathy and pity are not less 
 profound that Desdemona is not an Imogen 
 or Hermione. She has no such strength of 
 personality, no such force of will, no such self- 
 control, dignity, and judgment as these re- 
 markable women possess. There is more of a 
 Juliet and of an Ophelia in her moral and 
 mental characteristics. She is sentimental, 
 impressionable, and pliable. She lacks self- 
 reliance and self-assertion. Her passion wants 
 the balance of command. She loves unthink- 
 ingly, impulsively, and without judgment. She 
 is a fond and effusively affectionate creature, 
 but her heart is beyond the control of her 
 head. She is the incarnation of feminine im- 
 petuosity, but perfectly pure in her emotion- 
 alism. Her desire rushes to adoration. This 
 was the first cause of her terrible and tragic 
 suffering; she impetuously, almost hysteric- 
 ally, gave her heart to the wrong man, and 
 she did it from a wrong impulse. She fell in 
 love with a great, splendid animal. It was a 
 physical infatuation, and yet she knew not 
 that Othello was only sensuously lovely to 
 her eyes. Othello should have married a 
 Cleopatra ; it would have been animal meeting 
 animal, lion meeting lioness, at least. Or Isa- 
 bella would have made him a good wife in her 
 Venus de Milo grandeur, in her cold, imposing, 
 
158 HEEOINES OP HISTORY 
 
 statuesque dignity; for she would have con- 
 quered his animalism and cooled his hot 
 Moorish blood by the philosophy of her early- 
 acquired austerities of the nunnery. But for 
 this great brute to marry the gentle, tender 
 Desdemona was for the lion to lie down with 
 the lamb in the most militant and premillen- 
 nial sense. Desdemona, then, was the yictim 
 of a threefold conjunction or conspiracy of 
 evil forces : first of her own strength of passion 
 and weakness of will — of her sentimental in- 
 fatuation with an animal man; second, of 
 lago's villainy; and, third, of Othello's brutal 
 jealousy. 
 
 Let us not refuse Desdemona our sympathy, 
 or even our admiration, because she was so 
 blind in her infatuation that she could not 
 grasp the reality or meaning of her husband's 
 unreasoning suspicion. She was not a woman 
 of high and commanding intellect ; she did not 
 reflect, much less reason; she only felt. But 
 how deeply, tenderly, passionately, and yet 
 innocently she felt ! If she did not spurn the 
 accusation and the accuser, it was because 
 she could not believe suspicion against her 
 possible. She manifested no sense of injured 
 dignity, because she had no such dignity in 
 her unsophisticated nature as made the char- 
 acter of Hermione majestic. She did not resent 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 159 
 
 with scorn the insult of the charge against her 
 wifely fidelity, because she hardly knew what 
 infidelity meant, what a base thing it was, and, 
 therefore, what an insult it was for a man to 
 accuse his wife of infidelity. Poor Desdemona ! 
 She was more to be pitied than Imogen or 
 Hermione, because she was so helpless; she 
 had such meager resources of personal power, 
 dignity, logical acumen, and will to fall back 
 upon. She had not force of character suffi- 
 cient to repel an attack upon the integrity and 
 purity of her affections. If this poor, tender, 
 confiding girl once wakens to the reality of 
 her situation, to the full and cruel meaning 
 of it, it will kill her. But, ah ! Othello's act 
 anticipates all that. Had she once become 
 disillusioned, had Othello become impossible 
 to her, she would have ended all, as did Juliet, 
 or else, like her poor, weak sister, Ophelia, she 
 would have gone mad. If the villainy of lago 
 had not been detected, and if it had succeeded 
 in robbing her of Othello's love, she would have 
 died of a broken heart, had she not died of the 
 Moor's fierce dagger. Yet in it all how pure, 
 trustful, and innocent she was ! Unworthy of 
 her as Othello may have been, misplaced as 
 was her confidence and love, blind as was her 
 almost unnatural infatuation for this black 
 and shiny animal, she was true to her husband, 
 
160 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 and in her fidelity so sanguine that slie never 
 dreamed that her patience was such a virtue 
 as patience, or that any circumstances could 
 destroy their mutual love, much less lead on to 
 crime and tragedy. She was not conscious of 
 being a heroine; she was hardly conscious 
 of being a grossly injured, brutally treated 
 woman, and could not have been conscious of 
 the shame and ignominy of her situation, or 
 of the fact that she was doing anything that 
 was praiseworthy and magnanimous. Desde- 
 mona seems capable of nothing but of loving 
 Othello with all the passion of her woman- 
 hood, nor had she awakened from her blissful 
 dream when death ended the dream or pro- 
 longed it forever. 
 
PART III 
 
 WOMAN-HEROIC 
 IN THE BIBLE 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 THE SCEIPTUEAL TYPE OF HEROISM 
 
 The true greatness of a people and the real 
 glory of national life are to be found in the 
 character of its womanhood. Who can ever 
 read Carlyle's Heroes and Hero-Worship with- 
 out a feeling of disappointment and protest? 
 In his philosophy of history he superciliously 
 overlooks, if he does not contemptuously 
 ignore, all the heroines. There is the "Hero 
 as Divinity, Odin"; "The Hero as Prophet, 
 Mahomet" ; "The Hero as Poet, Dante, Shake- 
 speare" ; "The Hero as Priest, Luther, Knox" ; 
 "The Hero as Man of Letters, Johnson, Eous- 
 seau, Burns"; "The Hero as King, Cromwell, 
 Napoleon." But the heroine in any capacity 
 whatsoever he does not seem to have dis- 
 covered. Indeed, he failed to find the heroes — 
 for of all these names mentioned there were 
 not more than three or four real heroes among 
 them — Dante, Luther, Cromwell, and, pos- 
 sibly, Knox. Moreover, when Carlyle searches 
 for the philosophy of history he finds this : 
 "Universal history is at bottom the history of 
 the great men who have worked here." But 
 
 163 
 
164 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 what of the great women who have worked 
 here? Have they had nothing to do with uni- 
 versal history? The Frenchman, Lamartine, 
 and the German, Heine, have gone more deeply 
 into the philosophy of history than this Scotch- 
 man, Carlyle. The former says with a true 
 French gallantry, and a historian's unpreju- 
 diced veracity : "There is a woman at the be- 
 ginning of all great things" ; and Heine, with 
 his Teutonic love of fact and instinct of justice, 
 says : "When I read history and am impressed 
 by any deed or occurrence, I often feel as if I 
 should like to see the woman concealed behind 
 it as the secret spring. Women make history 
 although historians know only the names of 
 men." A woman at the beginning of all great 
 things? Are you searching for the beginning 
 of Jewish nationalism? Watch that woman 
 Jochebed as she hides her babe in the bul- 
 rushes of the Nile. Are you looking for the 
 beginning of Christianity? Listen with rever- 
 ential awe as the angel whispers his message 
 to the soul of Mary, the Virgin of Galilee. 
 Would you know how the gospel received its 
 first welcome to England? Study the life of 
 Bertha, the Queen of Kent. Arfe you interested 
 in the beginning of the Reformation ? Behold 
 rfrsula Cotta there in Eisenach as she takes 
 young Martin Luther by the hand and assures 
 
THE SCEIPTUEAL TYPE 165 
 
 him that in spite of his poverty he shall have 
 a university education. Are you inquiring 
 into the beginning of New-World discoveries? 
 Hear Isabella of Spain promise Columbus to 
 finance his expedition for the westward quest 
 of India.. Are you asking for the philosophy 
 of the beginning of Methodism? Contemplate 
 the character and devotion of Susannah Wes- 
 ley, who puts five of her sons through Oxford 
 University, among them John and Charles. Is 
 the beginning of the independence of the Amer- 
 ican colonies your study? Consider the advice 
 that Mary Washington gives to her son George 
 when he is determined to join the British 
 navy, go to sea, and be drowned — in oblivion. 
 It would appear, Thomas Carlyle, that the 
 women have had something to do with this 
 universal history. In the higher type of hero- 
 ine, higher than the mythological type or the 
 Shakesperean type, there must meet and blend 
 the spirit of courage, the spirit of righteous- 
 ness, the spirit of self-sacrifice, and the spirit 
 of benevolence and altruistic helpfulness. 
 Heroism is not simply courage or valor in the 
 presence of danger. A bandit, a train-robber, 
 a burglar, an assassin may be brave without 
 being heroic. A pirate, a prize fighter may 
 have courage without heroism. Herodias had 
 nerve and strength of will and purpose, but 
 
166 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 slie was not a heroine. Jezebel was a woman 
 of power, but was without heroism. Cleopatra 
 possessed a splendid genius, but was not 
 heroic. Heroism must and ever does contain 
 a large element of moral greatness. The hero 
 or heroine loses sight of self in a purpose to 
 confer benefits on others — on individuals, on 
 one's country, on the world. Heroism aims to 
 do good, to do right, to lift the fallen, to defend 
 the weak, to liberate the oppressed, to comfort 
 the sorrowing, to alleviate misery, at cost of 
 self, of treasure, pain, or life. Heroism has 
 inspired every great benevolence, every just 
 revolution, every battle for freedom, every 
 moral reformation. Heroism inspired and then 
 led the exodus. Heroism gave inspiration and 
 impetus to the Reformation. Heroism sent 
 the Pilgrims to New England. Heroism fired 
 the soul of the American Revolution. That 
 same spirit in the common walks of life has 
 inspired men and women to sacrifice them- 
 selves for the common good, to pledge their 
 money, lives, and sacred honor to the triumph 
 of justice, the enthronement of right, the 
 liberty and sovereignty of the people. Such 
 men and women are as true heroes and hero- 
 ines as any that have scaled the heights of 
 fame or sought and won reputation at the can- 
 non's mouth. It is remarkable that history 
 
THE SCEIPTURAL TYPE 167 
 
 has not furnished us a Plutarch to set forth in 
 imperishable biography the characters and 
 lives of the great women of the past. The 
 fairest, most gallant, chivalrous literature in 
 the world is Hebrew literature. It is high- 
 mindedly true to Jewish womanhood. Can as 
 much be said of Latin literature, of Grecian, 
 or Indian, or Chinese, or Egyptian, or any 
 other ancient literature? Who were the great 
 women, the heroines of Rome or of Athens? 
 True, now and then the vast superiority of a 
 woman compels the poet's or historian's recog- 
 nition of her genius : a Sapho, an Aspasia, a 
 Cornelia, a Volumnia, or a Semiramis rises 
 into immortal distinction. But these names 
 are gathered from three great civilizations. 
 And but one or two of these stand for any- 
 thing more than intellectual power and bril- 
 liancy. Cornelia and Volumnia of Rome may 
 be recognized as true heroines. Turn to the 
 Hebrew race — who were their heroines? The 
 Bible is jeweled with their names. Here is 
 the only book that has come down to us from 
 antiquity in which historic womanhood is 
 treated with any but scant respect, venera- 
 tion, and honor. Here is the only religious 
 book of the ancients that thinks it worth while 
 to preserve the records of the great deeds of 
 great women, the only body of national reli- 
 
168 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 gious literature to acknowledge that woman 
 has been a history-maker, or that history has 
 ever been glorified by heroines. Honor to the 
 Jew, the Jew, who, above the proud Roman 
 and above the haughty Greek, has revered and 
 honored a holy heroic womanhood! We need 
 no regenerated Carlyle, no converted Plutarch 
 to present illustrations of womanly heroism; 
 we open the Bible, and here are our ideal hero- 
 ines, heroines real, historic, and representa- 
 tive, delineated by pens divinely guided, by 
 hearts of sympathy and high appreciation. It 
 is not the stage, it is not the drama, after all, 
 that holds the mirror up to nature. The Bible 
 alone does that. The stage does not represent 
 nor does it interpret real life, real character, 
 real men and women. It portrays a life more 
 or less false, fictitious. So too must it be said 
 the novel lacks reality, is often false to human 
 nature, and is fundamentally and philosophic- 
 ally fictitious. In the Bible we find reality 
 and ideality, the real ideality and the ideal 
 reality which is truth in character and life. 
 The improbabilities and the impossibilities of 
 romantic literature, of the novel, have no inspi- 
 ration for noble souls. They do not place before 
 the aspiring man or woman a real standard of 
 moral excellence ; it is always a false standard, 
 often delusive and dangerous. But here are 
 
THE SCEIPTUEAL TYPE 169 
 
 possibilities, here are probabilities, here are 
 undying realities of character and life in this 
 Bible. And here only in the real do we find the 
 ideal, and here only in these ideals do we find 
 the real, the immortal real. The Bible not only 
 exalts woman, but places a crown of special 
 honor on the brow of woman in her relation 
 to the family. With all the classic writers 
 before us we find therein no such high respect 
 paid to motherhood, no such honor and vener- 
 ation demanded for her, as is found in the laws 
 of Moses and the Proverbs of Solomon. "For- 
 sake not the law of thy mother." "A foolish 
 man despiseth his mother." "The eye that 
 mocketh at his father and despiseth to obey 
 his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick 
 it out, and the young eagles shall eat it." 
 "Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy 
 days may be long in the land which the Lord 
 thy God giveth thee." 
 
OHAPTEE II 
 
 THE HEEOINE-MOTHER 
 Eve 
 
 In studying the historic mothers of the 
 Bible what a wide range and variety of char- 
 acter, experience, and influence are presented 
 for our consideration! We see the devoted 
 mother, the self-sacrificing mother, the pious 
 mother, the worldly and wicked mother, the 
 ambitious mother, the spiritual mother, the 
 proud and happy mother, the sad, heart- 
 broken, disappointed mother. They are all 
 here. So true to human nature in all the 
 delightful and distressing realities of life is 
 this honest old Bible ! 
 
 Doubtless it is true always and everywhere 
 not only that great men are what their mothers 
 have made them, as Emerson declares, but also 
 that if great men make great nations, then, in 
 the final analysis of the philosophy of history, 
 great nations are what mothers have made 
 them. History begins in the soul of a great 
 mother — shall we say of the greatest mother? 
 There is nothing more touching and pathetic 
 170 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 171 
 
 in literature than the motherhood of Eve. 
 Should Eve have the world's pity and venera- 
 tion, the world's commiseration and con- 
 gratulations, the world's loving smiles and 
 sympathetic tears? Yes, these and more— its 
 everlasting admiration and honor. What a 
 proud distinction goes with the title, "Mary, 
 the mother of Washington," or "Abronaton, 
 the mother of Themistocles," or "Cornelia, the 
 mother of the Gracchi"! But incomparably 
 greater is the significance of the words of Holy 
 Writ applied to the first woman — "Eve, the 
 mother of all living." 
 
 We turn our thoughts in retrospective con- 
 templation to that far-off event of the intro- 
 duction into this world of human life. We 
 would look with reverent imagination upon 
 humanity's original mother and read her 
 thoughts, interpret her feelings, know her 
 heart? What was it to be the first woman, 
 the first wife, and the mother of all living? 
 
 O, the joy of life! The happiness of love! 
 The glory of nature! The wonder of the 
 world ! Marvelous indeed must have been the 
 experience of the first woman in whose heart 
 and mind were awakened the emotions and 
 inquiries, the sentiments and speculations 
 which are even to this day the most awe-inspir- 
 ing and profound that can engage the human 
 
172 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 intellect and imagination. The first woman 
 to know life and love; the first to look with 
 amazement and fear, with curiosity and de- 
 light, upon the multitudinous manifestations 
 of nature in plant and flower, fruit and tree, 
 stream and plain, vale and mountain, and 
 firmament of sun, moon, stars, and infinite 
 blue ! What creature, human or angelic, ever 
 before or since could have been subjected to 
 such a conflict of ideas and feelings, of antici- 
 pation and dread, of contentment and alarm, 
 of hope and fear, of peace and perplexity, of 
 admiration and awe as must have been experi- 
 enced by Eve, "the mother of all living"? 
 
 The first woman to enter this vast, strange, 
 magnificent, yet awful world must have been 
 created with a stout heart, with a courage, self- 
 poise, mental force, and authoritative power 
 of will which has never since been required of, 
 if possessed by, any woman of this long earth 
 history. The first woman, the first wife, the 
 first mother. Eve, was the world's first, if not 
 the world's greatest, heroine. What must the 
 strength of such a mind have been that she was 
 not destroyed by the fierce emotional agita- 
 tions aroused within her being by the first 
 temptation, by the first sin, by the first vision 
 of crime and death! This old world, so full 
 of tragedy and tears, has become familiar with 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 173 
 
 sin and wrong, with death and war. History- 
 is but a story of wickedness and a record of 
 evil. But how she must have stood appalled, 
 paralyzed with dread and fear, who was the 
 first of all women to look upon and experience 
 the sorrow of the introduction of sin into this 
 world with its attendant miseries! 
 
 Yes, the truest heroine that ever suffered 
 temptation was Eve. Alone she stood, mother- 
 less, daughterless, sisterless. Even with the 
 comradeship of Adam, what must have been 
 that unutterable longing within her soul, that 
 sense of void and solitude, that yearning in- 
 definable for counsel, comfort, pity, sympathy, 
 hope, which was but a psychological demand 
 for feminine companionship ! It baffles imag- 
 ination to picture all the possible moods of 
 that woman-soul in its dread loneliness. Has 
 God ever exacted as much of any other woman? 
 If Eve was the first to fall, she too was the 
 first to be tempted. Brave indeed was the 
 man who first went forth to contend with 
 savage beast ; though the beast destroyed him, 
 he remained the first hero to face brutality. 
 Great courage had the man who first bared 
 his breast to the shock of the ocean's wave; 
 though he went down, conquered by the anger 
 and treachery of the sea, he remained the first 
 hero to try the awful deep. By the authority 
 
174 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 of Holy Writ, woman was tlie first of earthly 
 intelligencies to receive the attack of the 
 tempter. The feminine soul was the first to 
 face the storm and shock of demoniacal an- 
 tagonism, and, though she fell before her soul's 
 enemy, overcome and overwhelmed, Eve re- 
 imains the first heroine to be subjected to the 
 fearful ordeal of temptation — a preeminence 
 undisputed even by any hero in the history of 
 man. No, alas! Eve was not the first to be 
 tempted without sin. But there was a heroism 
 in her submission to the very trial that over- 
 came her. And if she was the first to sin, she 
 was the first to suffer, while her woman's tears 
 were the first to fall in cleansing repentance 
 upon the very title page of human tragedy. 
 
 But it is as the mother of all living that 
 Eve occupies the most exalted seat in the realm 
 of woman-heroism. She was the first to suffer 
 for mankind. Death itself could not have been 
 more awe-inspiring and fearful to contemplate 
 than motherhood. What heroine of siege or 
 battle, of travel or adventure ever braved as 
 much of suffering and danger as did she who 
 was the first to dread and then endure the 
 mystery and agony of motherhood? But the 
 honor of it! Yes, the glory that crowns the 
 brow of Eve shines with a splendor second 
 only to that which weaves its eternal halo 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 175 
 
 about the head of Mary, the mother of our 
 Lord. 
 
 Whether this picture of Eve be traditional 
 or historical, fanciful or real, allegorical or 
 biographical, it is the only attempt in ancient 
 literature to honor the memory of "the mother 
 of all living." According to the mythologies, 
 the origin of the human race cannot be traced 
 back to a tender, suffering, and heroic mother- 
 hood. Evolution finds no place for Eve in 
 its hypothesis, and recognizes no individual 
 mother of all living to honor with its venera- 
 tion. It has no place in history for the origin 
 of the human family in a mother's wonder and 
 heroic pain. That race alone which was hon- 
 ored by the purest womanhood of antiquity 
 could boast the chivalry that dreamed the 
 magnificent dream of woman's surrender to 
 the heroic endurance of the peril and sorrow 
 of motherhood in giving common origin to the 
 nations of mankind. Honor to the Hebrew 
 race, which, if it has done no more to honor 
 her memory, has exalted Eve in its tradition 
 and literature as the "mother of all living." 
 
 And what mother does not venerate the 
 memory of her who had the heroism to become 
 the first mother? Only a mother can know 
 what that first mother must have suffered, 
 what must have been her dread and apprehen- 
 
176 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 sion ! How her soul must have trembled within 
 her! How she must have longed for a sym- 
 pathy indefinable that only a sister-woman 
 could have bestowed upon her in her lonely 
 and fearful state! How she must have won- 
 dered, in a sad, pathetic wonder, at the awful 
 mystery of her condition ! And, affrighted 
 with the consuming joy and pride and triumph 
 of the maternal instinct springing up in her 
 soul, how she must have gazed in amazement 
 upon the world's firstborn as he lay helpless 
 in her weak and trembling arms ! the mys- 
 tery of life, of birth, of awakening mentality, 
 of growing childhood, of developing manhood, 
 of disease and death, and the silence, and the 
 earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust! 
 The mystery of tears ! The mystery of pain ! 
 The mystery of sin! The mystery of death! 
 The mystery beyond death! How the mys- 
 teries must have overwhelmed that first 
 mother's imagination ! Sad, awe-struck, be- 
 wildered woman, who has not pitied thee! 
 Who has not honored thee! What a lot was 
 thine ! And yet was this thy temptation and 
 thy sin — the ambition and the heroism of 
 motherhood? Wouldst thou be like God and 
 have man come from thee fashioned in thy 
 likeness? What ambition greater than this 
 has ever animated woman? Had angel ever 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 177 
 
 such an ambition, an ambition to produce his 
 like? What greater sorrow has ever filled the 
 heart of a daughter of Eve than the sorrow of 
 childlessness? If this was thy sin, O mother 
 of us all, was the danger and the pain of 
 motherhood the penalty imposed upon so dar- 
 ing, so almost godlike an ambition as that of 
 being the authoress of a race? And wast thou 
 willing to pass under the cloud of this great 
 mystery, willing to suffer and even to submit 
 to the dread ordeal of threatened death, to be 
 a mother? Honor to thee for all that was sin- 
 less in thy motherhood! Too long has the 
 heartless world ignored thy claim upon its 
 most chivalric honor and veneration. To have 
 been Eve was to have been the greatest of 
 women, the most heroic heroine of them all. 
 
 Was there no Eve, no historic personality 
 corresponding to this scriptural portrait of 
 humanity's first mother? And must our 
 science deny to any one woman the honor 
 which is given by Holy Writ to Eve? Or must 
 we believe that in the order of evolution man 
 sprang from several original mothers of the 
 races that inhabit the earth and that the many 
 divisions of the human family had their sev- 
 eral origins in the various countries of the 
 world either simultaneously or at not very 
 ^"idely separated periods of time, and that 
 
178 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 those original mother-types were but little 
 higher than the bestial apes? Has it come to 
 this in our study of the origins, that we must 
 surrender the exalted and exalting idea that 
 man was created but little lower than the 
 angels, in the beauty and nobility of the divine 
 likeness? May we no longer rationally believe 
 that the mother of all living was beautiful as 
 an angel, as the living, heroic daughter of 
 God? 
 
 After all, are not the poets as true to nature 
 and to life as the scientists and philosophers? 
 Is not the imagination of a David as trust- 
 worthy as the speculative fancy of a Darwin? 
 Which gives to man the higher dignity and 
 glory of origin, the theory that mah was made 
 but little lower than the angels or the hypoth- 
 esis that he was made but little higher than the 
 apes? The Eve of Paradise Lost is the Eve 
 of Hebrew tradition and of inspired history. 
 And with what a glory does poetry clothe the 
 "human form divine" ! In describing the ani- 
 mal creation, Milton thus gives preeminence 
 to our first parents: 
 
 Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall. 
 
 Godlike erect, with native honor clad. 
 
 In naked majesty, seemed lords of all. 
 
 And worthy seemed; for in their looks divine 
 
 The image of their glorious Maker shone. 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 179 
 
 In his sleep, during whicli Eve was formed, 
 Adam dreamed that he beheld God fashion 
 her: 
 
 "Under his forming hands a creature grew, 
 Manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair 
 That what seemed fair in all the world seemed now 
 Mean, or in her summed up, in her contained 
 And in her looks, which from that time infused 
 Sweetness into my heart unfelt before. 
 And into all things from her air inspired 
 The spirit of love and amorous delight." 
 
 By a poetical conceit that may not be without 
 scientific foundation, Milton gives to Eve the 
 Anglo-Saxon beauty of the blonde rather than 
 the traditional Oriental characteristics of the 
 brunette : 
 
 She as a veil down to her slender waist 
 Her unadorned golden tresses wore 
 Disheveled. 
 
 Again he describes "The flowing gold of her 
 loose tresses." To Adam she is "Heaven's last, 
 best gift." Even the Satanic tempter is so 
 charmed with Eve's loveliness that he is quite 
 disconcerted and hesitates to execute his cruel 
 purpose of temptation. 
 
 Her heavenly form. 
 Angelic, but more soft and feminine. 
 Her graceful innocence, her every air 
 Of gesture or least action, overawed 
 His malice, and with rapine sweet bereaved 
 His fierceness of the fierce intent it brought. 
 
180 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Warranted by the Sacred Oracles, the holy 
 traditions, it is with such charms of beauty, 
 grace, and dignity of high intelligence, per- 
 fection of womanly instincts, and sum and 
 combination of moral attributes and angelic 
 virtues that the poetic imagination clothes this 
 "Daughter of God and man, immortal Eve." 
 
 And must this glorious ideal be surrendered 
 for some pitiable, hideous, filthy monstrosity 
 which in passing over the differentiating line 
 between brute and man is neither beast nor 
 human, but is hardly to be distinguished from 
 the chattering ape, incapable of the hope or 
 fear, the joy or sorrow, the dread or heroism 
 of human motherhood? Must humanity sur- 
 render the noblest heroine of poetry or ro- 
 mance, of tradition or history, and immolate 
 Eve on the altar of evolution? 
 
 Art, like poetry, has treated this heroine 
 with a dignity which science and theology have 
 almost jeeringly avoided. Dtirer, Raphael, and 
 Michael Angelo have represented Eve as the 
 very paragon of physical grace and loveliness. 
 
 But sad indeed it must seem to every gener- 
 ous soul that this awful and sublime charac- 
 ter, this august, lonely, but majestic woman, 
 should have been so contemptuously neglected 
 by literature in general ; sad that this mother 
 of our race, from whom all genius has caught 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 181 
 
 its heavenly fire, all greatness has inherited 
 its impulse and power, and from whom all 
 histories have sprung, all destinies have re- 
 ceived their initiative, and all immortals their 
 immortality, should have recognition only in 
 the Hebrew traditions and in theologies which 
 treat her memory with execration. Not even 
 do the poets or the prophets of Hebrew litera- 
 ture deign to rescue her name from ridicule 
 and contempt. Not once is her name even 
 mentioned by the writers who succeeded the 
 author of Genesis. And Paul mentions her 
 only incidentally, and that, with his Jewish 
 training, only to blame her for her part in the 
 moral catastrophe of the fall. No word of pity 
 or of praise, no extenuating argument, no sigh 
 of sympathetic commiseration is to be found 
 in all the vast library of sacred lore. The 
 historian does not think it worth while to 
 record the number of days allotted her on 
 earth, the place of her death, or the locality 
 of her lonely grave. But the world's neglect, 
 ridicule, contempt, and blame have made the 
 mother of all living the heroine of all heroines. 
 
 Sakah 
 
 If Abraham is to be known as the father of 
 the favored race and chosen people, the orig- 
 inal progenitor of the Jews, why should not 
 
182 HEEOINES OP HISTORY 
 
 Sarah, Avith equal veneration, be recognized as 
 Israel's mother? Why may she not share with 
 Abraham the honor and glory of the fulfill- 
 ment of the promise of God, "In thy seed shall 
 all the nations of the earth be blessed"? The 
 author of the Epistle to the Hebrews gives 
 Sarah her share of this honor and glory when, 
 after referring to her faith in God's promise, 
 he concludes : "Therefore sprang there even 
 of one, and him as good as dead, so many as 
 the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the 
 sand which is by the seashore innumerable." 
 "Therefore !" — on account of Sarah's faith did 
 Abraham become even in his old age the father 
 of the faithful. And was she not "therefore" 
 the glorious and heroic mother of the faithful? 
 In the shadow of every great man stands, 
 hidden from the careless observer, that great 
 man's mother, at once his mother and the in- 
 spiring genius of his life. In every new epoch 
 of a people's history, whether it be political, 
 moral, intellectual, or military, will be found 
 a mother giving to a son not only the genius 
 for his work and mission, but also the spirit, 
 purpose, and ambition of it. Perhaps no race 
 owes more to its mothers than the Jews. And 
 to no mother of their many great and heroic 
 mothers does Israel owe more than to Sarah. 
 When Abraham is called to become the pro- 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 183 
 
 genitor of a peculiar people, the very character 
 of that people is left to the molding, fashion- 
 ing influence of motherhood. That whole deli- 
 cate story of Sarah's ambition for Abraham's 
 power and fame and favor with God which 
 inspired her self-abnegation in Hagar's favor 
 is a story of the rarest heroism ever known. 
 O, that was more than surrendering wealth, 
 honors, life itself! It is a strange, pathetic 
 legend coming to us out of paganism, out of 
 barbarism, out of times and conditions less 
 enlightened than our own, but it is all heroic 
 on Sarah's part, with a heroism, a self-sacri- 
 fice, that must ever evoke the admiration of 
 all those noble, sensitive minds that under- 
 stand. 
 
 Was it this very heroism, by which Sarah 
 would sacrifice her womanhood that sprang 
 up within her soul as a living flame from a 
 single ember and became the faith which made 
 her a mother? Isaac was the son of a heroine, 
 of the greatest heroine since Eve. And where 
 do we find the philosophy of Isaac's destiny? 
 In the influence of that mother. Even in her 
 instinctive insistence that Hagar and Ishmael 
 shall leave the tent of Abraham she has an 
 eye to the future of Isaac. Is she also con- 
 cerned for that promised seed of Abraham 
 which shall be as the stars? Has she the 
 
184 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 instinct, the self-consciousness of a mother of 
 a race no less than of the mother of Isaac? 
 Here is a problem for Abraham with Isaac 
 and Ishmael growing up in his tent. Sarah 
 has to solve the problem, jand it is a serious 
 one, involving the character of a race. When 
 Ishmael makes faces at Isaac, does the quick- 
 eyed mother foresee the time when the older 
 boy may taunt and ridicule and denounce her 
 son? With an inspired jealousy that mother 
 comes to the rescue of her boy and of her race. 
 Foreseeing the strength and pride and inso- 
 lence of Ishmael, she begins to fear that he 
 may usurp the place of honor in the father's 
 pride and crowd Isaac off the stage of his- 
 tory. Abraham seems to be oblivious to the 
 jealousies that may spring up between the 
 boys, and does not think that possibly some 
 day this Ishmael may strike Isaac the fatal 
 blow, for the hot blood of the future Arab is 
 in his veins. Sarah rightly interprets Ish- 
 mael's sneer and saves Isaac, saves Abraham, 
 saves her race. She is the mother of the hero- 
 ines of Israel. 
 
 Much sympathy has been expressed for 
 Abraham in the trial of his faith when he 
 seemed called of God to make a sacrifice of 
 Isaac. But what of Sarah the mother? In 
 this strange incident may we suppose that 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 185 
 
 God adopted this method to eradicate a cruel 
 superstition from the mind of Abraham? Is 
 it not possible that Abraham believed in hu- 
 man sacrifices : that he had imbibed the fanati- 
 cism from the surrounding religions before 
 he knew the true worship? Indeed, were not 
 his ancestors of Chaldea fire-worshipers, and 
 may not the cult or religion of Moloch and of 
 Chemosh which demanded the offering of hu- 
 man sacrifices have come down from Abra- 
 ham's forbears? 
 
 Was it in the blood of Abraham in that 
 earlier time, and was it God's purpose by this 
 trial at Moriah to forever eradicate the super- 
 stition from his blood? Be that as it may, 
 Abraham, who seems not to have hesitated, 
 or even, like Jephtha later, to have expressed 
 his grief at the thought of offering up his own 
 child as a sacrifice — Abraham after that trial 
 never showed a symptom of the human-sacri- 
 ficing superstition which may have hereditar- 
 ily lingered in his blood. But Sarah, what of 
 her? Can we for a moment imagine that she 
 was in ignorance of Abraham's purpose to 
 offer up Isaac? Not if we still have faith in 
 the moral integrity of Abraham. Was it none 
 of her business ? What ! and shall this father 
 slay his son even at God's command, and give 
 no warning to Isaac's mother? Can Abra- 
 
186 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 ham honestly, humanely, righteously keep this 
 a secret from Sarah? Evidently he kept it 
 a secret from his servants, and even from 
 Isaac himself, until the last moment. But 
 could he have slain Isaac without giving his 
 son any warning? Could he have slain the 
 boy without revealing his purpose to that 
 boy's mother, without preparing her for it and 
 helping her to meet the terrible trial? We 
 cannot believe it. Sarah must have known 
 jvhat Abraham's purpose was when he de- 
 ; jarted with Isaac and the servants. Poor wom- 
 m ! demand not of her all the stoical strength 
 of Abraham. She is a woman and a mother, 
 'saac is her all, nay, to her imagination, he is 
 the world's all. And now must her hopes be 
 dashed to the ground, the hopes that came 
 with the coming of Isaac, the hopes for Abra- 
 ham's promised posterity? 
 
 What a disappointment! What a test of 
 faith! It must have been a severer trial to 
 Sarah than to Abraham, to mother than to 
 father. And sits she alone there in the tent 
 sobbing, praying, wondering? O, the mystery 
 of the ways of God! If she knew it all, that 
 poor mother, and moaned the hours away and 
 prayed alone there for her boy and for Abra- 
 ham and for herself, and still had faith in 
 God — the good, just God and Father of us 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 187 
 
 all — and if she did not rebel, ah, there was 
 the grandest heroism of the whole mysterious 
 incident ! But she did it for her God as many 
 a mother has surrendered her son for her 
 country ; she did it for religion as she thought, 
 as many another has sacrificed her boy for 
 liberty. But let us not forget this mother 
 crouching and wailing and praying in the tent 
 alone while Abraham and Isaac are on Mo- 
 riah. Let us not forget the heroine who by 
 faith bowed to what she with Abraham inter- 
 preted as the will of God. 
 
 Rebecca 
 
 Come on into the next generation. To whom 
 does Jacob owe his success? To his mother, 
 Rebecca. Isaac was a good-natured, mild- 
 mannered, peaceable man, rather a negative 
 character and lacking in initiative force. 
 Knowing that it takes two to make a quarrel, 
 he never got mixed up in any serious misunder- 
 standings with his neighbors, who did not 
 hesitate to impose on his amiability and rob 
 him of his rights whenever the opportunity 
 presented. 
 
 Well, he liked the boys, but evidently had 
 very little discipline or authority in his man- 
 agement of the family. The will, the dom- 
 inant if not the domineering will, of that do- 
 
188 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 mestic establishment was Rebecca. Call her 
 a schemer if you will, she schemes for vast, 
 universal results. She had no right, some will 
 say, to favor either one of those twin boys, 
 Jacob or Esau, to the undoing of the other. 
 But her mother instinct saw that Jacob was 
 the fitter of the two for the history that had 
 to be worked out by that chosen race. Faults 
 enough there were in both of the boys, but no 
 one will claim that the mother was mistaken 
 in the character of her sons when she chose 
 Jacob for the preeminence. And who shall 
 say that Rebecca did not choose as wisely and 
 with as motherly a consideration for Esau 
 as for Jacob? What if Esau had tried to fill 
 the place that Jacob came to occupy in his- 
 tory? What a misfit he would have been! 
 What if Ishmael had taken the place which 
 Isaac was called to fill? It was proper that 
 these selections should have been made as 
 they were if there was a demand for a race 
 such as was to produce men like David and 
 Solomon and Isaiah. But Esau was a greater 
 success where Rebecca's sagacity and schem- 
 ing succeeded in fixing him than he would 
 have been in the place to which heredity had 
 accidentally assigned him. The mother who 
 has the heart and brains, the courage and wis- 
 dom to train, educate, and place her sons for 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 189 
 
 the positions in life where they will make the 
 most of themselves will be as true to the boy 
 for whom she chooses the plow or the anvil 
 as to the boy for whom she chooses the bank, 
 the pulpit, the editor's chair, or the senate. 
 Rebecca was as faithful to Esau as to Jacob. 
 It would have been unmotherly cruelty for 
 her to let Esau be crushed under the burden 
 of responsibility which even a Jacob, a ten- 
 fold greater genius, had scarce the brain power 
 and moral strength of fiber to bear without 
 reproach. Not an ideal mother? No, but a 
 sagacious mother; a mother of very keen in- 
 sight; a mother with very stalwart, independ- 
 ent convictions as to the fitness of things; 
 a mother who knows her boys through and 
 through; a mother who realizes her own re- 
 sponsibility for the best this world is to get 
 out of her sons ; a mother who seems to know 
 in some deep, strange, unerring way that she 
 is accountable to all future ages for the fitting 
 of those boys of hers into God's plans, the or- 
 dained program of history. Is not this the 
 justification of Rebecca, that she believed God 
 had ordained Jacob to be the successor of 
 Isaac as the head of the racial line by which 
 all the families of the earth were to be blest? 
 God replied to her anxious inquiry : "Two na- 
 tions are in thy womb, and two manner of 
 
190 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 people shall be separated from thy bowels; 
 and the one people shall be stronger than the 
 other people; and the elder shall serve the 
 younger." Concerning this revelation of God 
 to Rebecca, Paul speaks in his Epistle to the 
 Romans, and there claims that Jacob's sup- 
 planting Esau was that the purpose of God 
 might stand. And, anticipating the ethical 
 difficulty, the question of the justice of Jacob's 
 securing Esau's birthright, Paul asks the ques- 
 tion: "Is there unrighteousness with God? 
 God forbid." If, then, Rebecca was but car- 
 rying out the purpose of God in directing the 
 stream of the Abrahamic descent from the 
 wild, rough, animalistic Esau to the brainier, 
 more highly developed and civilized Jacob, is 
 there unrighteousness with Rebecca? God 
 forbid. God's justification is the justification 
 of Rebecca, who, as the agent of Providence, 
 saw to it that of her twin sons the elder should 
 serve the younger, brawn should serve brain, 
 and Jacob should become Israel. This 
 mother's affection for Esau and her solicitude 
 for his welfare were not destroyed by her 
 special and divinely inspired guardianship of 
 Jacob's interests. She with Isaac took griev- 
 ously to heart Esau's marriage with Judith 
 and Bashemath. She had not lost interest in 
 Esau when she could have "grief of mind" 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 191 
 
 over his mesalliance with these daughters of 
 the Hittites. 
 
 With all of Rebecca's solicitude for the 
 safety of Jacob when Esau was threatening 
 to get even with his brother for supplanting 
 him there may have been very good reason 
 for her anxiety with regard to Jacob's own 
 feelings toward the "daughters of the land" 
 in which they were dwelling. Not only was 
 she heroically determined to save Jacob from 
 Esau, but with a determined mother's will 
 she was resolved to save him from marrying 
 in another race and thus corrupting the Abra- 
 hamic blood. "And Rebecca said to Isaac, 
 I am weary of my life because of the daugh- 
 ters of Heth: if Jacob take a wife of the 
 daughters of Heth, such as these which are 
 of the daughters of the land, what good shall 
 my life do me?" If Jacob is to follow the 
 example of Esau and marry a heathen, then 
 for me life is no longer worth the living. 
 
 Jacob may never have seen his mother 
 again. He went off to his uncle in Padan- 
 aram and there served Laban for fourteen 
 years, married Leah and Rachel, and tarried 
 longer still. In the meantime doubtless Re- 
 becca had died. Yes, long years had passed, 
 and Jacob had dreamed his dream at Bethel 
 and had wrestled with the angel at Peniel and 
 
192 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 had become the father of many children and 
 had been reconciled to Esau and had become 
 rich and powerful, but when he returns to 
 Isaac, his father, now an old man of one hun- 
 dred and eighty years and soon to give up 
 the ghost and be gathered unto his people, no 
 mention is made of Rebecca his faithful, de- 
 voted, heroine-mother. She doubtless had fall- 
 en on sleep long before Jacob's return. Her 
 old nurse, Deborah, had died at Bethel, 
 whither she had gone, we may conclude, to 
 be near Jacob after Rebecca's death. And 
 may not this dear old nurse have told Jacob 
 many things which his mother bade her say to 
 him? To her dying day her mother-heart must 
 have followed the destiny of Jacob with fond 
 solicitude and with many a prayer. And did 
 she yearn for him and long to see his face be- 
 fore she died? It took heroism for that mother 
 to send her favorite son away even to save 
 him from marrying among the daughters of 
 Heth, and she was destined to endure his ab- 
 sence to the end of her days. But for his 
 sake, and for the sake of Israel that was to be, 
 for the glory of her blood and race, for the 
 glory of the future of which she may have 
 had the vision, she made the heroic sacrifice. 
 And Jacob became Israel, and Israel the peo- 
 ple of God, and the people of God the cus- 
 
THE HEEOINE-MOTHER 193 
 
 todians of the oracles of heaven, and the or- 
 acles of heaven the promise of redemption. 
 Eternal honor crown the brow of that heroic 
 mother — Eebecca ! 
 
 Rachel 
 As we advance to the next generation, we 
 find another character standing out in all the 
 splendor of a unique and magnificent man- 
 hood. He is as brilliant in intellect as he 
 is amiable in temper, magnanimous in spirit, 
 and chaste in life. Joseph was the noblest of 
 all the sons of Jacob, and his mother was the 
 beautiful Rachel. Considering the influence 
 of Joseph in his time, the fertility of his 
 genius, his statesmanship, diplomacy, and pa- 
 triotism, his command of the most critical 
 situation in the development of Israel, we ask, 
 could a son of Esau by a daughter of Heth 
 have filled so large a place in history? What 
 would have become of the seed of Abraham 
 if Esau had succeeded Isaac and not been sup- 
 planted by his brother Jacob? What if there 
 had been no Joseph in Israel at that most 
 critical period in the development of the 
 chosen people for their mission to the world? 
 Surely, all must have gone amiss if Esau had 
 not been put aside. Is not Joseph's great- 
 ness a justification of his grandmother's par- 
 tiality for Jacob? 
 
194 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 But Joseph was emphatically his mother's 
 boy. Rachel, with the highest instinct of 
 highest womanhood, unburdened her heart to 
 Jacob when she said, "Give me children, or 
 else I die." The pitiful prayer only angered 
 Jacob, but "God remembered Rachel, . 
 and she conceived and bore a son . . . and she 
 called his name Joseph." Jacob was proud 
 enough of the lad, and his partiality should 
 have spoiled Joseph. But one feels that this 
 boy, this clean, pure, gentle boy, this young man 
 of honor, this ideal gentleman, this chivalrous 
 courtier, this magnanimous statesman, this 
 Joseph sans peur et sans reproehe, owes every- 
 thing to that mother who had prayed to be his 
 mother. In her heroic devotion she trained 
 him to be every inch a man. And he was a 
 man whose very reverence for womanhood his 
 mother Rachel had inspired within him. He 
 never forgot what he owed woman because 
 he never forgot as an honorable man what he 
 owed the memory of his mother. Though he 
 was but fourteen years old when .Rachel died, 
 he seems to have inherited his mother's spirit. 
 Joseph was evidently a man of noble physical 
 presence, who had inherited his handsome fea- 
 tures and graceful proportions from his beau- 
 tiful mother. But his mental and moral attri- 
 butes which distinguished him as a man beau- 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 195 
 
 tiful within, adorned with all the graces of 
 handsome manliness and imposing character, 
 were, no less than his physical attractions, the 
 gifts of a mother whose very dignity, patience, 
 forgiveness, gentleness, loyalty, and power of 
 love she seems to have poured into the soul of 
 her beautiful boy. And we may suppose that 
 the fourteen happy years of her motherly in- 
 fluence over Joseph must have fashioned him 
 to a comeliness of character, to an attitude of 
 moral grace, dignity, symmetry, and poise that 
 the years could no more change than time 
 could change the noble proportions of the 
 Apollo Belvedere. Yes, there was a marvelous 
 heroism of motherhood in Rachel's confession, 
 "Give me children or else I die." And was she 
 not a martyr to the very heroism of mother- 
 hood? She died at Benjamin's birth. "And 
 it came to pass as her soul was departing 
 that she called his name Benoni"— "son of 
 my pain." It was as "they journeyed from 
 Bethel; and there was but a little way to 
 come to Ephrath." Back to this heroine 
 mother many a great man traced his ancestry. 
 Through Joseph such heroes as Joshua, 
 Gideon, and Jephthah could boast lineage 
 from Rachel. And through Benjamin, Rachel 
 became the ancestress of Saul, the first king 
 of Israel; of Jonathan, the friend of David; 
 
196 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 of Jeremiah, the prophet, and of Paul, the 
 apostle of our Lord. 
 
 JOCHEBED 
 
 As history crowds toward the fullness of 
 time and there approaches in the evolution of 
 the divine plan of world-saving the dispensa- 
 tion of symbolism, the demand arises for an 
 emancipator, a lawgiver, a deliverer, a na- 
 tional leader, a scholar, a prophet, a hero of 
 heroes. In placing such a man as Moses 
 ( composite in his many-sided greatness as was 
 Csesar, Napoleon, Michael Angelo, Pericles, or 
 Washington) in the forefront of the world's 
 advancing moral movement, God uses the in- 
 fluence of the heroine-mother. 
 
 The heroine as mother, the mother as hero- 
 ine! There she is, behold her, with all her 
 pride sacrificed to material devotion, crouch- 
 ing among the flags that grow along the brink 
 of the Nile and committing her beautiful babe 
 (a goodly child) to the little cradle of bul- 
 rushes floating on the water near to where 
 the daughter of Pharaoh comes to bathe! 
 That mother has succeeded in hiding the mar- 
 velous boy for three months. The edict has 
 gone forth that every son born of a Hebrew 
 mother shall be cast into the river. And so 
 Moses has been thrown into the river, but 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 197 
 
 that mother's heroic care and devotion and 
 that mother's wit have kept the child from 
 perishing and saved him for a wonderful fu- 
 ture. So it thrills us to again read the story 
 as found in the Holy Writ: 
 
 And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took 
 to wife a daughter of Levi. 
 
 And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when 
 she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him 
 three months. 
 
 And when she could not longer hide him, she took 
 for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime 
 and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid 
 it in the flags by the river's brink. 
 
 And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be 
 done to him. 
 
 And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash 
 herself at the river; and her maidens walked along by 
 the river's side: and when she saw the ark among the 
 flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. 
 
 And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, 
 behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, 
 and said. This is one of the Hebrews' children. 
 
 Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall I 
 go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that 
 she may nurse the child for thee? 
 
 And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her. Go. And 
 the maid went and called the child's mother. 
 
 And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this 
 child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy 
 wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it. 
 
 And the child grew, and she brought him unto Phar- 
 aoh's daughter, and he became her son. And she called 
 his name Moses. 
 
 His education in all the wisdom of the 
 
198 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Egyptians followed, and that, in the provi- 
 dence of God, was but a preparation for the 
 mission to which Moses was called. When at 
 last the summons came for action and devo- 
 tion, great as were his political possibilities, 
 his financial, worldly prospects, his hopes of 
 official preferment, his opportunities for reap- 
 ing applause and satiating any thirst for fame, 
 he "chose rather to suffer affliction with the 
 people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of 
 sin for a season, esteeming the reproach of 
 Christ greater riches than the treasures of 
 Egypt." There was the greatest hero of his 
 age, the greatest genius of his age, the great- 
 est man of his age. Who made that greatness 
 possible? Jochebed, the servant of Pharaoh's 
 daughter, the heroine-mother of Moses. It 
 is a barbarous name to our ears — Jochebed! 
 but by interpretation it is appropriate, for it 
 means "glorious." Yes, glorious woman, 
 glorious heroine, glorious mother! To have 
 been the mother of Moses was greatness enough 
 for any woman. 
 
 But Jochebed was the mother of heroic Mir- 
 iam and the mother of Aaron, the first high 
 priest of Israel, as she was the mother of 
 Moses, Israel's leader, deliverer, and immortal 
 lawgiver. The author of the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews places Jochebed, though not by name. 
 
THE HEEOINE-MOTHBR 199 
 
 among the immortal worthies of his national 
 portrait gallery, assigns her a place among 
 the "great cloud of witnesses" who look down 
 and cheer us in the race by the inspiring mem- 
 ory of their own triumphant achievements of 
 heroism and of faith. But why have not poets 
 sung the praises of this glorious Jochebed? 
 
 Was there a more devoted heroine-mother of 
 all that mighty race? Was Sarah, Rebecca, 
 Rachel, of more heroic mold and spirit than 
 she? And yet a thousand times will one hear 
 their familiar names with praises sung or 
 spoken to once that one will hear the name of 
 Jochebed. The world might better have spared 
 a Joseph, a Jacob, an Isaac, an Abraham, than 
 a Moses. He overtops them all in brain and 
 power, in history-making will and force of eter- 
 nal, universal influence. To have saved him to 
 the Jewish race and to the world was for that 
 mother to have imposed a debt upon the ages 
 that must bankrupt all gratitude to pay. To 
 have kindled this mighty moral luminary, to 
 have fashioned it and fed its young fires to 
 the heavenly intensities, and then to have 
 hurled it out to sweep in awful flame the orbit 
 that encircles worlds, was for that woman 
 Jochebed to have done what some great mother 
 sun hath done when from her heart of fire 
 eternal she has thrown a new world flaming 
 
200 HEEOINES OP HISTORY 
 
 into space to abolish night and make it morn- 
 ing everywhere. 
 
 Hannah 
 
 In Samuel, the illustrious judge and prophet 
 of Israel, we have learned to venerate one of 
 the most genuine, incorruptible, perfect, and 
 admirable characters in the public life of an- 
 tiquity. Greek and Roman annals will be 
 searched in vain for his superior, if for his 
 parallel. And the child who became to Israel 
 the prophet and the ideal judge was a gift of 
 God granted in answer to the prayer of Han- 
 nah, who heroically pleaded for the honor and 
 glory of motherhood. Here was the same high 
 and holy womanly instinct asserting itself 
 in the heart of the modest, devout, affectionate, 
 and intellectual Hannah that stirred the soul 
 of Rachel when she cried, "Give me children, 
 or else I die." Is there need of such mother- 
 heroism, and even of mother-martyrdom, in 
 this age, when too many women, with a pagan 
 viciousness of sentiment, would destroy that 
 mother instinct which is the most precious 
 jewel in the crown of Hebrew womanhood? 
 Is there a surer, sadder sign of the decadence 
 of a people than the loss of woman's highest 
 virtue, the heroism of motherhood? 
 
 Modestly, pathetically, yet heroically, had 
 this noble daughter of Israel prayed for a 
 
THE HEROINE-MOTHER 201 
 
 man child. Fasting and sorely weeping and 
 silently praying, slie vowed that if God would 
 honor her with the honor of motherhood, she 
 would give her son unto the Lord all the days 
 of his life. "And the Lord remembered her." 
 Hannah called the boy Samuel — "asked of 
 God." That mother's influence gave noble 
 fashion to the character of her son. If, as 
 Herbert Spencer has affirmed, the child takes 
 most of his nature from his mother, then Sam- 
 uel's nature was the gift of a mother richly 
 endowed with a rare combination of intellec- 
 tual force and refinement, and of spiritual 
 graces and attributes. Even the great judge 
 and prophet bore upon him to the end the im- 
 pressions of his mother's pious and heroic de- 
 votion. Hannah, the heroine-mother, prom- 
 ised God that if she were blest with a son, 
 she would give him to the Lord and consecrate 
 him to his service. Faithful to her vows, when 
 he was but three years old she took the boy 
 to Shiloh and presented him to the priest Eli 
 for education and training in the service of 
 God. It took a heroine to make such a sac- 
 rifice. Was not Hannah the first of that long 
 line of heroine-mothers who have given their 
 sons and daughters to God for his service? 
 Even to-day are not mothers sending their 
 children to India and China and Africa and 
 
202 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 the far-off islands of the sea to serve God as 
 missionaries in the redemption of the heathen 
 world? There, indeed, is a mother-heroism 
 such as Hannah possessed when she gave 
 Samuel to the Lord. But that mother knew 
 it was for Samuel's good, for Israel's welfare, 
 and for the glory of God that she should thus 
 give up her son as a sacrifice to high and 
 holy service. A very sweet and pathetic phase 
 of Hannah's self-sacrifice is revealed in the 
 record that, she went up to Shiloh every year 
 to see him whom she had "lent unto the Lord," 
 and every year the dear mother carried with 
 her and presented to Samuel a new coat made 
 with her own patient, motherly hands. Ah, 
 these great men, they know, if the world does 
 not always know, how much they owe their 
 mothers, their patient, self-sacrificing, hopeful, 
 heroic mothers! Samuel knew how much he 
 owed that mother, the devout Hannah, for all 
 he came to be and to do in his country's his- 
 tory. Alexander the Great knew what he 
 owed his mother, so did Napoleon, Goethe, 
 Wesley, Lincoln, Washington ; each knew what 
 an infinite debt he owed his heroic devoted 
 mother for all his greatness. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE HEROINE-WirE 
 The Ideal Home 
 
 It is the heroine-wife that rises before the 
 sociological student of the Bible into a beauty, 
 dignity, and glory transcending all wives of 
 classical literature, of pagan society, of human 
 religions and nationalism. What is the wife 
 of India as compared to the wife of Israel? 
 What is the wife of China, what was the wife 
 of Greece, or Rome, or Egypt, or Babylon as 
 compared to the Hebrew wife? What home 
 life can equal that ancient Jewish home life? 
 What country or people ever looked with equal 
 veneration upon the sacredness of the mar- 
 riage relation? Where in any social organism 
 has the family been so conspicuously and es- 
 sentially the social unit and the foundation 
 of the national character? Upon the home rests 
 the nation; upon the family ideal rests the 
 home ; upon the sanctity of marriage rests the 
 family ideal, and upon the equality and one- 
 ness, the mutual and reciprocal love and loy- 
 alty of husband and wife, rests the sacredness, 
 the inviolability of the marriage relation. Not 
 
 203 
 
204 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 only shall man leave his father and mother 
 and cleave unto his wife and they be one 
 flesh, but the exhortation comes from the 
 Word of God: "Husbands, love your wives 
 even as Christ also loved the church and gave 
 himself for it. So ought men to love their wives 
 as their own selves. For this cause shall a 
 man leave his father and mother and shall 
 be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be 
 one flesh." This Christian view of marriage 
 is but the ripened fruit of that vital seed truth 
 planted in the heart and life of man at his 
 creation and nourished with more or less care 
 and carelessness, success and failure through 
 the centuries of patriarchal and Jewish his- 
 tory struggling up to full flower and fruit- 
 age against the influence of many discourag- 
 ing environments. 
 
 Though monogamy was the true marriage 
 relation instituted by the Creator, and man 
 was originally taught to recognize it as the 
 only lawful and ideal basis of the family or- 
 ganism, nevertheless that divinely ordained 
 ideal has come to its historic reality through 
 a long process of evolution. Though the pur- 
 ity of the Jewish home life has become pro- 
 verbial, and no people have ever treated the 
 institution of marriage with greater reverence, 
 yet it cannot be denied that even that people 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 205 
 
 of God in the examples of some of their most 
 illustrious progenitors violated their own mar- 
 riage laws and ignored their own family ideal 
 by the sin of polygamy. It must be said, how- 
 ever, to their glory as a people, that in mod- 
 ern times, if not from the captivity, polyg- 
 amy, like idolatry, has disappeared from the 
 domestic and religious life of the Jews and 
 with no other race has the wife come to be 
 held in so high and holy an esteem, or dis- 
 ruption of the home and the disgrace of the 
 family through domestic infidelities and loose 
 divorce sentiments, customs, and laws been 
 more bitterly and persistently discounte- 
 nanced and condemned. Christianity has had 
 a great influence upon Judaism in this purifi- 
 cation, exaltation, and safe-guarding of the 
 home life. The Christian home should be 
 and is the Jewish home perfected and sancti- 
 fied by the light of Jesus Christ and the favor 
 of the Spirit of the new life. The marriage 
 relation, for ages held more or less sacred by 
 God's peculiar people, received a new sanctity 
 by the presence of Jesus Christ and his first 
 miracle at Cana of Galilee, and through Paul, 
 its chief apostle, Christianity pronounced 
 afresh the universal honor of the sacred rite. 
 Aside from its debt to the gospel itself, to no 
 institution is civilization more deeply indebted 
 
206 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 than to the home. That institution is the 
 chief glory of the Anglo-Saxon world. What 
 is this, however, but affirming that the saered- 
 ness of marriage lies at the foundation of good 
 and enlightened society and of free and stable 
 government? Nothing will so endanger the 
 beautiful and majestic fabric of civilization 
 as the moral degeneration of the home life, the 
 decline of the people's reverence for wifehood 
 and for the rite of marriage, a growth of flip- 
 pant divorce sentiment, and a demand for lax 
 divorce laws. Whatever lifts from the brow 
 of wifehood the glittering diadem of honor, 
 the crown of holy veneration, and sets the 
 blister of contempt and dishonor there will 
 bring shame and reproach upon the nation. 
 The nation cannot outlive the home ; the home 
 cannot outlive the holiness of marriage, the 
 holiness of marriage cannot outlive the honor 
 paid to wifehood. 
 
 The wives of the Bible are representative — 
 not ideal, but representative. If they were 
 ideal, they would not be representative. They 
 are real, historic, and belong to Eve's family. 
 Their lives are lessons of inspiration and of 
 warning. Of heroic wives there are not a few. 
 But often in their heroism they may be found 
 to lack other qualities which are essential to 
 perfection. Hence a heroine-wife may fall far 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 207 
 
 short of the ideal wife, and her heroism may 
 be the only characteristic that preserves her 
 from oblivion and gives her a niche in the pan- 
 theon of fame. 
 
 Sarah — Wife of Abraham 
 
 We have seen the mother-heroism of Sarah 
 in her devotion to Isaac, and her glorious 
 motherly instincts were inseparably united to 
 a wifely devotion which filled her with am- 
 bition for Abraham's greatness. Surely, that 
 was a providential union. No great man ever 
 had a wife who became a greater power for 
 success in his own life. What loyalty, what 
 supreme confidence, what love united them ! 
 In her wifely heroism she obliterated herself 
 in the supreme desire to see the promise of 
 God fulfilled in Abraham. It was for Abra- 
 ham's sake that she longed for the honors 
 of motherhood. It was for his sake, and at her 
 own, not his, suggestion that Abraham was in- 
 duced to ignore the ancient law of marriage 
 and take Hagar into his home. Did ever wife 
 before or since make greater sacrifice of self 
 in her ambition for her husband's historic 
 preeminence? What her sufferings were, her 
 humiliation, shame, bitterness of pride, con- 
 flict with envy, and jealousy, we may not know, 
 
208 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 but it could not liave been less than painfully 
 heroic, heart-breakingly heroic. 
 
 Abraham has ever been looked upon as the 
 heroic pioneer of sacred history. In that por- 
 trait gallery of the immortal heroes of faith 
 preserved in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews, his portrait hangs conspicu- 
 ous. "By faith, Abraham, when he was called 
 to go out into a place which he should after 
 receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he 
 went out not knowing whither he went." In 
 the old, old record of Genesis the story runs : 
 "Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee 
 out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and 
 from thy father's house, unto a land that I 
 will show thee. And I will make of thee a 
 great nation, and I will bless thee, and make 
 thy name great ; and thou shalt be a blessing : 
 and I will bless them that bless thee and 
 curse them that curse thee : and in thee shall 
 all families of the earth be blessed. So 
 Abram departed, as the Lord had spoken 
 unto him." There is the great first pioneer 
 in what has come to be the world's most 
 progressive civilization destined to culminate 
 in the Kingdom of God upon earth. But 
 in that old record this bit of significant his- 
 tory is justly preserved: "And Abram took 
 Sarai his wife." Ah, there is the heroine of 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 209 
 
 that original pioneering movement ! Sarah was 
 the first of those thousands of wifely heroines 
 who side by side with their pioneer husbands 
 have pushed back the frontiers, made way for 
 the march of empire, the progress of humanity, 
 the migration of races, the colonization of wil- 
 derness places, the populating of new worlds, 
 and the coming of the kingdom of heaven. 
 How much the world owes the wife of the 
 pioneer! What heroines have they been — 
 these self-sacrificing wives of the first settlers, 
 of the frontiersmen of civilization ! The hard- 
 ships of such women! Their burdens and 
 cares, their deprivations, their dangers, their 
 sufferings, their sublime faith, their abound- 
 ing hope, their fortitude and courage ! What 
 devotion to husband, home, liberty, and con- 
 science ! What belief in man and Providence, 
 and in the greatness and glory of the future ! 
 This has reached beyond the power of poetic 
 genius to worthily immortalize in verse, and 
 has given a philosophy of human progress al- 
 most too deep for the historian to fathom. 
 Think of them — those wives of the Mayfiower 
 and of Plymouth Rock; those wives of wild 
 American forests and plains; those wives of 
 the first pioneers of New England, and Vir- 
 ginia, and Canada, and the great West ; those 
 wives of the Puritans and Huguenots, of the 
 
210 HEEOINES OF HISTOEY 
 
 Pilgrims and the Cavaliers; those wives of 
 the humble immigrants who have filled the new 
 world and pushed its mines and mills, its 
 farms and factories, its churches and its 
 schoolhouses, its cities and its States onward 
 from the Eastern to the Western sea ! Think of 
 them, ye poets and philosophers and orators, 
 and give them their meed of merit, their just 
 tribute of praise. And when the State his- 
 tories are written let the names of these he- 
 roic wives of your pioneers jewel their pages 
 and let the historian be true to the deepest 
 philosophy of our national development and 
 greatness. That pioneer life of Abraham was 
 made endurable, possible, successful by the 
 heroism of Sarah, by the inspiration and 
 comfort of her companionship, by the wit 
 and wisdom of her wifely counsel, by the ten- 
 derness of her love, by the self-sacrificing, 
 self-effacing intensity and constancy of 
 her devotion. How different in character 
 is the wife of Lot! Her name has become 
 synonymous with hesitation, indecision, 
 vacillation. Her name was a proverb in 
 Christ's day: "Eemember Lot's wife." Had 
 she been as true to Lot as Sarah was to Abra- 
 ham, Lot might never have pitched his tent 
 toward Sodom, nor would she in the destruc- 
 tion of the cities of the plain have turned back 
 
THE HEKOINE-WIPE 211 
 
 to perish. By contrast how the character of 
 Sarah shines forth in all the splendor of its 
 wifely heroism ! 
 
 A very charming story of Sarah's beauty 
 comes down to us from rabbinical tradition. 
 Of Abraham's journey to Egypt we have the 
 scriptural record ; therein we learn of the peril 
 which threatened Sarah on account of her 
 beauty, and how she and Abraham had to re- 
 sort to a subterfuge to save her from insult 
 and wrong. The tradition embellishes the in- 
 cident by relating that as Abraham ap- 
 proached the country he locked the beautiful 
 Sarah in a chest and tried to enter the chest 
 as property. The customs collector said, "Pay 
 us the custom." He replied, "I will pay the 
 custom." They said, "Thou carriest clothes 
 in the chest," and he answered, "I will pay 
 for clothes." Not satisfied, they said to him, 
 "Thou carriest gold," and he replied, "I will 
 pay for my gold." Still curious, they insisted, 
 "Surely, thou bearest the finest silk." He 
 calmly assented, "I will pay custom for the 
 finest silk." Finally they cried out, "Surely, 
 it must be pearls that thou takest with thee," 
 and he said, "I will pay for pearls." But as 
 they could not mention anything of value for 
 which Abraham was not willing to pay custom 
 they insisted that he open the chest and reveal 
 
212 HEEOINES OF HISTOET 
 
 its contents. The chest was opened, and be- 
 hold ! the whole land of Egypt was illumined 
 by the splendor of Sarah's beauty — a beauty 
 far more glorious than the beauty of pearls. 
 
 In considering the biblical incident, of which 
 this is a traditional gloss, we are forced to 
 admit that it is not demanded by Christian 
 ethics that a wife shall so compromise her own 
 honor as to indulge in such a subterfuge as 
 Sarah was guilty of when she represented 
 herself to the Pharaoh and later to Abimelech 
 as the sister of Abraham. There is no casuis- 
 try by which we can justify either Abraham 
 or Sarah in these instances of deception, 
 although a Jewish rabbi once said to the 
 writer in extenuation of this fault of the 
 patriarch and his wife, "There is no command- 
 ment against lying." Thus he excused the 
 deception on the Jesuitical sophistry that the 
 end justified the means. One thing is true — 
 and Abraham made this a justifying argument 
 — that Sarah was his sister by his father 
 though not by his mother. She was his half 
 sister. But even this willingness to sacrifice 
 one's integrity in wifely devotion to one's hus- 
 band, though going beyond the requirements 
 of righteousness, cannot be other than heroic. 
 Some may look upon those instances of decep- 
 tion, which, after all, contained a part-truth, 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 213 
 
 as only contests of wit against wickedness. 
 It may have caused Sarah's cheeks to burn 
 with shame to deny her wifely relation to 
 Abraham. She may have hated the half-lie, 
 and she may have felt the sting and humilia- 
 tion of denying what she was proudest of, that 
 she was the true, lawful, and loving wife of 
 the man who asked her to swear she was only 
 his sister. How to reconcile these deceptions, 
 and the later relation of Abraham with Hagar, 
 as suggested and condoned and even justified 
 by Sarah, we know not, but we cannot doubt 
 that this wife's heroic devotion was capable 
 of any sacrifice, even of honor, virtue, or life 
 itself, that circumstances might demand of 
 her. Every act of heroism may not be morally 
 justifiable. But it may be heroic in spite of its 
 being unjustifiable and even irrational. Call 
 Sarah's suggestion of concubinage to Abraham 
 as a method for satisfying her ambition for 
 his prophesied posterity an immoral act, call 
 her denial of her wedded relation to Abraham 
 unrighteous, justify or leave without justifi- 
 cation these incidents in her life, the heroism 
 of the woman, her abject heroism, cannot be 
 denied. Mistaken as sjhe may have been, or 
 as she was, in her moral philosophy, she was 
 willing to do anything, anything to please, to 
 honor, to save the life and promote the great- 
 
214 HBEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 ness of her husband. And this she did with 
 the light she had. And to the last she was 
 Abraham's loving, devoted, self-humiliating, 
 heroic helpmate. 
 
 Nothing in all that patriarchal tradition 
 is more beautiful and pathetic than Abraham's 
 devotion to the memory of Sarah. With 
 infinite care did he select a last resting place 
 for Sarah when she died in Kirjatharba, 
 an hundred and seven and twenty years 
 old! And there beside her did he sleep 
 at last "In the cave of Mach-pe-lah, in the 
 field of Ephron — which is before Mamre, the 
 field which Abraham purchased of the sons 
 of Heth : there was Abraham buried and Sarah 
 his wife." As the grand old patriarch is laid 
 to rest beside his wife how all her heroism is 
 revived in our memory by the meeting at that 
 tomb of the men whose very existence her 
 heroism made possible. "And his sons Isaac 
 and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Mach- 
 pe-lah." Isaac and Ishmael ! Abraham and 
 Sarah! The cave of Mach-pe-lah! What 
 memories, what prophecies, what destinies 
 center here and radiate hence to all ages, all 
 peoples, all worlds! 
 
 Deborah — Wife of Lapidoth 
 But it may be claimed that the intellectual 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 215 
 
 woman does not make a good wife, or that a 
 faithful and devoted wife, having the happi- 
 ness and honor of her husband and the inter- 
 ests of her home at heart, cannot give attention 
 to things intellectual, literary, and political. 
 The strong-minded woman, it will be urged, 
 has not the domestic instinct; or, if she be of 
 a domestic temperament, she can have no 
 relish for those studies which bring the mind 
 in touch with the great thought-movements in 
 the world of art and science, letters and gov- 
 ernment. But we shall find a wife in Deborah, 
 who, like a Queen Victoria, or a Queen Anne, 
 or a Queen Mary, wife of William III, or like 
 an Elizabeth Barrett Browning, was great- 
 souled and broad-brained enough to be inter- 
 ested and absorbed at once in her love of her 
 husband and of her country, in the welfare of 
 her home and the progress of the world, in her 
 domestic duties and her intellectual, moral, 
 and social responsibilities. Deborah was the 
 wife of Lapidoth. She may have been her 
 husband's intellectual superior, but, from the 
 fact that her name is historically joined to 
 his, and doubtless by her insistence, we may 
 conclude that her honor and affection for him 
 were in no measure lessened by her evident 
 love of her country and people or by her poet- 
 ical genius, or her judicial temper and legal 
 
216 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 learning. The very fact that she is mentioned 
 as the wife of Lapidoth would indicate that 
 her husband was a man of note and standing 
 and of sufficient repute to give a dignity to 
 her marital relation. Here was a woman 
 whose genius and heroism, whose learning and 
 patriotism reflected honor upon her sex, while 
 it shed a luster upon her country's history and 
 gave immortality to her own and to her hus- 
 band's name. Deborah was gifted with a four- 
 fold genius — judicial, military, poetical, and 
 prophetic. If there were no incidents in her 
 home life or in her wifely relations which give 
 a dramatic interest to her biography; if there 
 came to her no great sorrow, no sore test of 
 her fidelity, no temptation to her virtue and 
 honor, no demand of sacrifice for home or 
 husband, she was nevertheless the patriot- 
 heroine, and, as the prophetic judge and 
 "mother in Israel," an example to the wife- 
 hood of her country. By her literary tastes, 
 her poetical feeling, her judicial acumen, her 
 courage in danger, her loyalty to her people 
 and her home she became the national ideal 
 which exalted wifehood to its highest dignity 
 and influence in national life and proved the 
 marriage relation to be in no way hampering 
 or embarrassing to the most perfect intellec- 
 tual development of woman or to the most 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 217 
 
 complete culture, liberal learning, and patri- 
 otic interest in national affairs — not in the 
 least degree a hindrance to the most loyal 
 exercise of the domestic instincts and func- 
 tions. Deborah was one of the strong and 
 splendid souls of antiquity. Few, if any, in 
 all the annals of Israel assume a more heroic 
 form than she ; nor does any other race or time 
 furnish her parallel. Her austere virtues and 
 martial prowess, mingling with her finer 
 graces of learning, her poetic exaltation and 
 her gift of prophecy, gave her a rank above 
 Sappho or Aspasia or Semiramis or Cleopatra. 
 Not one of these women combined in herself 
 all the high and commanding traits of char- 
 acter which made Deborah the noblest heroine 
 of her time. 
 
 We have no record of her beauty or physical 
 charms as we have of Sarah's, Rachel's, Rebec- 
 ca's, Sappho's, and Cleopatra's. Hence the 
 tradition of her heroism borrows nothing of 
 false glamour from her storied loveliness, from 
 a sensuous beauty which is often made to 
 cover and excuse a multitude of sins. Yes, 
 she was a strong-minded woman, but none the 
 less feminine for that. Weakness is not neces- 
 sarily feminine, nor is masculinity necessarily 
 strength. It took a strong woman, but a 
 woman, to save Israel in her day. She was 
 
218 HEKOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 mentally and morally the most heroic-formed 
 personality of her age. How bravely she stood 
 against the corrupting, degenerating tenden- 
 cies of her people ! Since the death of Joshua 
 Israel had suffered many vicissitudes of 
 fortune. Her very judges were corrupt and 
 corrupting, and when they were upright the 
 people would not heed them, hence the wrath 
 of God came upon the disobedient people who 
 suffered humiliations, defeats, oppressions and 
 cruelties untold at the hands of their enemies. 
 And now Israel is subject to Jabin, the cruel 
 king of Canaan, whose chief general is the 
 inhuman and brutal Sisera. God's people are 
 sorely oppressed by this ancient Weyler, whose 
 soldiers insult and shoot their arrows at the 
 maidens of Israel as they come to the wells to 
 draw water for their cattle and their domestic 
 needs. These outrages continued and increased 
 until they became intolerable even to this 
 patient and afflicted people. "Twenty years 
 he mightily oppressed the children of Israel." 
 But there was not a man among all the tribes 
 of Israel to resist these cruelties, to organize 
 successful opposition to Jabin and Sisera and 
 to lead God's people out of their cruel and 
 humiliating subjection. It was left for a 
 woman to furnish the brains, the courage, and 
 the heroism to check the encroachments of this 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 219 
 
 tyrannical power, hurl the oppressor from the 
 land, and give the people rest. This woman 
 was Deborah the wife of Lapidoth. She was a 
 prophetess and judge in Israel, incomparably 
 superior to her predecessors, who with few 
 exceptions had been men of weak will, inferior 
 intelligence, craven spirit, and debauched 
 morals. For once a pure, fearless, patriotic, 
 godly judge commands the love, confidence, 
 and veneration of the people. And as she 
 dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah, between 
 Ramah and Bethel in Mount Ephraim' (like 
 Plato in his grove at Athens ) , the children of 
 Israel came up to her for judgment. Evidently, 
 they saw in her, and in her alone, a deliverer. 
 As the oppression continued and increased, 
 the people began to cry unto God for deliver- 
 ance from the power of Jabin and the cruelties 
 of Sisera. Then was it that this heroine arose 
 single-handed to command the situation and 
 make a bit of history to be remembered for 
 all time. True, she had a general who knew 
 his duty, but who lacked the genius of initia- 
 tive, the courage of his convictions, and the 
 heroism of a patriot. He hesitated to lead his 
 army against Sisera. He was afraid of the 
 "chariots of iron" and the swarming hosts that 
 came up against the land, although God had 
 commanded, promising to deliver Sisera into 
 
220 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 his hands. Hear him, hear the soldier and 
 general of Israel, hear him cry to a woman, 
 to the prophetess and judge, to Deborah the 
 wife of Lapidoth : "If you will go with me, 
 then I will go." Had ever a nation's courage 
 sunk so low as that? Had ever the man, the 
 patriot, the soldier proven himself a more 
 abject coward? What is the hope of the coun- 
 try ? It is a woman ; it is Deborah. 0, what 
 a soldier! "If thou wilt go with me, then I 
 will go : but if thou wilt not go with me, then 
 I will not go." With such a coward as Barak 
 at the head of the army how can the people 
 hope for deliverance? Nay, how can Deborah 
 hope for victory against Sisera with only a 
 Barak to lead her soldiers to the field? But, 
 ""/ will surely go with thee" — it came like the 
 thwang of a mighty bow-string, like the blare 
 of a battle-trumpet, from the lips of Deborah. 
 "And Deborah arose and went with Barak to 
 Kadesh." The army was gathered. Away they 
 marched to the battle — Barak with ten thou- 
 sand men, "and Deborah went up with him" — 
 Deborah more than the whole army of ten 
 thousand men, with Barak thrown in ! And 
 Deborah sent her men into the fight with this 
 command: "Up, for this is the day in which 
 the Lord hath delivered Sisera into thine 
 hand; is not the Lord gone out before thee?" 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 221 
 
 It was a great fight and a complete rout of 
 the enemy and a glorious victory for Israel. 
 They fought from heaven that day : "the stars 
 in their courses fought against Sisera." What 
 power is at the command of Deborah in this 
 battle! She marshals the forces that control 
 the heavens; the legions of the sky obey her 
 will; the Lord of hosts honors her faith, in- 
 spires her heroism, blesses her high resolve, 
 hears her prayer and delivers Israel with a 
 mighty deliverance. And in the providence 
 of God all the human glory shall be given to 
 woman. Barak was informed before the battle 
 that the honors of the real victory should not 
 be his. Deborah was bound that her general 
 who would not go to battle unless she went 
 with him should surrender the glory to a 
 woman. Right enough she was, and she seemed 
 to throw it at him with a righteous toss of 
 her head : "The Lord shall sell Sisera into the 
 hand of a woman." And he did. This Jael, 
 the wife of Heber, was far from our modern 
 ideal of a gentle educated leader in society. 
 She was without what we call refinement and 
 culture. She lived in the tent, gypsy fashion, 
 had never entered a house, a drawing room, a 
 schoolhouse, a church. She did an act that 
 any woman might shudder to think of to-day. 
 But it was fair play then. It was heroic, 
 
222 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 patriotic then. Who shall contradict the 
 prophetess when she says, "The Lord shall sell 
 Sisera into the hand of a woman"? If the 
 Lord ordained Jael's act, let him be respon- 
 sible. And if anyone is disposed to question 
 the ethics of that performance with the nail 
 and hammer, let him argue it out with God 
 and not with the poor, brave woman who 
 completed the overthrow of the monster 
 Sisera. Strange it is that sentimentalists, 
 who never question the righteousness of de- 
 fensive war, who think it justifiable in battle 
 for one man to chop off another man's head 
 ^vith a battle-ax, brain him with a bludgeon, 
 disembowel him with a sword, tear him to 
 pieces with a cannon ball, or sink him to the 
 bottom of the sea with a torpedo, find it neces- 
 sary to explain Jael's action on other than 
 righteous and patriotic grounds. 
 
 The woman simply killed the brute who had 
 been the terror of Israel and of the women of 
 Israel for twenty years. The battle was not 
 over until Sisera was killed, and whether killed 
 with sword or spear or battle-ax or hammer 
 and nail, the old fiend got his deserts and he 
 justly got them at the hand of a woman, nay, 
 at the hands of women — Jael and Deborah. 
 
 Sing, O Deborah, sing your song of triumph, 
 and all brave men and virtuous women will 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 223 
 
 join in your song ! You have as much right to 
 sing of Sisera's overthrow and death as Miriam 
 had to sound the loud timbrel over Egypt's 
 dark sea and celebrate the drowning of the 
 proud hosts of Pharaoh. 
 
 "And the land had rest forty years." Honor 
 to Deborah, the heroine-prophetess, the hero- 
 ine-judge, the heroine-poetess! Honor to the 
 woman capable of such wisdom and learning, 
 such vision and judgment, such courage, faith, 
 and heroism, and of such a song as Deborah's ! 
 
 HuLDAH — Wife of Shallum 
 
 Though separated from Deborah and her 
 times by nearly seven hundred years, there 
 were many virtues adorning the character of 
 Huldah which associate her in our thought 
 with the former patriot-heroine of her race. 
 The times have changed. The simplicity of 
 the age of the judges has given place to the 
 pomp and circumstance of monarchial govern- 
 ment. The people have risen to a great en- 
 lightenment. Israel has enjoyed the prosperity 
 and the national independence and power 
 which were secured by a David's genius, and 
 it has witnessed the glory of Solomon; the 
 literary, aesthetic, and commercial splendor of 
 his reign. The Jews have seen the temple rise 
 in all its storied magnificence, the house of 
 
224 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 cedar and gold. They have attained the highest 
 art in music, architecture, and literature. 
 They have become a nation of students, scien- 
 tists, and philosophers. They have brought 
 religious symbolism to perfection. They have 
 produced great men, men of genius and of 
 deeds; poets, warriors, statesmen, scholars, 
 and seers. But, alas! they were not compe- 
 tent to hold the proud heights which they 
 had gained. It took the kingdom one hundred 
 and twenty years to rise from the anointing of 
 Saul to the glory of Solomon's forty years' 
 reign, but no sooner had that favored people 
 reached their loftiest eminence than they began 
 to reel and stagger to their national fall. Long 
 indeed was that process of decline from the 
 division of the kingdom to the final subjuga- 
 tion and captivity. Now and then, to relieve 
 the blackness and terror of the political storms 
 through which Israel and Judah passed, 
 would rise a virtuous king to give the people 
 light and hope. Alternately rising and falling 
 like a ship tossed by the winds on angry seas, 
 the chosen people are driven toward the rocks 
 of inevitable national ruin. The ship now 
 seems for a brief interval to be riding on the 
 crest of the wave, lifted from the trough in 
 which it has been foundering through corrupt 
 administrations ; the clouds part ; the sunlight 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 225 
 
 breaks through, the storm ceases and there is 
 a calm. Josiah is at the helm of the ship of 
 state in Judah ; "And he did right in the sight 
 of the Lord, and walked in all the way of David 
 his father, and turned not aside to the right 
 hand or to the left." 
 
 A brief renaissance was about to dawn upon 
 Jerusalem, and one of the most potent influ- 
 ences at work in cooperation with the piety of 
 Josiah was the genius, learning, and patriotic 
 heroism of a woman — Huldah, the wife of 
 Shallum. This Shallum was a man of no 
 mean extraction ; he stood near the throne and 
 was doubtless, like his father and grandfather 
 before him, keeper of the royal wardrobe. Of 
 Huldah's ancestry we know nothing, but it 
 seems to have been her distinction to be known 
 as the wife of Shallum. But there can be little 
 doubt that Huldah preserved her husband's 
 name from oblivion and the ages since have 
 known Shallum only as the husband of 
 Huldah. This woman had grown up like a lily 
 in a cesspool. Among a degenerate and de- 
 generating people, she is in no sense the prod- 
 uct of environment, but a single star in the 
 black sky, a white rose in the desert, an angel 
 flying through the night. Huldah had no such 
 mission as Deborah. She may have possessed 
 none of the more nearly masculine attributes 
 
226 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 of that heroic judge and prophetess of the 
 earlier and ruder times. If Deborah was 
 amazonian in her force of character, fitted for 
 the judicial throne and even for the battlefield, 
 we have reason to believe that Huldah was of 
 a finer, more delicate and gentle mold. If her 
 genius was less rugged than her sister's, it was 
 not less brilliant and refined. In the cultiva- 
 tion of her mind Huldah had the advantages 
 of a learning which did not exist in the time 
 of Deborah. In natural power, in original 
 stature, the latter seems to overtop the former 
 as a Venus de Milo does a Venus de Medicis. 
 But in her refinement of power, in her educa- 
 tion, in 'her intellectual aptitudes and attain- 
 ments, in her piety, prophetic wisdom, heroic 
 patriotism, and simple religious devotion, she 
 seems in comparison with Deborah as the 
 pearl to the ruby, as the lily to the thorny rose, 
 as the nightingale to the eagle, or as a Queen 
 Victoria to a Queen Elizabeth. 
 
 In such an age and among such a people for 
 a woman and wife to rise above the social 
 degeneracy, above the universal ignorance, 
 sensuality, and idolatry, and aspire to things 
 virtuous, intellectual, religious, and patriotic, 
 is to be a heroine. The old learning which had 
 passed into decay, the ancient culture and re- 
 finement which by the masses had long been 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 227 
 
 forgotten, education to wMcli society was in- 
 different, the prophetic vision to which the 
 whole nation had become blind, were all sacred 
 things to this holy heroine. It was evidently 
 the ambition of Huldah not only to acquire 
 knowledge and attain true culture with all its 
 promises of blessing and enjoyment, but also 
 to disseminate learning among the people. Her 
 connection with the college at Jerusalem 
 would seem to indicate that she was a teacher, 
 devoting herself to the education of the youth 
 and possibly applying herself to those investi- 
 gations in nature and science, philosophy, his- 
 tory, and literature, and to that mastery of 
 the languages which were included in the 
 higher learning. To be a student, a scholar, 
 an educator, and a true prophetess was to be a 
 heroine ; and had no other mission been given 
 her, that alone should have distinguished her 
 as the highest ideal of Jewish womanhood in 
 her age. But a crisis had come in the affairs 
 of Judah. Josiah furnished his people with 
 an opportunity to regain their lost integrity 
 and the nation to rise to a new purpose and 
 power. The renaissance began with a general 
 and thorough renovation of the temple and a 
 restoration of the old ceremonial worship. The 
 neglect of the temple had resulted in its sad 
 deterioration; it had suffered such abuse as 
 
228 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 to have rendered it quite unrecognizable as 
 Solomon's house of cedar and gold. Carpen- 
 ters, masons, and builders were set to work 
 repairing the house of God. In cleaning out 
 the rubbish that had accumulated in the build- 
 ing, then three hundred and sixty years old, 
 Hilldah found a book. It was a book unknown 
 to a people M-ho should have been familiar with 
 it. It was the Book of the Law, long lost, 
 buried in the rubbish, forgotten; the book 
 which had been a lamp to the feet and a light 
 to the path of their fathers. It was a curiosity 
 even to the high priest — such a curiosity in- 
 deed that he sent it to King Josiah. Shaphau, 
 the scribe, was intrusted with the literary 
 curiosity by Hilkiah. And when he presented 
 it to Josiah the king asked him to read it, 
 which he did. It was evidently the first time 
 that either the king or his scribe had ever 
 read the Book of the Law. It was like a new 
 revelation. The reading profoundly moved 
 the king; he became interested, then excited, 
 then alarmed. He rent his garments, called 
 for the learned men to seek the Lord for an 
 understanding and interpretation of the won- 
 derful book. The so-called scholars were at 
 their wits' end. Their combined wisdom and 
 learning was insufficient for the task set them 
 by the king. In their extremity they gather 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 229 
 
 up their learned robes and start for the col- 
 lege : their only hope is Huldah the prophetess, 
 the wife of Shallum, who is dwelling in the 
 college of Jernsalem. See them there, the 
 scribes and scholars and savants of the king- 
 dom bowing to the acknowledged superiority 
 of a woman ! For this supreme moment had 
 Huldah all unconsciously been preparing her- 
 self. Nay, had not God been training her for 
 this crisis? Quickly, unhesitatingly, eagerly, 
 clearly, does this remarkable woman interpret 
 the law to the scholars who sit humbly at her 
 feet. Faithfully as a seer does she tell them 
 for the king and the nation the will and the 
 purpose of God concerning them. Never did 
 a woman render her country a greater, more 
 heroic, more patriotic service ! It took a hero- 
 ine to say what Huldah said that day as she 
 sat in her chair in the college of Jerusalem. 
 It took a heroine to send such a message to 
 the king as she fearlessly but loyally sent to 
 Josiah. It was for the time at least the salva- 
 tion of the nation. Huldah's interpretation of 
 the will of God as found in the Book of the 
 Law made that book once more a lamp to 
 their feet and a light to their path. On re- 
 ceiving Huldah's message the king immedi- 
 ately set on foot a thorough campaign of 
 iconoclasm. He swept away all the forms 
 
230 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 and instruments of idolatry. He rein- 
 augurated the old, divinely inspired temple 
 service. The people caught the inspiration. 
 They turned away from their idols and 
 returned to the worship of their fathers' 
 God. "And the king sent, and they gathered 
 unto him all the elders of Judah and of 
 Jerusalem. And the king went up into the 
 house of the Lord, and all the men of Judah 
 and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, 
 and the priests and the prophets, and all the 
 people, both small and great: and he read in 
 their ears all the words of the book of the 
 covenant which was found in the house of the 
 Lord. And the king stood by a pillar and 
 made a covenant before the Lord, to walk after 
 the Lord, and to keep his commandments and 
 his testimonies and his statutes with all their 
 heart and with all their soul, to perform the 
 words of this covenant that were written in 
 this 'book. And all the people stood to the 
 covenant." Wonderful results of a woman's 
 patriotic devotion, sanctified learning, and 
 prophetic heroism ! Honor to Huldah, the 
 prophetess, the wife of Shallum ! And did she 
 not enter into the joys of that glorious revival 
 of the. old-time religion? Was her name not 
 spoken by all, from peasant to king, with 
 greater veneration than ever? Was there a 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 231 
 
 woman in all Jerusalem worthy of such honor 
 as crowned her name? Could any citizen have 
 entered more heartily, more gratefully into 
 the celebration of the newly restored temple 
 service than she? What a day that was, the 
 day appointed for the celebration of the long 
 neglected and quite forgotten passoverl 
 "Surely there was not holden such a passover 
 from the days of the judges that judged Israel, 
 nor in all the days of the kings of Israel, nor 
 of the kings of Judah; but in the eighteenth 
 year of King Josiah, wherein this passover 
 was holden to the Lord in Jerusalem." And 
 what a day that must have been to the faithful 
 Huldah, true patriot of her king and country, 
 first scholar of the age, patient student of the 
 law, kindly educator of the youth of Judah, 
 greatest woman of her time, yet happy and 
 contented as she dwelt there in Jerusalem in 
 the college, to be known and honored and loved 
 as Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum ! 
 
 Abigail — Wipe of Nabal 
 
 Of all the heroine-wives in this world she 
 who is bound to an ugly, churlish, drunken 
 brute of a husband, and yet remains patient, 
 loyal, and devoted, commands, if not our 
 highest admiration, at least our profoundest 
 sympathy and commiseration, and often the 
 
232 HEROINES OP HISTOEY 
 
 truest veneration due to the heroine. When 
 such a wife is gifted with the rarest excel- 
 lencies that can adorn womanhood; is rich in 
 mental endowments and spiritual graces, is 
 wise, good, intellectual, sagacious, witty, gra- 
 cious, noble, queenly, and beautiful, what an 
 heroic sacrifice she makes when she unwit- 
 tingly gives herself to a fool ! And though she 
 learns her mistake when it is too late to cor- 
 rect it, if she patiently submits to her fate and 
 tries to make the best of it, we may at first 
 inwardly protest, but in the end we must ad- 
 mire, even if we pity her. Abigail was a hero- 
 ine. As a woman she had a fearless, heroic 
 spirit. As a wife her infinite superiority to 
 her husband made her devotion to him such 
 a self-sacrifice, such an immolation of self on 
 the altar of tragic duty as is rarely demanded 
 of any heroine. In comparison with such a 
 patience and forbearance as she was called 
 upon to exercise, in comparison with her sacri- 
 fice of womanly dignity, pride, and noble feel- 
 ing, any losses of fortune, any encountering 
 of dangers, any test of her honor, any trials 
 and temptations of her wifely virtue and 
 fidelity would seem but trifles. She who could 
 live with Nabal and still be as true to all his 
 i interests as was Abigail could endure anything 
 demanded of a heroine. 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFB 233 
 
 This woman was remarkable for her beauty 
 and accomplishments. It means much for one 
 to be so highly gifted that the historian and 
 poet make note of her endowments and pre- 
 serve the memory of them in the national 
 literature. Abigail "was a woman of good 
 understanding and of a beautiful counte- 
 nance." These divine gifts do not always go 
 together, but when they are found associated 
 in one personality what an enviable charm and 
 power do they give to a woman ! Alas, how 
 often is beauty only skin deep ! What a de- 
 formity is the woman who has beauty without 
 brains, grace without goodness, comeliness 
 without character — a splendid animal without 
 a soul ! She is a rare gift of God to this world 
 of whom it may be said, "She is a woman of 
 good understanding and of a beautiful coun- 
 tenance." As the saying goes, in the lottery of 
 life Nabal drew a prize ; Abigail drew a blank 
 — a fool. That is the meaning of the name 
 "Nabal" — fool. It must not be supposed that 
 Nabal was a mental fool. But that he was a 
 moral fool Abigail soon learned after she mar- 
 ried him. We know not why so charming a 
 woman married this boor. It may be that his 
 wealth and the glamour of his pedigree at- 
 tracted her. "The man was very great." Nabal 
 was rich and belonged to the house of Caleb. 
 
234 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 He had the blood of the ancient heroes in his 
 veins, and was an aristocrat — but a mighty 
 mean man for all that. Abigail was too good, 
 infinitely too good, for such a man, even with 
 all his sheep and pedigrees. But having once 
 pledged her troth and united her life and 
 destiny with his, she was too true a woman, 
 too devout a Jewess, too noble a heroine to 
 separate from him in violation of the most 
 sacred laws and traditions of her religion and 
 of her race. To be Nabal's wife was Abigail's 
 martyrdom. 
 
 One incident in her life worthy of a place in 
 history gave opportunity for the exercise of 
 her womanly wit and wifely fidelity, and im- 
 mortalized her name and heroism in story. 
 Nabal and his men were shearing sheep in 
 Carmel, when David in his wanderings came 
 into the neighborhood. His followers, a brave 
 lot of fellows, about six hundred in number, 
 fell on good terms with Nabal's shepherds and 
 saw to it that in the little warfares going on 
 no harm came to them or their flocks. Indeed, 
 by the confession of one of the shepherds, 
 David's soldiers were good fellows who had 
 been as a wall of defense to them in time of 
 danger. Of course for all this Nabal should 
 have been duly grateful, but, as the sequel 
 proved, he was too much of a churl to be 
 
THE HEROINE-WIPE 235 
 
 grateful to anybody for anything. David and 
 his men needed rations, hence the future king 
 sent a small detachment of his men to the rich 
 farmer and sheep-baron with his compliments 
 and assurances of friendship and peace, ac- 
 companying his courteous salutations with 
 the hint that the smallest donation of pro- 
 visions which Nabal might be disposed to send 
 to his little army would be gratefully received. 
 Nabal spurned the whole matter with super- 
 cilious contempt. "Who is David? and who is 
 the son of Jesse? Shall I then take my bread 
 and my water, and my flesh that I have killed 
 for my shearers, and give it unto men whom I 
 know not whence they be?" Think of such 
 an answer coming from a man who was shear- 
 ing three thousand sheep in Carmel! Of 
 course the red-haired, hot-headed David was 
 wild when his servants came back empty 
 handed with Nabal's impertinent reply. He 
 quickly girded on his sword, bade his soldiers 
 get ready for a fight, and, leaving two hundred 
 with the stuff, he led four hundred toward 
 Carmel, determined to destroy Nabal and every 
 man child that pertained to him before morn- 
 ing. In the meantime one of the faithful 
 servants revealed the whole situation to Abi- 
 gail. What a compliment that was to her 
 intelligence and to her influence in Nabal's 
 
236 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 household ! She had impressed her very serv- 
 ants with a sense of her wisdom and superior- 
 ity. Instead of going to Nabal with the news 
 that David was coming with mischief in his 
 heart, the servant hastens to Abigail, believing 
 that she had more sense and ability to meet 
 the situation than her churl of a husband. 
 And he was right. Immediately this Jewish 
 matron was transformed into a diplomat, an 
 intercessor, and a heroine. She knew what to 
 do and immediately did it, without asking 
 leave of Nabal. "What a pity," she must have 
 been saying in her heart, "what a pity David 
 did not send his servants to me! I should 
 have had sense enough to appreciate his kind- 
 ness to us and our shepherds, and I should 
 have sent him food for his little army. Of 
 course I should. Why didn't Nabal do it? 
 O, the fool!" What a hustling and bustling 
 among the servants! What a hurrying and 
 skurrying, lading the asses with bread and 
 wine and parched corn, and dressed sheep, 
 and great clusters of grapes and cakes of figs ! 
 And away the servants hasten, Abigail fol- 
 lowing, to meet David. And not a word to 
 Nabal ! There was courage for you : the cour- 
 age to assume responsibility, the courage and 
 genius of initiative! Taking counsel of her 
 own "good understanding" and of her woman 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 237 
 
 wit and fearlessness, without asking advice of 
 servant or husband and without the loss of a 
 moment of valuable time, this strong-souled 
 heroine hastens to meet him whose prowess 
 had terrified Saul and whose greatness was 
 to rule a kingdom. Nor does this heroine's 
 heart quail as she catches sight of David and 
 his armed men. Four hundred soldiers are 
 coming, eager for slaughter. This woman with 
 her servants, swordless and harmless, does not 
 hesitate or have any fear at the sight. Quickly 
 she leaps off the ass and falls before David 
 and begins to intercede for Nabal. Not for 
 herself, no, brave woman, heroine-wife! She 
 pleads to have the blow fall upon her, not 
 upon her husband and his sons. And what a 
 plea was that ! Sagacious ? Diplomatic ? Of 
 infinite wit and wisdom of phrase? Yes, but 
 the outgushing of an honest heart, sincere, 
 absolutely ingenuous. And the sweet womanly 
 deference and dignity of it! She has a right 
 to claim that if David's servants had come to 
 her there would have been no trouble; she 
 would have sent them food as they well de- 
 served for all their kindness to Nabal and his 
 shepherds. Her plea was not unmixed with 
 very diplomatic fiattery. Or shall we say the 
 woman was wrought up to a prophetic frenzy 
 and spake like a seer in predicting David's 
 
238 HEROINES OP HISTOEY 
 
 triumpli over Ms enemies? Did God tliat 
 moment give her the vision and the utterance 
 of a prophetess? Nay, did not Abigail in that 
 exalted moment forget all her own interests, 
 even the interests of Nabal, in her noble plea 
 for David to withhold his hand from shedding 
 blood? What finer, nobler utterance had ever 
 fallen on David's ear or stirred his poetic soul 
 than this prayer and admonition which fol- 
 lowed Abigail's prophecy of David's triumph 
 over Saul : "And it shall come to pass when the 
 Lord shall have done to my lord according to 
 all the good that he hath spoken concerning 
 thee, and shall have appointed thee ruler over 
 Israel; that this shall be no grief unto thee, 
 nor offense of heart unto my lord either that 
 thou hast shed blood causeless, or that my lord 
 hath avenged himself : but when the Lord shall 
 have dealt well with my lord, then remember 
 thine handmaid." Well, who could have stood 
 out against such a plea? Certainly not David. 
 Then and there he surrendered. Yes, he sur- 
 rendered to superior sense, to superior virtue, 
 to superior heroism. Abigail is the divinely 
 inspired conqueror of David ! 
 
 "And David said to Abigail : Blessed be the 
 Lord God of Israel which sent thee this day 
 to meet me: and blessed be thy advice, and 
 blessed be thou which hast kept me this day 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 239 
 
 from coming to shed blood, and from avenging 
 myself with mine own hand." And having 
 accepted her gift of food for his little hungry 
 army he sent her to her home with his blessing. 
 Thus did Abigail show herself superior in 
 "good understanding" to both Nabal and 
 David. She undid the mischief which her 
 churlish husband had wrought, and she pre- 
 vented the mischief which David was about 
 to do. She had to furnish brains for both 
 men. And it took a brave heart for that wife 
 to do the deed which has made the name of 
 Abigail immortal. 
 
 Still was this wife's soul under the tense 
 strain of the great responsibility which she 
 had so independently and heroically assumed. 
 She had to return to Nabal. What would the 
 ugly, mean-tempered man say? Would he 
 rebuke his wife? Would he scold and rage 
 and create a scene? Well, the wife, the noble, 
 high-minded, sensitive, beautiful wife, found 
 her liege lord — drunk. God pity such women 
 everywhere and always who have to call drunk- 
 ards husbands! Think of the heroism of a 
 wife who for his sake, and for his children's 
 sake, and for the old folks' sake, and for God's 
 sake, will still patiently, forbearingly, humili- 
 atingly, hopefully, prayerfully consent to be 
 called that mean, drunken churl's wife "until 
 
240 HEEOINES OF HISTOEY 
 
 death us do part" ! Death soon parted Abigail 
 and Nabal. That night, when the faithful wife, 
 whose wisdom and heroism had saved him and 
 his household, returned to find Nabal "very 
 drunk" after a sheep-shearing festival, her 
 "good understanding" kept her from saying 
 anything about the incidents of the day until 
 the next morning, when Nabal was somewhat 
 sobered up. She had doubtless had sad ex- 
 periences with this husband before when he 
 was drunk and had learned to have no dis- 
 cussions' with him on any subject when he was 
 in his cups. She always appealed from Nabal 
 drunk to Nabal sober. It took infinite patience 
 to hold the tongue just when the tongue was 
 under the whip and spur of "righteous indig- 
 nation." It is often more heroic to be silent 
 than to speak. O, these gentle, patient, suffer- 
 ing but silent heroines ! Have they not the 
 spirit of Him who, though reviled, reviled not 
 again, and who as a lamb before his shearers 
 is dumb, so he opened not his mouth? To 
 suffer and be strong, strong enough to be silent 
 and suffer — that is heroism of the finest, di- 
 vinest fiber. When Nabal heard the story a 
 mortal terror seized him, and in a few days 
 he died as the fool dieth. 
 
 But to the last, Abigail was his faithful, 
 suffering, humiliated, heroine-wife — his guar- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 241 
 
 dian angel. What a waste of womanhood, 
 what a waste of heroism was Abigail wasted 
 on Nabal ! No, not wasted ; all that was there 
 sacrificed in some sure and subtle way passed 
 into the world's heroism, into the world's char- 
 acter, into the world's ideal wifehood and 
 womanhood as they are and as they are to be. 
 Abigail's heroism has a blessing of comfort 
 and inspiration for many a heroine-wife, and 
 it always will have. Worthy of all the honor 
 that came to her was Abigail even when she 
 became the beloved wife of David and lived 
 to participate in his glory "and shape the 
 whisper of the throne." Abigail was a queen 
 indeed, and every inch a queen, without the 
 worldly dignities that came with royal mar- 
 riage. 
 
 Esther — Wife of Ahasuerus 
 The Jewish annals are rich in national 
 heroes. During the long ages of their develop- 
 ment and decline God's people passed through 
 many vicissitudes which threatened their 
 destruction, but to preserve them from ruin 
 and to insure their future power and pros- 
 perity God raised up among them reformers, 
 leaders, and deliverers, whose mighty deeds 
 belong to the most stirring and eventful his- 
 tory of antiquity. Three great crises in par- 
 ticular furnished the occasions for the appear- 
 
242 HEEOINES OP HISTOEY 
 
 ance of great men to deliver the chosen race. 
 The famine which threatened to exterminate 
 the house of Jacob called to the front Joseph, 
 through whose influence Israel was given a 
 home in Egypt, where prosperity shone upon 
 them in their rapid multiplication and in the 
 increase of their substance. When, in later 
 years, a Pharaoh came to power who knew 
 not Joseph and afflicted Israel with oppres- 
 sions which crushed them into poverty and 
 servitude, and which could not but have ended 
 in the destruction of their racial spirit and 
 national hope, Moses came into history as their 
 deliverer, ordained of God to lead them out 
 of bondage and to the land of promise, where 
 they were to become an independent and 
 mighty nation blessed with all the arts of the 
 highest civilization. After a national career 
 of true greatness and splendor they became 
 politically decadent, fell before their con- 
 querors and were swept into captivity. For 
 seventy years they suffered the humiliations 
 and oppressions of that captivity. Then, hap- 
 pily, there arose among them in the distant 
 land a deliverer in Nehemiah, who was the 
 inspiring genius of their return to the Holy 
 Land and of the rebuilding of Jerusalem and 
 of her sacred temple. Great indeed were the 
 achievements of these men who, by their 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 243 
 
 patriotism, genius, and heroism, delivered 
 their people from their distresses. 
 
 But with these names, among the most 
 glorious in the history of Jewish heroism, must 
 be mentioned another, and that the name of 
 a woman — Esther, one of the sweetest and 
 most popular names given to woman even to 
 this day. It was her distinction and glory that 
 by her heroism she saved her race from uni- 
 versal massacre and gave the Jew a place in 
 a foreign land and empire which he had never 
 before and has never since occupied. The Jews 
 were in the land of captivity subject to 
 Ahasuerus, whose powerful reign extended 
 from India even unto Ethiopia, over an hun- 
 dred and seven and twenty provinces. Esther 
 was doubtless born in the land and was left 
 an orphan to be adopted by Mordecai, the 
 uncle of her father, who came a captive from 
 Jerusalem and with whom she was living in 
 Shushan. As a maid "she was fair and beau- 
 tiful." Vashti, the queen of Ahasuerus, for 
 some offense, fancied or real, had been dis- 
 carded, and the king had commanded that all 
 the provinces be searched for a virgin whose 
 beauty and graces would entitle her to the 
 queenly crown. Among the many summoned 
 to the palace was the Jewish maiden Esther. 
 These fair virgins were in training, according 
 
244 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 to the custom of the land, for twelve montlis. 
 By laws of purification, by education in dress 
 and manners, they were prepared for the life 
 of the royal palace. And it would seem that 
 Esther immediately became the favorite of 
 the keeper of the women, Hegai. He doubt- 
 less gave special attention to the beautiful and 
 well-mannered girl in educating her for the 
 part she was to act and in preparing her to 
 win the prize in the contest, which prize was 
 nothing less than a royal crown. Whether 
 Esther went to the palace to enter this beauty 
 contest from compulsion or from inclination 
 is not recorded. In either case it must have 
 been a sore trial to her to thus be separated 
 from her home and people for a year, and it 
 certainly must have cost Mordecai many a sigh 
 that the light of loving Esther's beauty was 
 withdrawn from his home. It is a touching 
 and pathetic picture — Mordecai's solicitude 
 about the dear girl and his lonesomeness dur- 
 ing her long absence. This is a charming 
 touch given to the picture by the historian 
 who must have written it with a manly tear 
 in his eye: "And Mordecai walked every day 
 before the court of the women's house to know 
 how Esther did, and what should become of 
 her." 
 
 The twelve months passed, and by the con- 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFB 245 
 
 test Esther was recognized as the most beauti- 
 ful of all the beautiful virgins of the empire. 
 "And the king loved Esther above all the 
 women, and she obtained grace and favor in 
 his sight more than all the virgins ; so that he 
 set the royal crown upon her head and made 
 her queen instead of Vashti." The most beau- 
 tiful woman from India to Ethiopia! But 
 Esther's intelligence was equal to her beauty 
 and her virtue to her intelligence. Raised to 
 this queenly eminence, she wore a crown with 
 dignity and grace as if she had been born to 
 royalty. And yet with all her honors upon 
 her she lost nothing of the womanly tender- 
 ness and modesty which had characterized her 
 from childhood. In the glare of a palace and 
 in the light that beats about a throne she is 
 the same Esther that has been the pride of her 
 people and the joy of Mordecai's home. She 
 did not forget Israel, nor did she sacrifice her 
 Jewish convictions to pride of wealth and 
 royal station. But she was a power for right- 
 eousness in the. palace of Shushan. So su- 
 perior was she in her physical charms, an ideal 
 Jewish beauty, so brilliant, resourceful, and 
 intellectual, so virtuous and womanly withal 
 that the king himself became her willing sub- 
 ject and could rarely let an occasion pass for 
 bestowing upon her any mark of his love and 
 
246 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 favor that she might ask. Indeed, it was a 
 common habit of this love-infatuated king to 
 ask his beautiful queen to make known her 
 wishes, that he might grant them even to the 
 half of his kingdom. It was this wonderful 
 influence which Esther had over Ahasuerus, 
 gained by her transcendent beauty and wom- 
 anly worth, that placed within her hands the 
 ■ power to save her people from destruction. 
 And this power she exercised in the spirit of 
 a wifely heroine, a filial heroine, a patriot- 
 heroine. Mordecai, by whom she had been 
 adopted and whom she had recognized as her 
 father, had brought trouble upon himself and 
 upon the captive Jews of the city and empire 
 by his mean and haughty spirit. He refused 
 to recognize with due respect and the custom- 
 ary salutation Haman, the chief man of the 
 empire. This so irritated that dignitary that 
 he finally, on the wily siiggestion of his wife, 
 Zeresh, planned the death of Mordecai and the 
 massacre of the entire Jewish population. The 
 mind of Ahasuerus had been poisoned against 
 the Jews by Haman and his party, who charged 
 that the Jews were disloyal and not obedient 
 subjects, in fact, that they were a dangerous 
 and threatening element of the body politic. 
 Thus infiuenced, the king issued a decree that 
 was to seal the doom of the Jews. On a cer- 
 
THE HEKOINE-WIFE 247 
 
 tain day a slaughter was to begin and it was 
 to continue from India to Ethiopia until the 
 captive race was exterminated. Every man, 
 woman, and child was to perish and all the 
 property of the Jews was to be confiscated. 
 It was from the execution of this cruel decree 
 that Esther dissuaded her king and thereby 
 saved her people. To her own husband, the 
 king, to her father, Mordecai, and to her peo- 
 ple, the Jews, she rendered a service which 
 should place her name among the noblest hero- 
 ines of all time. 
 
 It is noteworthy that Esther, even though 
 she was a queen and married to one of an- 
 other race, still cherished an undying love for 
 her own race and for Mordecai, to whom she 
 owed so much for all his kindness to her since 
 as a little girl she was left an orphan in a 
 strange land. Moreover, though grown to 
 womanhood and elevated to wealth, honor, and 
 power, she kept within her heart the spirit 
 of filial obedience which had characterized her 
 from childhood, "for Esther did the command- 
 ment of Mordecai like as when she was brought 
 up ^ith him," runs the quaint and simple rec- 
 ord. It was this love of Esther for Mordecai 
 and this spirit of obedience that found a way 
 by which the queen often communicated with 
 her foster-father though they did not meet or 
 
248 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 see each other face to face after her coronation 
 in the Shushan palace. The same charms of 
 her wonderful personality which gained grace 
 and favor with the king won the love and obe- 
 dient attachment of all her servants and at- 
 tendants in the palace, for they seemed ever 
 willing to communicate to her any important 
 news from the outside world and to bear any 
 messages to and from her friends, especially 
 to and from Mordecai. It was, therefore, due 
 to her rare, unapproachable gifts, to her su- 
 perlative beauty, and lovable attributes of 
 mind and heart that all who knew her honored 
 and loved her, and that she became her hus- 
 band's heroic guardian when assassins plotted 
 to take his life. Mordecai heard of the plot 
 and by some means communicated the star- 
 tling intelligence to Esther. She immediately 
 warned the king in time to thwart the as- 
 sassins, who were duly hanged. Evidently, 
 Queen Esther informed the king of his dan- 
 ger in some official way through documents 
 and through the agency of the proper func- 
 tionaries of the palace so that the king did 
 not know at the time that he owed his life to 
 his beautiful and heroic queen and to the 
 Jew Mordecai. But this he was to learn in 
 time for the information to be of great service 
 to Mordecai and his endangered race. 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 249 
 
 The decree of Ahasuerus condemning the 
 Jews to extinction filled Shushan mth con- 
 sternation. There was weeping and wailing 
 among the Jews. They with Mordecai 
 mourned in sackcloth and ashes. Some faith- 
 ful servant of the queen told her of Mordecai's 
 condition. She in alarm, and with fi.lial solic- 
 itude, inquired the cause. Now messages 
 flew thick and fast between the daughter and 
 father by the agency of faithful and attached 
 servants of the palace. Mordecai hinted that 
 Esther could not hold her peace at such a 
 time and sent her the memorable words: 
 "Who knowest whether thou art come to the 
 kingdom for such a time as this?" 
 
 What can Esther do? Shall she hasten to 
 the king and plead the cause of her people? 
 That may mean her own death. For there 
 is a law that makes it a capital offense for 
 any person to come to the inner court of the 
 king without his bidding. And if any such 
 person, man or woman, shall presume to trans- 
 gress this' law, the penalty will be death un- 
 less the king shall hold out the golden scep- 
 ter, which will mean that the offending person 
 may live. Esther knew this law. And now 
 the question with her is : If I go to him, will 
 he hold out the golden scepter? For some 
 reason the king had neglected her for a whole 
 
250 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 month. Had Haman and his party reminded 
 the king that Esther was a Jewess and must 
 perish with the rest of the race? Had the 
 king's affections been alienated? Was she 
 also doomed? If she approached the king, 
 would he refuse to hold out the golden scep- 
 ter, and would that mean death? What a 
 moment, what a crisis, in one's life! But 
 what an occasion for heroism to assert it- 
 self! Is this woman equal to the emergency? 
 Is she, indeed, by the providence of God, 
 "come to the kingdom for such a time as 
 this"? Yes, yes, a great heroine is incar- 
 nate in that beautiful woman, all her beauty 
 enhanced by her high resolve. Her cheeks 
 glow, her black eyes flame, her lips are com- 
 pressed, her serene brow is shining as if a 
 halo were resting on her hair, her form is 
 proudly erect, her hands are reverently 
 clasped, her face, angelic with inspiration, is 
 lifted heavenward to the God of her fathers. 
 The victory is won! The heroine appears! 
 Esther is come to the kingdom for such a time 
 as this! This message goes by the hand of 
 some faithful attendant to Mordecai: "Go, 
 gather together all the Jews that are present 
 in Shushan, and fast ye for me, and neither 
 eat nor drink these days, night or day : I also 
 and my maidens will fast likewise: and 
 
THE HEKOINB-WIFE 251 
 
 will I go in unto the king which is not ac- 
 cording to the law: and if I perish, I perish." 
 That message belongs to the holiest literature 
 of heroism. Fit to be written in letters of 
 gold! Let it be set to loftiest music! Give 
 it the immortality of undying eloquence and 
 song! Esther asks for the prayers of her 
 people. Before she reveals her purpose to 
 them she calls, them to the old Jewish serv- 
 ice of fasting, and she and her maids engage 
 in devout religious exercises. It was in this 
 spirit of religious enthusiasm, with her faith 
 in her people's prayers and in her people's 
 God, that she made the resolve, "I will go in 
 unto the king, and if I perish, I perish." It 
 was a great thing to say, " To plead for my 
 people, to save my father's race, I will go 
 in unto the king. Which lij ti6t according to 
 the law: and it 1 perish. I perish?^ It was _ 
 
 a g-rpqf thing in «gy^ antl fnr fl. womau to Sav it- 
 It was a greater thing to do, and for a woman^ 
 to do it. Esther went into danger, but she went 
 there from her knees, and at that moment 
 were not Mordecai and all her people on their 
 knees before God? It is an awful but glori- 
 ou g_scene ! There she stands in the forbidden 
 in ner court — Esther, the most beautiful 
 woman in the world, never soTadiantly beau- 
 tiful as now ! Esther, the most fearless, cour- 
 
252 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 ageous heroine in the world, arrayed in her 
 jewels and royal apparel! What will the 
 king do when he beholds his beautiful heroic 
 queen? Is he alienated? Is he angry with 
 her? Has he resolved that she too must die 
 with her people? Will this act of hers only 
 enrage him? Will he withhold the golden 
 scepter and thereby seal her doom? It is 
 an awful moment, the supreme moment of 
 destiny for Esther and for her people. God 
 be with you now, O lovely heroine! The 
 king turns, his eyes meet the most beautiful 
 eyes in all the world, never so tenderly and 
 splendidly beautiful as now, supernatural with 
 the light of love, of prayer, of hope. The 
 scepter, the fateful golden scepter! Look! 
 "The king held out to Esther the golden 
 scepter that was in his hand." Saved ! Honor 
 to Ahasuerust "So Esther drew near, and 
 touched the top of the scepter." Saved! 
 Saved! She shall not perish. And when the 
 eyes of the king once more look into those 
 great, black, beautiful eyes of his Esther, eyes 
 whose heroic and wondrous fire is now soft- 
 ened with her tears of gratitude and love, the 
 old familiar tenderness masters him and with 
 a sweet and manly emotion in his voice, he 
 asks: "What wilt thou, Queen Esther? And 
 what is thy request? It shall even be given 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 253 
 
 thee to the half of the kingdom." Her cause 
 is won. She Icnows by that dear old question, 
 so often asked by the king, that she is still 
 his own beloved Esther, still the pride of his 
 eyes and the joy of his life. And she also 
 knows by that promise of his which cannot 
 be broken that she will have her heart's desire 
 and that Mordecai and her people will be 
 saved. From that moment Esther commands 
 the situation. Her wit, her sagacity, her clev- 
 erness, her tact, her executive genius, are now 
 in control, and what this woman wills God 
 wills. 
 
 It must have been with a wondrous joy 
 and satisfaction that Esther learned, perhaps 
 from her king's own lips, that Ahasuerus by 
 reading the documents discovered that Mor- 
 decai and she had saved him from assassina- 
 tion years before. Did the king ever ask her : 
 "Why, my beautiful queen, my heroine-wife, 
 why did you not tell me this before? Why 
 did you allow your modesty to keep your 
 very devotion to me a secret all these years? 
 Why did you not tell me that you were my 
 guardian angel in the time of danger and that 
 you and Mordecai saved me from assassina- 
 tion by the conspirators?" One thing we 
 know, the king was grateful with a gratitude 
 that drew his beautiful Esther closer to his 
 
254 HEKOINBS OF HISTORY 
 
 heart than ever. And we also know that he 
 was surprised to find that Mordecai's service 
 had never been rewarded. But now he is 
 determined to reward him as one whom the 
 king delighteth to honor. Not only was the 
 edict by which the Jews were to be extermi- 
 nated revoked, but Haman and his house were 
 destroyed, Mordecai was elevated to the high- 
 est office and honors in the gift of the king, 
 and the Jews were granted a position of power 
 and influence which gave them an enviable 
 dominance in commerce and politics from In- 
 dia to Ethiopia. With what joy Esther must 
 have witnessed the preferment of Mordecai 
 which she had by her own heroism made pos- 
 sible ! And all this good fortune which came 
 to the Jews, by which they were enabled to 
 hope for and prepare for their return to Jeru- 
 salem in the days of Nehemiah, was the re- 
 sult of Esther's heroic devotion to her hus- 
 band and king, to her father Mordecai, and 
 to her people, the Jews. If the most impor- 
 tant and impressive achievement of this hero- 
 ine-queen was the rescue of her race from 
 universal massacre, that must not make us 
 lose sight of the service which Esther ren- 
 dered to Ahasuerus in saving him from the 
 results of Haman's wicked machinations and 
 from the execution of that infamous edict 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 255 
 
 of extermination which, had it not been re- 
 voked by her heroism, would have stained 
 the king's name with everlasting ignominy 
 and brought upon his last days infinite sorrow 
 and shame, upon his memory the execrations 
 of all time. As David had reason to thank 
 God for the good advice and heroism of Abi- 
 gail, by which she saved him from staining 
 his royal hands with the blood of Nabal and 
 his house, much more had Ahasuerus right to 
 thank God for Esther's heroism in saving 
 him from the 'wholesale massacre and com- 
 plete extermination of the Jews. And if the 
 Jews remember with gratitude the patriotic 
 heroism of Deborah, by which they were saved 
 from the oppression and cruelties of Jabin 
 and Sisera, much more should they keep in 
 grateful and everlasting remembrance the 
 heroism of Esther, the beautiful queen, who, 
 in the days of their captivity, saved their race 
 from extinction. 
 
 And is not one of the Jewish festivals, cele- 
 brated even to this day, a monument perpetu- 
 ating the heroism of Esther with the deliver- 
 ing providence of God? As the passover keeps 
 in memory the event of God's protecting care 
 of Israel when the destroying angel smote the 
 firstborn in Egypt, so Purim is a festival 
 kept to perpetuate forever the memory of the 
 
256 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 day when, by Esther's heroic influence, 
 Ahasuerus annulled the edict of extermina- 
 tion, spared the Jews in captivity, and 
 promoted them to high office, social station, 
 and political power throughout his wide em- 
 pire. By all the usages of that time, if not 
 this, Haman and his party, assassins all, de- 
 served their fate. 
 
 Esther saved her adopted country not only 
 from a horrible massacre and the infamy of it, 
 but she also saved it from a revolution which 
 might have shaken the throne to its ruin and 
 disrupted the empire. We may Avish that 
 Esther could have exercised more magna- 
 nimity than to urge the destruction of Haman's 
 house and Haman's party throughout the 
 land; we may wish she had forgiven the cruel 
 machinations and intrigues of the party of 
 Jew-baiters; we may even wish there had 
 been no death penalties, no wars, no taking 
 of men's lives in those far-off and less enlight- 
 ened times; but what Esther insisted upon 
 was as just and righteous in her day as is 
 that which we insist upon concerning such 
 matters in our day. With the light she had, 
 and with all the light which the world had in 
 her day, Esther acted the part of a blameless, 
 irreproachable patriot and deliverer, and she 
 will ever live in the righteous esteem and ad- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 257 
 
 miration of mankind not only as one of the 
 most beautiful women of history, but as one 
 of the most devoted heroines that ever 
 adorned her sex or jeweled the annals of 
 her own race with splendor. 
 
 EuTH — Wife op Boaz 
 
 A line of great men, stretching through a 
 history of nearly forty generations, begins 
 with one of the most self-denying heroines 
 immortalized in Holy Writ. Back to Ruth 
 is traced the ancestry of such kings as Jo- 
 siah, Hezekiah, Jehoshaphat, Asa, Solomon, 
 and David. She was the mother of Obed, the 
 grandmother of Jesse, and the great-grand- 
 mother of the illustrious David, the poet-king 
 of the Jews. Joseph, who took to wife Mary, 
 the mother of Jesus, was a lineal descendant 
 of Ruth down through a line of kings. This 
 daughter of Moab brought a strain of rich 
 heroic blood into the veins of Israel. Ruth 
 belongs to an age anterior to Abigail, Hul- 
 dah, Hannah, and even Deborah. Such an 
 ideal of womanly virtue, filial heroism, and 
 wifely devotion, rising out of the Moabitish 
 heathenism of so remote a time, quite unset- 
 tles our notions of the influence of heredity 
 and environment and even of the hypothesis of 
 evolution so far as ethics, morality, and char- 
 
258 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 acter are concerned. Taking into account the 
 customs of both her native and adopted coun- 
 tries, there was not an act of hers in all her 
 trying, soul-testing experiences as maiden, 
 wife, widow, daughter-in-law, or mother that 
 would not reflect honor upon womanhood even 
 in this more advanced and enlightened age. 
 It may never have entered the thought of 
 Elimelech and Naomi as they left Bethlehem 
 for the land of Moab on account of the long 
 drought, that they would remain in the 
 strange country until their boys should grow 
 to manhood and that those Jewish sons of 
 theirs would marry heathen women. As faith- 
 ful Jews, those parents might have hesitated, 
 nay, even refused to go to Moab, if they could 
 have foreseen this intermarriage with Moabit- 
 ish women. But, as the sequel proved, those 
 sons, Mahlon and Chilion, could not have 
 found better wives even among the daughters 
 of Israel than they found among the Moab- 
 ites. Nor, certainly, of all the maidens of 
 Bethlehem could Naomi have had more af- 
 fectionate, obedient, and heroically devoted 
 daughters-in-law than Ruth and Orpah. It 
 seemed a most happy alliance. And nothing 
 in the sad experience of the early widowhood 
 of these women is more deeply impressive than 
 the tender love and honor with which they 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 259 
 
 cherished the memory of their husbands, their 
 fidelity to them though dead, and the affec- 
 tionate praise bestowed upon them by Naomi 
 for their wifely devotion to her sons. "The 
 Lord deal kindly with you as ye have dealt 
 with the dead and with me," was Naomi's 
 prayer. It was a sad lament that this poor 
 widow had to offer : "The Almighty hath dealt 
 very bitterly with me." Death had taken her 
 husband and her sons. And it seemed a 
 strange, unaccountable providence that she 
 and both of her daughters-in-law should have 
 been suddenly left widows and, evidently, des- 
 titute. But in this time of distress how loyal 
 are these women of Moab to their Jewish 
 mother-in-law! One cannot read that exquis- 
 ite idyl of the book of Ruth without discern- 
 ing that J^onu_JieEsel-f--Kas___a ^remarkable. 
 woman, a woman of strong affection,of ten- 
 der~enio±iani,~ of great wisdom, courage, and 
 piety. She had _an_extrao£dinary_,moral and 
 r elig ious influence ovct Jier^daughters^ which 
 bound them to her w ith_strongest— filial at- 
 tachmeat^an d with a sincerity of honor and 
 vgneration t hat won~EEeiri to her religionjind 
 to the worship of the God of Israel. There 
 is no evidence that ^ao"mi "iliowed any par- 
 tiality in her affection for her daughters. 
 When she decided to return to her own coun- 
 
260 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 try and people, and contemplated separating 
 from Ruth and Orpah, her words of motherly 
 advice, her kisses, her tears, were for both, and 
 for both Avere her expressions of appreciation, 
 gratitude, and praise. Does not Naomi rise 
 before us as one of the true heroine-mothers 
 of the Jewish race when we consider with 
 what sacrifice she decided to return to Beth- 
 lehem? Her husband and her sons are dead, 
 and now, deeply as she loves them, yet, as 
 she thinks, for their sake, for their better 
 marital prospects and for their future hap- 
 piness, with motherly tears and caresses she 
 advises her faithful daughters-in-law to re- 
 turn to their people. What regard for them 
 does Naomi reveal when she sobs, "It griev- 
 eth me much for your sakes that the hand of 
 the Lord is gone out against me"! And now 
 she would relieve them of all responsibility 
 for her own welfare; she would not be a bur- 
 den upon them, though they were well and 
 strong and dutiful. She would not limit their 
 freedom nor make claims upon their care and 
 attention which would be a hindrance or an 
 embarrassment to them for all their future. 
 Had she been a selfish woman, had she not 
 been a true heroine, she might have advised, 
 nay, commanded those young women to fol- 
 low her; and upon them she had a right to 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 261 
 
 lean for support. But from all the obliga- 
 tions to obedience and service to which she 
 had the right to hold them she tenderly re- 
 leased them, thinking only of their future 
 prosperity and happiness rather than of her 
 own. Naomi is a heroine as she stands there 
 at the parting of the ways, a pathetic figure, 
 but all so noble, so womanly in her loneliness. 
 All she has left are Ruth and Orpah, and 
 now she must part with them. It is in the 
 gloaming; here the great silences spread their 
 soft wings; here only the great good God 
 listens and hears, hears the loving words, the 
 kisses and the sobbing otf women's voices. 
 Naomi's arms are about her daughters, her 
 dusky cheeks are wet with tears, her great 
 soft eyes with their sad dreams and hallowed 
 memories are looking toward the land of her 
 fathers. She must return not as she had 
 come — "full," but "empty" and alone; not 
 as Naomi "the pleasant," but as Mara "the 
 bitter." But there is another heroine in that 
 little group. Nay, are they not all heroines? 
 Poor Orpah — there shall be no blame put 
 upon her. Naomi does not chide her. Both 
 daughters volunteered to go with Naomi. 
 "They said unto her. Surely we will return 
 with thee unto thy people." Again and again 
 they lifted up their voices and wept. One 
 
262 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 seemed as devoted as the other. And when 
 at last Orpah took the advice of Naomi, doubt- 
 less prompted by her faith in Naomi's wis- 
 dom, and with tears and kisses bade her 
 mother-in-law farewell and returned to her 
 own people, she carried with her into obscur- 
 ity the respect and honor of every person of 
 sensibility who has ever read this beautiful 
 and pathetic story. 
 
 But now the sweet, the noble, the affecting 
 heroism of Ruth reveals itself. She cleaves 
 to Naomi. Whatever may be her attachment 
 for her own country and people, a deeper at- 
 tachment binds her to this Jewish mother-in- 
 law. Whatever her own attractions may be 
 of womanly beauty, of virtue, amiability, and 
 character that almost inevitably insure her 
 a future happy and honorable alliance with 
 some worthy son of Moab, she seems abso- 
 lutely oblivious of her own welfare in her 
 devotion to the woman whom she has come 
 to love more than she can love herself or any 
 other even of her own people. Perhaps Or- 
 pah was not capable of such love. Her affec- 
 tion was sweet and sincere, but her intellect 
 was not as strong as her sensibilities were 
 tender. Her convictions were not sufficiently 
 superior to her emotions. In Ruth we find a 
 rare combination of mind and heart, of intel- 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 263 
 
 lect and sensibility, of will and affection, of 
 conviction and emotion. She has the moral 
 strength of a heroine and all the intuitions of 
 an ideal womanhood. And now nothing can 
 move her from her high resolve. She is not 
 yielding to her uncontrolled feelings : she sees 
 her duty. Love draws her, but duty compels 
 her. And it is a willing, loving, filial duty 
 that she will perform at any cost to herself, 
 a cost that only such a heroine can pay. 
 
 And they stand alone in each other's em- 
 brace, Euth and Naomi. Once more the dis- 
 consolate Naomi, and it seems with a supreme 
 effort but none the less heroic, exhorts Ruth 
 to follow Orpah and return to her people. 
 Poor woman, with what a breaking, bleeding 
 heart she does it! There comes forth from 
 the sobbing lips of Ruth that strain of elo- 
 quent pathetic pleading that has no parallel 
 in this world's poetry or eloquence: "Entreat 
 me not to leave thee, and to return from fol- 
 lowing after thee: for whither thou goest, 
 I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will 
 lodge: thy people shall be my people, and 
 thy God my God: where thou diest, will I 
 die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do 
 so to me, and more also, if aught but death 
 part thee and me." There is nothing equal 
 to this in Shakespeare or in the lines of the 
 
264 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 tragic writers of the best classic ages. Who 
 has ever read it or heard it sung to sacred 
 music without the deepest emotion that ren- 
 dered to it the tribute of most manly tears? 
 That plea reveals the soul of a heroine, of 
 a heroine worthy to be the ancestress of poets, 
 warriors, and kings. Ruth loses sight of her- 
 self except as she joins her fortune and des- 
 tiny with the mother to whom she consecrates 
 her life. She sacrifices all her hopes of a 
 second marriage; she plights her troth to 
 Naomi; her soul weds the soul of the mother 
 at the high altar of filial affection, of re- 
 ligious conviction, of supreme duty. That 
 is heroism of the most exalted type. 
 
 Notice the sweet and tender delicacy of 
 Ruth's plea: "Entreat me not to leave thee, 
 or to return from following after thee." As 
 though the privilege of remaining with her 
 and following after her to the end were very 
 great, a favor beyond price, if Naomi would 
 but grant it her. She does not seem to think 
 that she is sacrificing anything, everything 
 indeed, to her high and heroic sense of filial 
 duty. In fact, she does not seem to think 
 of obligation — it is all privilege. She is ab- 
 solutely unconscious of performing a duty. 
 She pleads that Naomi will grant her the 
 blessed favor of going with her to Bethlehem. 
 
THE HEROINE-WIFE 265 
 
 It will break her heart to return from fol- 
 lowing after her. "Entreat me not to leave 
 thee." The heroine is thus ever unconscious 
 of her heroism. A self-conscious heroism is 
 impossible — there is no such heroism. The 
 self-consciousness of an action destroys its 
 heroism. The heroism of an action destroys 
 its self-consciousness. 
 
 That is a fine bit of tender color which the 
 author of the book of Ruth gives to the poet- 
 ical narrative when, without any praise of 
 Euth's eloquence or heroism, he leaves the 
 record of the effect of Ruth's plea on the 
 mind and heart of Naomi in the simple ef- 
 fective sentence : "When she saw that she was 
 steadfastly minded to go with her, then she 
 left speaking unto her." Had Naomi a new 
 revelation of Ruth's character, of her worth 
 as a woman, of her daughterly devotion, of the 
 depth of her love, of her will-force, of her self- 
 sacrificing spirit, of her unconscious but 
 splendid heroism? As hand in hand they 
 turned their faces westward and started upon 
 their journey their souls were bound together 
 as never before— mother and daughter as 
 never before — and both heroines in their mu- 
 tual love and devotion. 
 
 Naomi had not been forgotten in her native 
 village. Evidently, she had been a woman 
 
266 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 held in love and admiration by those who 
 knew her as a girl and as a young woman, 
 and as Elimelech's wife and the mother of 
 Mahlon and Chilion. Her return was an 
 eyent in the little town of Bethlehem. The 
 historian gives it a tender and pathetic set- 
 ting: "So they two went until they came to 
 Bethlehem. And it came to pass, when they 
 were come to Bethlehem, that all the city 
 was moved about them, and they said. Is this 
 Naomi?" It was in this strange land and 
 new home that Ruth proved herself still the 
 heroine whom she had revealed herself to be 
 when at the parting of the ways in the land 
 of Moab she clave to Naomi. The heroism of 
 toil! Ah, many a woman in home, in shop, 
 in factory, in office, in field, has demonstrated 
 a heroism as worthy of the world's admira- 
 tion and praise as the heroism of adventure, 
 of danger, of battle. This gleaner in the 
 field of Boaz is a heroine, here following the 
 reapers and under the burning sun gathering 
 the daily bread. And her love for Naomi 
 makes toil sweet. She might have remained 
 in Moab and have wedded beyond the neces- 
 sity of such toil in the field. Heroism is never 
 conscious of the humiliation of duty. Duty 
 itself makes duty noble, exalting, divine. So, 
 conscious only of satisfaction in her virtuous 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 267 
 
 toil, the heroine gleaned day after day in the 
 harvest field of Boaz. Whatever the tempta- 
 tions may have been, nothing was more heroic 
 in Ruth than her discretion and virtue when 
 the necessities of toil brought her in associa- 
 tion with the young men and young women of 
 the harvest field. There is no higher type 
 of heroine than the discreet, virtuous woman 
 out there in the great world of toil, single- 
 handed and alone, earning an honest wage 
 for her support and for the support of those 
 who are dependent upon her. Of all such 
 Ruth is the patron saint. And about the 
 white brows of all such gather the halos of 
 God's favor, of humanity's honor and of all 
 earthly and heavenly sainthood. No higher 
 tribute could have been paid to the industrial 
 heroism, the virtuous heroism, and the filial 
 heroism of Ruth than the esteem in which 
 she was held by the people among whom she 
 had come as a stranger. They appreciated 
 her devotion to Naomi. Her heroism opened 
 their hearts to her. They loved her for all 
 she was in her sweet womanhood and for all 
 she had sacrificed for her mother-in-law. It 
 was an unusual tribute paid to Ruth's worth 
 as a woman when the women of Bethlehem, 
 praising her virtue to Naomi, said, "Thy 
 daughter-in-law which loveth thee is better 
 
268 HEEOINES OF HISTORY 
 
 to thee than seven sons." And the tribute of 
 Boaz, what a beautiful tribute it was ! What 
 a manly man it proved him to be! What a 
 kindly, grateful common sentiment toward 
 Euth it revealed ! "It hath fully been showed 
 me," said Boaz to Euth, "all that thou hast 
 done unto thy mother-in-law since the death of 
 thine husband; and how thou hast left thy 
 father and thy mother, and the land of thy 
 nativity, and art come unto a people which thou 
 knowest not heretofore. The Lord recom- 
 pense thy work, and a full reward be given 
 thee of the Lord God of Israel, under whose 
 wings thou hast come to trust." 
 
 And the crowning tribute came when Boaz, 
 contemplating marriage with Euth according 
 to the law of his people, said to her, "All the 
 city of my people doth know that thou art 
 a virtuous woman." So this heroine, a Moab- 
 itish woman, a young widow, toiling, glean- 
 ing after the reapers in the field, supporting 
 herself and her mother-in-law by honest labor, 
 becomes the wife of Boaz, "the mighty man of 
 wealth." 
 
 One of the happiest features of this alli- 
 ance, which had many happy features, was 
 the delight with which the people received 
 the proposal of Boaz to wed Euth and the 
 hearty approbation which they accorded the 
 
THE HEEOINE-WIFE 269 
 
 union. This was a tribute to both Boaz and 
 Ruth. "And all the people that were in the 
 gate, and the elders, said, We are witnesses. 
 The Lord make the woman that is come into 
 thine house like Rachel and like Leah, which 
 two did build up the house of Israel: and do 
 thou worthily in Ephratah and be famous 
 in Bethlehem: and let thy house be like the 
 house of Pharez, whom Tamar barSe unto 
 Judah, of the seed which the Lord shall give 
 thee of this young woman." 
 
 From that union sprang the line of kings 
 whose deeds made Israel a mighty people; 
 from that alliance came the genius which gave 
 splendor to Hebrew literature, and from Ruth 
 and Boaz there came through warriors, poets, 
 seers, and kings the rich blood of Joseph, to 
 whom Mary the Virgin was espoused when 
 there was born of her in Ruth's adopted town 
 of Bethlehem a Saviour which is Christ the 
 Lord. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 
 Mary — The Mother of Jesus 
 
 If the brow of any mortal in this world- 
 history of ours deserves a halo, it is the radi- 
 ant brow of Mary, the mother of Jesus. The 
 art which has circled her head with glory 
 has expressed the universal veneration of man- 
 kind for the truly greatest woman of all time. 
 If John the Baptist was worthy to be called 
 the greatest man born of woman because he 
 was the ordained forerunner and herald of 
 the Christ, does not Mary become the greatest 
 of women because she was ordained of heaven 
 to be the mother of the world's Saviour? 
 "Blessed art thou among women," said the 
 angel; and every noble soul since then has 
 repeated the angelic salutation, "Blessed art 
 thou among women." As the solemn mystery 
 pervaded her being and the Galilsean virgin 
 became conscious of her heaven-appointed des- 
 tiny, and began to realize what honor the 
 Holy Ghost had bestowed upon her, she was 
 lifted into a rapture of exultation and her soul 
 broke forth with inspired joy : "My soul doth 
 
 270 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIO 271 
 
 magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced 
 in God my Saviour. For he hath regarded 
 the low estate of his handmaiden : for, behold, 
 from henceforth all generations shall call me 
 blessed. For he that is mighty hath done 
 to me great things ; and holy is his name. And 
 his mercy is on them that fear him from gen- 
 eration to generation. He hath showed 
 strength with his arm; he hath scattered the 
 proud in the imagination of their hearts. He 
 hath put down the mighty from their seats, 
 and exalted them of low degree. He hath 
 filled the hungry with good things; and the 
 rich he hath sent empty away. He hath hol- 
 pen his servant Israel, in remembrance of his 
 mercy; as he spake to our fathers, to Abra- 
 ham, and to his seed forever." 
 
 We are profoundly impressed by the sweet 
 and modest nobility with which this divinely 
 exalted woman bore the honor of that mys- 
 terious and holy motherhood. The very 
 delicacy of her situation demanded of her a 
 heroism which nothing in the soul of woman 
 but her most womanly virtue, an absolutely 
 perfect faith in God, and the most implicit 
 confidence in the fair-mindedness of the 
 world could inspire. Her own consciousness 
 of purity seems to have made her naively ob- 
 livious to the possibility of any false or vicious 
 
272 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 interpretation of her condition. And yet the 
 awful apprehension may have dawned upon 
 her gentle spirit that a corrupt world would 
 pass her by with an incredulous smile or a 
 contemptuous sneer. If so, her woman soul 
 then needed the mighty bracing of an inspired 
 heroism. Incredible as it may seem, the de- 
 pravity, viciousness, and demoniacal cruelty 
 of human nature have compelled that name, 
 the Virgin Mary, to bear a two-fold odium — 
 the odium of unchastity and hypocrisy, and 
 the odium of fanaticism and idolatry. Which 
 insult has been the more bitter and revolting 
 it may be difficult to determine, the charge 
 that she was an impure woman or the claim 
 that she was divine. Which has done more 
 to create doubt as to her real character, the 
 imputation of weakness and depravity or the 
 imputation of immaculateness and impecca- 
 bility, it would be impossible to say. But the 
 depravity of human nature never became more 
 unspeakably little, cowardly, unmanly, vile, 
 than when by direct or indirect charges, by 
 affirmation or inuendo, such men as Voltaire, 
 Paine, Ingersoll, Nietzsche, the madman, and 
 Haeckel, the worse than madman, have at- 
 tempted to befoul the name and malign the 
 character of Mary, the mother of Jesus. It 
 may have been withheld from her pure eyes 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 273 
 
 to see the shameful vision of her own traduc- 
 ing. She may never have imagined in her in- 
 nocent womanly soul that the world would 
 ever produce a man who could be unmanly 
 enough to question her innocency and to in- 
 sult her memory, else there might have been 
 demanded of her more than a mortal heroism 
 to contemplate the shame of it. Philosophy 
 and criticism unblushingly bespatter with 
 indecent insinuations, or with blatantly foul 
 charges, the white fame of the best and 
 greatest of women, it is only when honor has 
 fled to brutish beasts, and these high studies 
 have fallen into decadence and the brain of 
 the scholar has begun to rot. 
 
 But let us believe that this Mary, the most 
 nearly divine mother of human history, lived 
 and died without having to bear the shock 
 of such a thought as that men, chivalrous 
 men, would jest at her motherhood, repudiate 
 her claims with a sneer, and seek to brand her 
 character and her name with indecent igno- 
 miny. O, angel of God, above the hiss and 
 snarl, the jest and sneer of the world's infi- 
 delity, we hear again thy sweet and heavenly 
 salutation, "Blessed art thou among women." 
 The angel is still the best philosopher, the. 
 best critic, the best theologian, the best 
 scholar, the best historian; and the world 
 
274 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 listens believingly to his "Blessed art thou 
 among women." 
 
 But have not fanaticism and superstition 
 brought that name of Mary into as undeserved 
 disrepute by raising up a Maryolatry which 
 has been a blight to religion, an affront to 
 Jesus Christ, a humiliation to the Church of 
 God, and a stumbling-block to all true be- 
 lievers? To impute to Mary divine attributes 
 and the office of intercession, to pray to her, 
 to claim for her and even for her image the 
 power of miracles, to worship her, is to insult 
 her, because it is to place her before Jesus 
 Christ himself and ascribe to her those di- 
 vine virtues and prerogatives which belong 
 only to the Son of God. Not one of these 
 claims did Jesus ever make for Mary. Not 
 one of these claims did ever one of the evan- 
 gelists or apostles make for her. Nowhere in 
 the Word of God is she credited with having 
 performed a miracle; nowhere is the promise 
 made that she will ever work a miracle; no- 
 where is the encouragement held forth that 
 prayers to her will be efficacious; nowhere is 
 man taught to adore and worship her. 
 
 The entire Protestant world holds the name 
 of Mary in as hallowed veneration as does the 
 Roman Catholic world, but honors her too 
 highly and too reverently to worship her or 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 275 
 
 to credulously kneel before her image. All 
 honorable men should cherish her memory too 
 highly to question her purity or to affirm her 
 divinity. Her name, the name of the best, the 
 purest, the greatest, yet the most pathetic of 
 Eve's family, is being rescued from the false 
 and cowardly insults of infidelity and from 
 the humiliating, revolting odium of fanati- 
 cism and superstition, and as never before 
 since she became the mother of the world's 
 Saviour does it shine with the superlative 
 glory which the angel saw in that humble, 
 holy Mary when he hailed her, "Blessed art 
 thou among women." 
 
 That Mary fully grasped the truth of 
 Christ's Messiahship and comprehended the 
 vast significance of her relation to Jesus and 
 of his relation to the world's redemption may 
 be doubted, unless we are ready to believe that 
 her spiritual vision was more penetrating 
 than that of the apostles, who did not seem 
 to understand even up to the morning of 
 Christ's resurrection the true spiritual nature 
 of his mission and Kingdom. That she with 
 all who heard wondered at the story of the 
 shepherds and the message which the angels 
 brought to them on the morning of the 
 Saviour's birth, and that "Mary kept all these 
 things and pondered them in her heart," does 
 
276 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 by no means signify that slie understood the 
 mystery of the divine incarnation, or that she 
 comprehended the nature of the Holy Child 
 whom she folded to her bosom in that stable 
 manger of the Bethlehem Inn. She was but 
 a simple peasant girl, as innocent of educa- 
 tion as of guile, to whom the subtleties of 
 philosophy and the processes of logical reason- 
 ing were as foreign as her chastity and inno- 
 cency were natural. It is, therefore, asking 
 too much of her understanding, and more than 
 is justifiable of her powers of spiritual appre- 
 hension, of her most acutely sensitive instinct, 
 to demand that she shall, from the beginning, 
 have a full consciousness of her mission or of 
 the mission of Jesus. That she was from the 
 Saviour's birth overshadowed and haunted 
 by the strange fearsome mystery of the Child's 
 nature and destiny and was thereby compelled 
 to such a care of him as would make her life 
 unnatural does not seem rationally harmoni- 
 ous with the facts that she was evidently not 
 so completely absorbed in her attentions to 
 Jesus as that she could not discharge all the 
 duties of her home life as a faithful wife and 
 as the equally affectionate and devoted mother 
 of other children — -James, Joses, Simon, 
 Judas (not Iscariot), and the daughters who 
 were known as the brothers and sisters of our 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 277 
 
 Lord. Mary's deTotion to Jesus may have 
 been no more sincere, tender, watchful, and 
 motherly than to the others. But we may 
 easily believe that as Jesus grew up in the 
 home there developed in the heart of Mary 
 and of Joseph, and of the brothers and sisters, 
 a consciousness of an unusual presence. That 
 Jesus was just like other boys, no more, no 
 less, it is quite unnecessary for us to imagine. 
 That there must have been occasional, if not 
 constant, manifestations of superiority in the 
 life of the Divine Child, it need not tax our 
 reason and faith to conjecture. We have this 
 glimpse into his early childhood and have re- 
 vealed to us the mother's tender care for his 
 physical and spiritual welfare: "And when 
 eight days were accomplished for the circum- 
 cising of the child, his name was called 
 JESUS, which was so named of the angel be- 
 fore he was conceived in the womb. And when 
 the days of her purification according to the 
 law of Moses were accomplished, they brought 
 him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord 
 (as it is written in the law of the Lord, every 
 male that openeth the womb shall be called 
 holy to the Lord) ; and to offer a sacrifice 
 according to that which is said in the law of 
 the Lord, A pair of turtledoves, or two young 
 pigeons." 
 
278 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 What feelings may have been excited in 
 Mary's heart by the visit of the Magi we 
 cannot know, but there were so many extraor- 
 dinary circumstances attending the birth of 
 Mary's Child that her soul must have been 
 filled with an unusual motherly solicitude lest 
 any mishap befall him. The hasty flight into 
 Egypt and the persuasion that they were 
 directed by the angel of the Lord reveal with 
 what a care Mary and Joseph were guarding 
 the young Child's life. It is a beautiful com- 
 ment upon the home life at Nazareth, and 
 especially upon the motherly faithfulness of 
 Mary, which we read between the lines of 
 Luke's record: "And the child grew, and 
 waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom : 
 and the gTace of God was upon him." These 
 words are found in connection with the going 
 and coming of the family between Nazareth 
 and Jerusalem in the performance of their 
 formal religious duties, and would seem to 
 open that family life to our view and to show 
 with what devotion that mother watched over 
 the welfare of her marvelous boy. It was in 
 this connection also that the incident is re- 
 lated of Mary's three days' anxious search for 
 Jesus, whom she found in the temple. Nor 
 could she forbear telling Jesus with what 
 sorrow they had sought him. True, there was 
 
THE SUPEEME WOMAN-HEROIC 279 
 
 nothing remarkable in Mary's motherly con- 
 cern and anxiety for her missing boy. Any 
 true mother would have sought for her child 
 with the same solicitude. There was no re- 
 buke in Jesus' words to Mary : "How is it that 
 ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about 
 my Father's business?" These words ad- 
 dressed to Mary in the , temple reveal what 
 an intimacy existed between the boy Jesus 
 and his mother. Had they talked of these 
 matters heart to heart in the quiet of the little 
 home at Nazareth? Had Jesus in holy, secret 
 communings with his mother mentioned his 
 "Father's business" so that the term was 
 familiar to the ears of Mary? If when Jesus 
 addressed these words to his mother the others 
 "understood not the saying he spake unto 
 them," the saying had a meaning for Mary 
 as "his mother kept all these things in her 
 heart." In Nazareth, by the great good sense 
 of that mother's training, Jesus was permitted 
 to live a perfectly natural life, in which he 
 yielded happy obedience, and in the healthy 
 atmosphere of which "he increased in wisdom 
 and stature and in favor with God and man." 
 Nothing more is seen of Jesus in the record 
 of his life until he is a man thirty years of 
 age. Nothing more is seen of Mary for all 
 these intervening eighteen years. But that 
 
280 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 during those years she liad been receiving 
 revelations from a study of Jesus' character 
 and life, and doubtless from special manifes- 
 tations of his divineness, is quite evident from 
 an incident at the marriage in Cana of 
 Galilee. When Mary told Jesus that the wine 
 was exhausted, had she a knowledge of 
 Christ's power to do what Elisha did when by 
 miracle he filled the vessels with oil, or what 
 Elijah did when "the barrel of meal wasted 
 not, neither did the cruse of oil fail"? Had 
 Jesus ever performed such a miracle in the 
 little home at Nazareth? Had he ever in- 
 creased the scanty loaves, or replenished the 
 cruse of oil, or filled the wine jar, when in 
 that humble carpenter's large family the pro- 
 visions ran low? The Saviour's first public 
 miracle was at Cana. But Jesus seems to 
 have understood Mary to mean that she sug- 
 gested an exercise of his powers; his answer 
 imj)lies this: "Mine hour is not yet come." 
 Had they talked of these matters ? Had Jesus 
 told his mother, and told her alone, that he 
 would show forth his power to the world by 
 miracles? It now seems to be only a matter 
 of the time, of the "hour," when he shall begin 
 this work, and this alone seems to have been 
 kept secret from Mary. Again, the remark 
 which Mary addressed to the servants indi- 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 281 
 
 cates that she knew of his miracle-working 
 power. "His mother saith unto the servants, 
 Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it" (John 
 2. 5 ) . Yes, Mary was the first to know Jesus 
 as "the power of God." She was expectant. 
 The words of Jesus did not disconcert her. 
 They seem to have assured her that he was 
 about to manifest his power, hence she ad- 
 vised the servants to prepare for the miracle. 
 The first miracle of our Lord was wrought, 
 virtually, at the request of his mother ! Here 
 Mary's influence over Jesus, the power of a 
 sweet and motherly persuasion, is manifest. 
 The tender regard for his mother is also re- 
 vealed by the Saviour in his complying with 
 her suggestion as if to honor her. And well 
 may we suppose that she rejoiced as Jesus 
 "manifested forth his glory" in this "begin- 
 ning of miracles." If Mary had not been 
 prepared for this miracle by others which he 
 had wrought in the privacy of their home life 
 she must have been so impressed by recent 
 events as to be ready for any wonderful sign 
 that Jesus might give to the peojile in proof 
 of his divine character and mission. Had 
 Mary looked upon the Saviour's baptism in 
 the Jordan and heard the voice of God from 
 heaven saying, "This is my beloved Son, in 
 whom I am well pleased"? Or, if not, had the 
 
282 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 scene been described, to ber by Jesus, or by 
 otbers wbo bad witnessed it, and bad it all 
 been talked over at borne in tbe presence of 
 Mary and Joseph and tbe astonisbed, mysti- 
 fied brotbers and sisters? Was Mary ac- 
 quainted with tbe incident of tbe Lord's temp- 
 tation in tbe wilderness? Had sbe learned 
 tbe story from tbe Saviour's own lips, wbile 
 marveling at tbe recital of all tbe details after- 
 ward recorded by tbe evangelists? And bad 
 it toucbed ber motberly heart, bad ber eyes 
 filled witb tears of compassion to see tbe wan 
 face of ber son and to bear Mm tell of bis 
 sufferings and of the fierce cruelty of tbe 
 Satanic temptations? Had sbe looked into 
 his eyes witb motberly pride and studied bis 
 strangely lighted face as be told of bis vic- 
 tory? Sbe must have known these things and 
 they raised new wonder, new questionings, 
 and new conjectures in her mind. She knew 
 also that Jesus bad entered upon a ministry 
 of teaching which was attracting the attention 
 of the people. He was calling disciples and 
 they were leaving their occupations to follow 
 him. They came with him to the marriage 
 feast in Cana, and their faith in him was con- 
 firmed by the miracle in which he changed 
 tbe water into wine. As Jesus, therefore, 
 enters upon his public ministry he is still so 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 283 
 
 attached to Mary and she so tenderly devoted 
 to him that they are often found together, as 
 at the marriage feast and during the visit to 
 Capernaum with his brethren and disciples. 
 When they seem to have, been separated for 
 some days, and the news is spreading that 
 enemies are making bitter charges against 
 Jesus and even plotting to destroy him, that 
 influential officials are threatening to Mil him, 
 Mary, becoming alarmed for his safety, 
 hastens to him, searching from village to vil- 
 lage until she finds him. Though her Jesus 
 is a grown man, Mary is as anxious about 
 his safety as she was when she sought him 
 sorrowing years before when he was but a lad. 
 With all the rumors that were filling the air 
 as to the confiicting opinions of the people 
 and the sinister threats of men in authority, 
 Mary's heart must have been sadly perturbed, 
 and it must have been with a restless, heavy- 
 hearted anxiety that she went out from the 
 home with her other sons to find Jesus and 
 assure herself of his safety. Certain writers 
 have strangely forced into this scene a rup- 
 ture between Jesus and his mother. They 
 have erroneously concluded that the Saviour, 
 by his reply to the messengers who announced 
 that his mother had come and desired to see 
 him, then and there coldly rebuked her anx- 
 
284 HEROINES OP HISTORY 
 
 iety and motherly interest in him, and ended 
 the tender and intimate relation that had ex- 
 isted between them for the thirty years of his 
 life by declaring that she was no more to him 
 than any other person who believed in him. 
 Nothing can be more strained and absurd than 
 such an interpretation of the Saviour's 
 language. In the midst of his discourse to 
 the multitude it is announced that his mother 
 and brothers are in the crowd and desire to 
 speak to him. He takes advantage of the 
 incident to enforce a great and precious truth ; 
 he catches up the endearing words, "mother" 
 and "brethren," and, inspired by the tender 
 emotions they awaken in him, and by the 
 warm feelings which the very presence of that 
 mother and his brothers kindles in his heart, 
 he sets forth the winning, comforting truth of 
 the intimate, loving, vital, spiritual relation- 
 ship to him of all true believers. If Jesus 
 was cold and indifferent when the presence 
 of his mother was announced, how could he 
 have put any warmth, tenderness, spiritual 
 emotion, and heart-touching power into the 
 words addressed to his disciples, "Behold my 
 mother and my brethren"? If Jesus treats 
 his disciples with the indifference that some 
 would have us believe he treated Mary and 
 his brothers that day, who would wish to be 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 285 
 
 his mother and brethren? But if, as was 
 doubtless the case, it touched his heart with 
 a sweet tenderness and gratitude to learn that 
 with all the enemies that were rising up 
 against him, with all the accusations and 
 threatenings that were assailing him, with the 
 clouds and the storm of the unbelieving 
 world's opposition gathering about him, there 
 was one who never lost faith in him, one who 
 loved him with a mother's love, one who would 
 be near him in trouble to comfort him and 
 minister to him, one who anxiously sought to 
 be assured of his safety and to assure him of 
 her constant, abiding, eternal devotion — if 
 this manifestation of mother love and loyalty 
 warmed his heart with emotion, what a 
 sweetness and pathos, what a tenderness and 
 spiritual unction must he have put into the 
 words to his disciples, "Whosoever shall do 
 the will of my Father which is in heaven, the 
 same is my brother and sister and mother" ! 
 It was as if he had said, "Between me and my 
 disciples there shall exist as tender and loving 
 a relation as exists between me and this 
 precious mother and these brethren who come 
 to show me their loyalty and love." 
 
 It may well be imagined how troubled in 
 heart poor Mary must have been over the 
 growing opposition to the Saviour's teaching. 
 
286 HEROINES OF HISTORY 
 
 Although the common people, in their sad con- 
 dition of poverty, ignorance, and oppression, 
 heard Jesus gladly, and the multitudes fol- 
 lowed him and wondered at the gracious words 
 that fell from his lips, and although every 
 village and city could tell of his power, 
 miraculously exercised in the healing of their 
 sick, yet was there a sullen, an ominous, and 
 a growing opposition to him manifesting itself 
 among the official and influential classes. A 
 political and ecclesiastical conspiracy was 
 forming against him. Nor could poor Mary 
 have been ignorant of this. As to the outcome 
 of it all, as to what the Saviour's intention 
 was regarding the establishment of his King- 
 dom and as to the character of that Kingdom, 
 his simple peasant mother may not have had 
 the courage of heart or the astuteness of 
 mind to conjecture. It doubtless remained 
 all vague and mysterious to her, as it did to 
 the disciples. And the very mystery may have 
 brought fear to her soul, and she may have 
 had sad forebodings, even unexplainable pre- 
 monitions of danger, evil, tragedy. Could 
 there have been a more anxious, perplexed, 
 heavily laden heart than Mary's as the events 
 hastened on to the culmination of the Saviour's 
 ministry? What was the burden of her 
 motherly prayers during those dark days of 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 287 
 
 the gathering storm? What must have been 
 the main topic of conversation in that little 
 home over which the cloud of mournful appre- 
 hension was resting? Could Mary think of 
 anything else than Jesus, and the danger he 
 was in and of the possible outcome of it all? 
 She who was so wont to keep her thoughts to 
 herself, to ponder in her mother heart all she 
 heard about Jesus from shepherd or disciple 
 or angel, she must have hid much of her anx- 
 iety and fear, of her growing dread and fore- 
 boding of evil, in her own sad heart and borne 
 alone with a wondrous faith and patience the 
 great sorrow that no one could know but such 
 a mother of such a Son. But Mary was a 
 true, a transcendently great and self-effacing 
 heroine. 
 
 In the final, awful scene on Calvary "there 
 stood by the cross of Jesus his mother." What 
 a picture of heroism ! Where sneering Phari- 
 sees jostled snarling priests, and brutal sol- 
 diers mingled with the maddened, howling 
 mob; where disciples, fearing to show them- 
 selves, had turned ■ and fled ; where all was 
 dark, cruel, frenzied, blood-thirsty, tragical, 
 there stood Mary nearest to the cross, her 
 mother-soul all fearless, undaunted, magni- 
 ficently heroic. And was it this mother's 
 heroism that inspired the presence of the other 
 
288 HEKOINES OP HISTORY 
 
 women, and of John, tlie only disciple that 
 had not in cowardice forsaken Jesus and fled? 
 Was it Mary's thought, "I must be, I will be 
 with him and nearest him to the last"? And 
 was the thought of the others, "Let us follow 
 Mary and be with her in this awful trial"? 
 Had not Mary insisted on standing by the 
 cross of Jesus in all the danger and horror 
 of that crucifixion, can we imagine that John 
 would have stood there, or Mary's sister, or 
 Mary Magdalene? 
 
 Again does Jesus show his appreciation of 
 his mother's devotion, and, tenderly address- 
 ing her in his dying agony, he commends her 
 to the care of John, the disciple whom he 
 loved. Was not Mary's presence there a com- 
 fort to her dying Son? The loyalty, the fear- 
 less, dauntless, heroic, loving devotion of 
 motherhood shone forth into the darkness of 
 that appalling tragedy as the greatest thing 
 in the world. There is nothing in history to 
 equal it; of all heroic deeds of heroic women 
 or of heroic men nothing parallels that last 
 act of Mary's devotion — "There stood by the 
 cross of Jesus his mother." And had not that 
 heroism a blessed reward? Mary must have 
 longed for one more look of loving recogni- 
 tion, one more word of comfort from Jesus. 
 She must naturally have wished to know that 
 
THE SUPREME WOMAN-HEROIC 289 
 
 Jesus was aware of her presence, that he was 
 conscious that his mother was near him and 
 would be with him to the last. "Will he know 
 I am here?" "Will he be able to see me and 
 recognize me?" "Will he speak to me?" These 
 questions must have filled her anxious, agi- 
 tated heart. He does know she is there; he 
 does see her; he does speak to her! O, so 
 tender, so considerate, so comforting is that 
 recognition! Yes, "Blessed art thou among 
 women"! Here on dark and tragic Calvary, 
 as in angel-encircled Bethlehem, and now in 
 all the earth, and forever, are Gabriel's ac- 
 cents true : "Blessed art thou among women." 
 And for thy faithfulness to Jesus Christ, the 
 world's omniflc Saviour, for thy wondrous 
 and heroic motherhood, no less than for the 
 heaven-imposed honor of which the Holy 
 Ghost had found thee worthy — "Blessed art 
 thou among women." For the Nazareth con- 
 ception, for the Bethlehem birth, for the 
 devotion of Calvary, thy song of exultation 
 passes into prophecy and into music eternal : 
 "From henceforth all generations shall call 
 me blessed." And with thee, heroine of 
 heroines, holiest of mothers, shall heroic 
 motherhood everywhere and always be called 
 
 —BLESSED. 
 
,^Akin