Evening Star Newspaper, August 14, 1927, Page 74

4 — THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. €., AUGUST 14, AMY BROOKS, M. D. She Lost the Man She Loved to a Woman She Had Saved—Then Came a Crisis. ANDER the smoke pall of the lower West Side lie those streets that Amy Brooks used to tramp while she studied and worked her way through the small collsge where she .won the right to put M. D. ter her name. Dun and dreary thoroughfa they are now. shadowed by the impercep tihle impenetrable veil of discouraged soule Lven on the days when sun shine poura down upon Chicago the neighborhood just beyond the river eatches only enough shower to thi en The its grayneas filters into pale ™ on widespread ramparts of grent hospitals znd medical college: of Preshyterinn and Cook County, « Rush. of Physicians and Surgeons. on dozens of smaller institutions cinstere | md them, on theusands of il marked by signs of “l'uu Rooms,” nnd leaves o of its glow that, even in the sunset the district gives bhack but feeb's fickerings of radiance. | Strangely. though, it stays a lani of vouth, a Quartier Latin of a west | ern world its gloomy streets ever | worn by the restless feet of those who | seck the city’s guerdons of fame and fortune, its run-down houses, shelter | for boys and girls ready and willing to battle for their dreams. Perhaps 10 these crusaders of a later genera- | tion’s freedom the néighborhood is as | brave an Agincouri us it used to be | to Amy Brooks and myself. when we souzht the meinings of life and love | and death and eternity under the grim palisades of the County Hospital. | Amy Brooks was in her last vear at | the Lister Medical College when 1| chanced to meet her in the way I/ met o many of the city's fizures of | drama. high and low. in the course of a news story. She was not the story’s chief actor, but she was its | stage director, for she was handling publicity for the college in payment of her tuition. and it is likely that 1 would have passed out of her ken without much further thought of her, if it had not been for her extraordi- nary gift of human sympathy. | lived in the neizhborhood of the col- lege, and she fell into the habit of picking me up when she needed com panionship—or, more probably, when | she thought I needed it. Outside the hours of my own work I went with her through the post- graduate puses nished of a liberal education, to clinics at Rush, to court hearings at the Psychopathic, to lectures at P. and S, The bond between us was our love of the city, but I realized even then that hers was a broader, bigger émo- tion than was mine. In those days i loved Chicago for its spreading pano- rama, for the thrill of its power, the vision of its future, the drama of its | storles Amy Brooks loved Chicago for its poor. Her profession was to | her,.I believe, meérely a nieans to the end of giving service to those who needed it most. That was why she counted the cost of struggle not at all. She was amazingly equipped for her work, with a physical endurance that never failed her and a shrewdness that saw around corners in everything but her own sentimental affairs. Even by the stretch of kindly recollection, she could not be accounted beautiful, but she had two assets of lasting charm—the quality of Aunderstanding and a speaking voice with the timbre of Bernhardt's. Women liked her ‘without effort on her part, but I never saw either a man who sought her if #he failed to notice him, or a man who resisted her if she chose to attract him. That wag why I did not believe her when she told me that Mark Pres- ton had come to love her against his will and her o%n. . “You worked for him,” I accused er. “I didn't, truly,” she protested. “He was the lawyer for that awful Ca- miardl, trying to get the children away from that poor woman, and I hated him so that I'd have scratched him if he'd won that case. “You saw that he didn't.” 'Yes, and then he called me at the college and sald that he had to see me. I thought it wak something about the children and I let him come. Now I can't lose him.” “It's true, and the joke of it is that he doésn't really want to lové me any more than I want him to.” * kxR I'r was certainly true, as far as out- ward appéarance went, that Pres. ton was the victim of an_unrecipro- cated passion for Amy. He was a Young lawyer, struggling, ambitious. Through the few rhonths that re- mained of hér course at Lister he was literally under her feet, for he waited for her in the gloomy eorridors of the college with doglike tenacity, even after hé came to know that she some- times evadéd him by back-door de- partures. He annoyed her at first, then amuséd her, and gradually she @dmitted him into comradeship, and then ghé began to love him. That love, nourished by the thou #and and one springs of her easily aroused emotionalism, flourished like tree. If she was no nig- &ard in friendship, she was a profii- gate in love. Thé devotion, the self- abnegation, the sympathy she poured out upon Preston would have sufficed & dozen ordinary women through a dozen lifetimes. ~ So tremendous was the tide of love that it periled Preston’'s desire for her, and, had it hot been for her determination to fin. ish the work she had set out to do for herself. it is likely that she would have lost him through the very vio- lence of her newly awakened wish to hold him. She had made up her mind, h-w- evér, to go through an internsk’ in one of the women's hospitals bLeiore she married, and nothing Preston could say moved her from that deter- mination. “I'd be cheating myselt and all the other women who try to be doctors,” she declared. *It's too hard to make the grade to let any one slip back be- fore she comes to the top of the hill.” Against Preston’s arguments and pleas she held out for that year of - intensive experience, and finally won an appointment to work in the Clara Clayton Foundation, which Dr. Anna Lebcovie's surgical skill was already making famous. On the night she took her degree Preston gave Amy hundreds of roses and an ultimatum that she must marry him the next day. He was go- ing to Texas on a case that might keep him away for several months, and he wunted her to go with him, “I can't,” she protested, standin; among the roses in her cap and gown. “L start at the hospital next Monday. “Don’t you think I'm more Impor- tant than the hospital?” “Not more important,” she coun- tered, “than my faith in myself. I've get out to do this job, and I'd be los. ing something vital if T quit now. “But what are you going to do with it all?" he protested. “You won't want a profession when you marry me. . “1 don’t know when I might need L “Don’t you think I can take care of you?" “Of courss 1 A¢ #he laughed. “I wouldn't marry you at all it I didn't, but I've seen too many of the accl- nts of life to 16t any woman, even vaslf. go without a means of liveli- hood when it's within her grasp. Be- eides, jt's something deeper than just that. 1'd feel that I'd failed if 1 xive this up. and I don’t want to give you a failure for a wife. “You're quibbling,” he declared. “You want this sort of life more than |to of the Danaite | of | think you're going to be as |am.” | e I after you all t littl | found her, a wistful stray, | would you that. The hospital people turned down three other women, women | much nore their own sort, to plck me | up. Those women have found other Jobs. If I back out, it'll mean that } the foundation can’t get the choice of | internes it could have had a month ago. The colleges are closed. the | graduates seattered. It'll mean, too, | | that they won't let down the lnrs again for a woman outside their own | It wouldn't be honest, Mark, | iit now.” “All right,” he sald surli | “but 1 am,” shé laughed, “I'll run | lie way to Texas." L A JFOR an her work, she missed him %0 much that It is possible that he micht have fulfilled her promise 1 it not Leen for Dora Lytle. Amy in one of the wards of the foundation and took her up In much the same ¢ she have cared for a sick Kitten The girl was ill and lonely and desti- tute. She told Amy that she had alienated her fami a little Tow town by running away with a cheap | theatrical compan nd that h pride forbade her to anpeal to them Amy anathematized the absent Lytles | hard and cruel and took upon her self the burden of Dora’s care. The girl seemed to repay her shel- | tering kindliness by voti atitud but there was In her a certain fur tiveness that would never have es- caped Amy if she had been on suard. She wa% too occupied with her hos. pital dutles and her lonelinass for Preston to notice much more about the Lytle girl than her pathetic need of friendship. When Dora grew well enough to leave the inatitution. Amy found her a job at Lister and a room in the house where she herself had voarded hefore she went into Clayton The girl was definitély established as Amy's satellite when Preston returned from Texas. He determined to marry Amy at once. He telephoned her as sooh as he arrived In town, insisting that she dine with him that night. It was difficult for her to leave the hospital, but she maneuvered leave | for herself and met him in one of | the neighboring restaurants. She w so genuinely rejoiced over his return that he took the .occasign to demand | that she go with him the next day | up to Waukegan, where they could | be married with greater legal expedi- | tion than was possible in Cook County. | He was S0 eagerly bovish that she wavered from her resolve. | “If we weren't so short at the| hospital, I'd do it.” she sau. | Do it anyhow,” he urged, i “Oh, it's such a rotten thing to | leave them like this,” she protested. “I couldn’t take my own happiness un- less I'd earned it straight.” “You have to take happiness when and where you find it,” he threatened. “I ktiow,” she said, “but do vou suppose 1 could be really happy. knowing that I might haye saved Mrs. Kozminski by Staying on the job and lost her life by going with you?" “Great heavens, you aren't physi- cian to the universe!” “No, but I am interne to Ward Three at the Clayton.” hen you won't?” in ve're through." “Don't be childish, Mark,” she pleaded. “You know perfectly well that I'll marry you the last week of next June.” She leaned over the table to touch his hand, and her eyes lighted. He shrugged petulantly, but he could not resist her voice and her smile. “You win, Amy dear,” he sald, but she had a curious feeling that she had lost. Bven his good-by seemed to hold a forecast of something beyond temipo- rary farewell, “lI wish I'd told him I'd go to- morrow,” she thought, as she donned her uniform, but, in the pressure of the night's labors, she did not revert to regret. The next time she saw Preston both of them apparently had slipped back in their attitude of calm acceptance of the s tuation. X% % | N influenza epidemic, filling rooms and wards of the hospital, kept | Amy Brooks on duty 16 hours out of every 24 through the next fortnight. ' | wome Twice she had to break engagements with Preston. Once, when she could not reach him by telephone, she sent Doia Lytle to his office with a note of explanation. Dora, coming to Clayton the next night. waited with me mor than an hour for Amy, eulogizing he ®0 persistently that I was moved to tell her that T had known Amy even longer than had she, Tken she into queries about Preston. talking of him when Amy tered the room. think it's terrible that you tr Preston the way vou'do,’ as Amy, exhausted, flun: bed. “Why don't you marry him m going to,” Amy vawned soon as 1 finish my fob here.” “In June “In “as June you really in love with him, You bet T am!" an’'t understand how love him and keep him waiting. Dora ok % ‘1 th treet "He Amy.” “I" mean, money " “1 guess h Why . 1 just wondered.” There was a quality of personal speeulativenese in voice that stirred me 1o suspleion, and 1 had o thought of warning Amy ainst the girl. but dismissed it as absurd. Amy and Preston cared for each other with a devotion beyond the reach trivial wiles as Dora Lytle's, 1 knew that Amy was not working quite hard as she had during the epidem you can Mr. Preston a good lawyer?” sked me as we walked to w better one since he knew is he makinz much e's started on the high and 1 felt that she was eminently well | able to manage her own affairs with- out advice from any one. T did not see Dora again for months, Then I met her at the theater with Preston, She tried to avoid me, but Preston greeted me casually and 1 had no qualm in passing on the in- formation to Amy as lightly as I could, in view of my resentment against the other girl. “Oh, Mark's nice to Dora,” she said evenly, hut 1 caught the surprise in her eyes, She vee of Dr. ed to talk of the hospftal, Ann1 Lebcovie's amazing sur- <kill and of her own ambition serve und that remarkable J day when 1 can do an operation with her outfit,” she declared Wouldn’t t first? Not if she helieved T was ready. I'd do as ghe does—pray the chancs into God's hands E in my own. “When do vou think sh2'll let you take an operation ‘Heaven know but 1'd hate to leave Clayton without having had the chance.” The chance did not come however, until long ter her wus turned upside down by the new I had to break to her one April eve- ning. I found her in the children's a réading a fairy tale to three for- lorn children of the city, charity pa- tients of the foundation. Their faces, lifted to hers, were not more radiant than her own as she made vivid the old Story of Snow White. She nodded to me, but did not put down the book he had ended. s the good new she asked me chearfully, as she came across the ard, 1t isn't good. Amy. “What's happened arm across my shoulder. I do for you?” “It's not about me. *1? What is 1t? he hurt?”’ “Then what “He's married.” “Married? Her hand covered her mouth as if to hold down a cty and her eye rrowed. “He married Dora Lytle today." Dora Lytle.” She said the name he girl 1 saved from Kill- erself.” She hegan to laugh sobbingly. I sent her to him. Now he's Oh, fsn’t life funny to vou fear the responsibil- to her, She put her “What can TUs—vou.” Is it Mark? of such | d hold the knife | world | 1= | ByMarySynon lifted to hysteria, o T pulled her through the ' cor- | vidor to her room. There for a mo- | ment she stood hefore the photograph of Preston that was the only personal | touch in the bare cell 1 loved you, <noke to the man tare. I loved you and | o picked it up from ¢ stand and hu rinst the wall, then threw herself down on the floor beaide her »w bed and burst into a passion [ tear . For hours as evening dimmed into night and the myriad lights of the city began to twinkle below us I s | with Amy Brooks as she sobbed out the sorrows of her soul. |1t was my fault” was her refrain | “I had my chance and I didn't take it. Aren’t we fools? We think we can eat our cake and have it 1 might | have known what would happen. 1 | could have seen it for some one clse | Why cun’t we see around the corner when it's for ourselves?"” Then she would drift to reproach {of Preston. “Why couldn’t he have | waited? 1t's such a little while to | June. June! The hospitalll be full of | roses that people bring in. June! We | were going to his old home down in Missouri. Do you think he'll take | her there She wouldn't want to o ther it. She isn't marr what she can do for him L man to give her a © bills. She's told times. She's said man_who'd earn a She doesn’t love love any one. him!~ What Her laughter s if she # his pic e lost you." hat's Mark for | All she wants | home and pay me that a doze she'd 1 good living for her. | Mark. She couldn't [ Oh, it he disaster for is life going to he?™ That's his affair now.” T said | sharply. “Your only concern is with what vour life s going to he.” “Mine?” she asked dully. doosn’t matter now. ““This is just when it does matter.” | “Nothing matters.” She turned her face toward the wall. “I had love and 1 sold it for a mess of pottage. Now all T can do is eat the pottage. You can go home now.” she bade me. ‘and write a story ahout a fool woman who loved a man and who didn't have sense enough to grab him when he wanted her."” “What are you going to do?" | “There’s nothing for me to do | except——" The door opened just Dr. Lebeovie came ih. She was a short. squat woman, with a head of splendid pride and eyes of strange in sight. have missed you. Dr. Brooks.” she said to Amy, in her strongly - accented. foreign volce. What ' troubles you?" she went on | seeing the other woman's fhe went to he lifted her hand. “Is it sicknes she asked, “or orrow?” ““It's nothing. “It's Sorrow, “A man?" ‘Yes,” Amy said. “You have loved him?’ “I was going to m June.” “And he goes aw “He married another girl toda “To be sure' she said. “He was a pigeon who takes a pigeon for mate, and lets the eagle fly to the sun. Some “you will thank ou from the fate h “Oh, then, and Amy lied. 1 told her. ry him—in him,” Amy moaned. vou will always love him." Dr. Anna told her, * vou will be glad you lost him. Now you must work. It is vour only medicine. You will help me. When June comes, you will have another kind of glory. ~If yo do what T tell you, you shall be my assistant.” There began for Amy that night a course of action that would have taken even a more self-conscious woman out of thought of hersell. fhe worked like a slave in wards and operating _room, and studied under Dr. Anna's direction. She went about her daily tasks with the exaltation of the chosen. Khe did not even | mention Preston to me for iveeks. | Then one night she flung at me: | “I saw Mark toda “Where?" I demanded. annoyed less by the fact than by the softness | in_her voice. | " ““He telephoned me and said he had to talk to me. I couldn’t bring him it distress. | | | | | | | was there RNED TO MARK AS THEY BORE DORA DOWN THE CORRIDOR. “DO YOU WANT DR. L EBCOVIC TO OPERATE?" here. and #o T told him T'd meet him at the Chinaman's place down the street. 1 lunched with him there.” “Why did he want to see you?" “Why did I want to sce him? cauge he's had time to find out he's made a moss of everything. “Why dld he marry her?” “Why do men marry women don't really love? Infatuation, pas slon, anger against another woman. Oh, there are fifty reasons, none of them good, and all of them true! I'¢ hurt him and neglected him, and she to soothe his vanity. He knows now what a mistake he has made.” * ok % X Y her avoidance of me in the days that foilowed, I knew that che was seeing Preston, and I wondered what Dora wonld do when she came to know the situation. Amy went on with her work in the hospital, and Dr. Lebcovie must have | noticed the change in her titude, hut since Amy was doing all she de- manded of her she was too wise a woman to offer unasked advice in the private affairs of a subordinate, Amy was striving mightily tow of individual responsi! work and, with the ra surance, was coming nearer. to every day. Dr. Anna's “soon” shifted to “very soon,” and Amy waited for th> command to take her into her first operation with the tense eage ness of a runner at the tape. Her months at the foundation had endowed her with perspective and her associ- ation with Anna Lebcovic had given her spiritual surety in skill, as well as an actual consciousness of the de- mands that the traditions of the pro- fession make upon its votaries. cept for the shadow of Preston in the background, her present was hope- ful, her future assured. May ran into June and the neigh- borhood came to pale summering, its only flowers those brought by visitors to the hospital or sold by dark-skinned ‘vendors along the streets. The fra. ternity houses along the boulevards began to clear as the colleges closed, but the current of the city’s life flowed unceasingly. Great waves of heat rose on the southwestward prairies and rolled over the city, pressing down upon the poor in crowded tenements and hovels. Old men, old women, lit- tle children died through the torrid days and breathless nights of misery. Ambulances clanged up Harrison street hour after hour, speeding some lity in her ance of reas- they | rd the goal | it | unfortunate victim to a chance of rfl-! covery in one of the big institutions, where doctors and nurses fought val- | fantly to save whom they could. The | inty was already filled when, in the ourse of a news story of the suffer- ing on the lower west side, I found an old woman stricken in a Mataer | street warren, and 1 telephoned to Amy Brooks at the Clayton as a last | hope, | “Bring her,” she told me. “She can | have my room. 1 commandeered a patrol wagon and rode with the sick woman to the foun- | dation, | Amy, pale from heat and overwork, | met us at the receiving door. “I'm ali [ in, running her hand throus eady disheveled hair | “Morrow was callad to St. Louis to- { night. They think his daughter’ | ing there. And Dr. Anna's passed out. | She's never stopped for three days and nights until she fainted in the oy |erating room. We're all half dead.” She swung into work upon the pa- | tient, though, as soon as we had put | her into Amy’s bed, and it was nearly | an hour afterward when she came out into the corridor with a sigh of relief. “sthe’ll pull through,” she said, She sank down into a chmir in the sun parlor, yawning prodigiously. “I'd call it a day if there were any one to relieve me,” she said, “but 1| suppose I'll have to stand guard till Temple comes on at 6. We certainly need another interne here.” “Had any sleep?” Yot for 56 hou I'm dog tired.” | She stretched wea Why do you suppose people in their s choose the work we do? Or do you suppose we aren’t sane’ The telephone whirred at the floor desk, and a_nurse from the ward came to answer it. “I'll call her,” I heard her say, then saw her come toward Amy, “For you, Dr. Brooks,” she ¢ you can't get me,” Amy im 4 Mr. Preston,” she Amy hurried to the desk. “What?" 1 heard her voice rise in alarm. “How long? Are you sure? Yes, I know Morrow's away. Have you tried any one else? But you can't bring her here. Yes, Dr. Leb- covie is here, but I don't know that she can take a case tonight. It's al most out of the question. Oh, Mark. there are a hundred hospitals in Chi- cago. I'm sure you can get her in some one of them. Yes, I know it's a .said, and | dicitis, band every su | here. question of minutes. Al right, bring he 'k, waxen white. slck.” ‘she sald. ‘“Appen- She's heen Morrow's patient, and he told her that it she had an- - attack she'd have to be on the within an hour. Mark thinks 11 die i it fen’t done tonight. J d to stave off her coming here, but he's set on But_what'll we do? Morrow's away and Dr. Anna's sick, on on call is rushed to Johnstor she sum moned the nurse, “will you call Dr | Maxwell? And Dr. Blane? And Fishkin? Tell any one of them you can get it's an emergency appendi- itis."” She began to pace the sun parlor “I don't know what we can do it we can't get.them." she fumed. *Dr. Anr out. There’s no one else| her | * ok ok x | P and down the room she strode, | restless as a tiger, her weariness | dispelled by the driving power of her problem. “I don't see why Mark had to call me,” she muttered. resentful of the responsibility of the burden. “The Preshyterian would have taken her in if he'd fought for it, even if she had been Morrow's case. 1 should have called there, not let him come | Don't you see what he's put- ting up to me? 1If she went to an- other hospital, I wouldn’t have to think twice about her. Ift—"" She paused, caught by sudden thought of another contingency. “Oh, she won't die,” she said bitterly. . rse returned from the desk. re all working at other hos- pitals,” she told Amy. “Mrs. Blane the doctor may be able to get » within three hours. That's the best anywhere.” “Too late.” She went back to the instrument as it buzzed again. “Mr. Preston's downstairs,” said. “Send him up. Amy went forward to the elevator, to stand beside it with martial atten- tion. Mark Preston came out heside Dora, who was on the rollered cot that two attendants were pushing. “You've got some one?” he asked Amy ot yet. You won't let me die?” gasped between her groans. won't let me die?"” “No.” Amy said. death. Miss she Dora “You Famous This is the third of a series of articles about some of ‘the points of listoric intereat in, Virginia which can be reached on a day's trip from Washington ond ased on data collected by Repre- sent R. Walton Moore of the con. ,ru‘m al district in iwhich the countied 4alt wcith are located. BY WILL P. K| NEDY. URNING from the Piedmont section to the Tidewater sec- tion of Virginia, there are the counties of Stafford and King George. The | distance from ‘Washington to the courthouse of the fprmer is about 50 miles by the Wash- ihgton-Richmond highway, and to the courthouse of the other about 70 miles, ovér the same highway to Fredericksburg and then by way of the King's Highway from that city. Stafford, organized in 1664, had as one of its early settlers the first of the Virginia Masons, lineal ancestor of George Mason of Gunston Hall. There s a tradition in the Mason family that as a member of Parllament he re- sisted with ability and eloquence the aggressive measures of the crown. Certain it Is, however, that when war eame he declined to espouse the cause of Cromwell and served as an officer in the army of King Charles, He was a Staffordshire man and led a Staffordshire troop of cavalry in the Lattle of Worcester. Following that disaster to the royal arms, after being in concealment for a while, he made his way to America and gave to th: Virginia county the name of the Eng- lish county where he had lived. Until 1742 Stafford included counties subse- quently created, amohg them Fairfax and Arlington, which are suburban to the District of Columbia. King George County, organized in 1720, was named for George 11 by the then colonial Governor, Alexander 8potswood, who conducted the expe- dition of the Knighta of the Golden Horseshoe across the Blue Ridge Mountains to the discovery of the Shenandoah Vall The King, be- fore ascending the throne, had served with Spotswood under Marlborough on the Continent, and won his devoted allegiance, Prior to 1776 Stafford had no front on the Rappahannock River and King teorge none on the Potomac, but that | ar their boundaries were readjusted by statute so as to give each county a front on both rivers. Thus the place called the Ferry Farm, or Pine Grove Farm, opposite Fredericksburg, to which Washington’s childhood was re- lated, was before that date apparently within the limits of King George County, though now within the limits of Stafford. The latest of the Washington biog- raphies says of this place: “Tha old farm buildings have disap- péaréd, with oné noteworthy eéxcep. tion. This is a little one-story struc- ture, which the youthful Washington used a8 a workroom—the only struc. ture now in existence which is posi. | tively known to have been in constant use by him during his boyhood, The new farm buildings, nestling amol the trees on the highland, occupy practically the same site as they did want me.” 1 don’t want anything in the world more than 1 want you,” she said, “but ] love vou &0 much that I want you 1o have the best of me. If [ went with you mow, I wouldn't be. giving in the days of Washington.” * K %% v irginians of CHATHAM, WHERE GEORGE WASHINGTON AND GEN. ROBERT E. LEE MET THE YOUNG WOMEN WHO LATER BECAME THEIR WIVES, a designation originally of much wider application, lies nest to Westmore- land County, another of the five. Dur- ing a debate in the House of Repre- sentatives in 1872 between Represen- tative (afterward Senator) Ho: Massachusetts and Representative Critcher of Virginia the latter, stress- ing the historic importance of West. moreland, whose annals intertwine with those of King George, said: “If you will go with me to my estate, you will find that the adjoining estate is Wakefield, the birthplace of Washington. On the other side you will find atford, the residence of ‘Light Horse Harry' of glorious Revo- lutionary memory. Chantilly, which adjoins it, was the residence of Rich- ard Hen lee, the mover of the Declaration of Independence and the Cicero of the American Revolution. You will find in the same parish the home of Charles Lee, Washington's Attorney General, and of Francis Lightfoot Lee, the signer of the Declaration of Independence. There, too, you will ind the home of Arthur Lee, the accomplished negotiator of the treaty of commerce and alliance between this country and France in 1778, Riding in the opposite direc- tion, you come first, as 1 said, to the birthplace of Washington. Another honr's ride will bring you to the birth- place of Monroe. Another hour's ride to the birthplace of Madison. Now, sir, it you suppose the present gen. eration in V inin unwqrthy of their illustrious ancestors, if you will visit that estate and look through the lofty foreats, you will descry the massive |Kl.‘1[‘- GEORGE, which 18 one of the five counties commonly spoken of as the Northera Neck of Virginia, chimneys of the bargnial mansion thad Witnessed the birtljegf Robert E. Lee. Now, sir, T ask you to find in the whole' Stite of ‘Massachusetts such illustrious names as I have given you of those who lived In my little county. The route from through Alexandri interest and distinction vies with Wil- { liamsburg and Fredericksburg. These. three Virginia towns are full of mem- ories of the founders of our institu- tions, “the dead but sceptered sov- ereigns who still fule our apirits from their urns.” On the route is the vil- lage of Dumfries, in Prince William County, once ohe of the must impor- tant shipping points In Americn, whers a very large commerce was reglstered in one of the earliest customhouses of the country, the ruins of which lie alongside a creek now so blocked by sand as to he incapable of navigation. On the route after leaving Alexan- {dria and before réaching Dumfries is the rolonial Pohick Church, in Fairfax County, of which Washington and Mason wére vestrymen, and George | Johnson, who was mentioned in the article on Louisa County, the legal i adviser, At the time of the Revolution the rector at Pohick was Lee Massie, a man of ability and worth, He was a native, of King George County. His rayer book i8 preserved, showing ink s drawn through the prayer for the ing of England. Not far beyond the Stafford line is Aquia Church, another noted colonial structure, which, after being destroyed by fire, was rebuilt in 17 An early rector of the church was Rev. John Moncure, a strong, de- vout Scotchman, the progenitor of a numerous and influeatial Virginia Washington is which in historic family. He was a connection of George Mason of Gunston Hall, as shown by their correspondence and by their wills, in which they refer to each other, One of the recently erected monu- ments in the Aquia churchyard marks the grave of Mr: ate Waller Bar. rett, whose family long been iden- tified with Stafford County., It from the home of her father at Wide- water that Prof. Langley, the pionecr of aviation, attempted his well remem- bered flight, In King George County there remain two colonial churches, 8t. Paul's and Lamb's Creek, which former Bishop Meade described as “one of the best of the cruciform churches in Virginia.” To learn the actlvity in ecolonial times of the established church in governmental affairs it is only neces- sary to read the court records of the old counties and the parish vestry books. ‘Within the northern line of Stafford i8 Aquia Creek, one of the tributaries of the Potomac. In the narrative of his expeditions, Capt. John Smith tells of entering the creek and finding a small mine, still to be seen, which had been worked by the Indians. The ore was thought to be silver, but in fact it was iron ore bearing pyrites. Lingering about the old village of Aquia is a misty tale of the advent of Spaniards there before Smith ar- rived and of two priests heing left with the Indians, by whom they were murdered, and upon whom the Span- iards, agaln appearing, took summary revenge. ia Staftord, opposite Fredericks- Stafford and King George | burg, is Chatham, one of the most| | notable of the old Virginia homes, the | | mansion house of an extensive estate | which had a race track and elaborate | stables. It was built by a Fitzhugh in 1728, and the dignity of the house, with the planning, of which, accord- ing to tradition, William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, who was a close friend of some of the ea Fitzhughs, had something to do, is matched by the beauty of the gardens, which the present owners have made among the finest in the country. Chatham John Dandridge, the father of Mrs. Martha Custis, died, and there she met her future hus- band, George Washington. There i Fitzhugh married George ington Parke Custis, and there their daughte Mary Custis, met Robert E. Lee, whom she afterward married. There I ident Lincoln re- viewed his troops, and in its paneled rooms councils of war were held. All about Chatham the storm of the Civil War raged, and it is said that before and during the battle of Fredericks- burg Gen. Lee, commanding the Con- federate forces south of the Rappa- hannock, ordered his artillerymen, whose guns were trained upon the Federal Army commanded by Gen. Burnside on the Stafford Heights, to spare the house with which he had such Intimate associations. . After the close of the Revolution. William Fitzhugh, who owned and had been licing at Chatham, and who was a member of the Continental Congress, finding that he could not stand the burden of the lavish h pitality which had become the custom of his home, removed to Ravensworth, in Fairfax County, where his ancestor, William Fitzhugh, the immigrant, who | up to his death in 1701 was the lead- | ing lawyer of Virginia, and whose original letters are in the library of | Harvard University, had acquired a| great tract of land. on a portion of which he had formed a Huguenot set- tlement. A little west of Chatham s the town of Falmouth, in which is the modest house, still Intact, once oceu- pled by the leading business man of | the town, Basil Gordon, stated by more than one writer to be the first Amer can who accumulated a fortune of as much as a million dollars. High on a hill_above Falmouth is another old house, the attractive home of Gari Melchers, the distinguished American painter. In an address before the Virginia State Bar Assoclation in 1898, Senator Hoar of Massachusetts, generously for- getting his insistence in the debate with Representative Critcher upon the his- torical supremacy of that State, said: “One thing is remarkable in the his- tory of Virginla, It is true, I think, of no other American State. Notwith- standing the splendid constellation of burning and blazing names which she gave to the country in the period of the Revolution and in framing and in- augurating the Constitution, it by some miracle they had been gathered together in one room, we will say in the year 1770 or 1780, and had per- ished in ohe calamity, Virginia could have supplied their places and have maintained almost entirely the same pre-eminence.” | i ] Ogpe of those who probably would ! have taken their places was a man | now little remembered, Joseph Jones of King George County, a member of | the Virginia House of Burgesses: of the Virginia convention of 1776, which adopted the Virginia bill of rights and | the first written constitution; of the Virginia committee of public safety, which guided the conduct of the State's affairs during the Revolution, and of the Continental Congress. His eminence is evidenced by the fact that the State Department has published for the Government a volume contain- ing his correspondence—correspond- ence with Washington, Jefferson, Mad- ison and Monroe, the last his nephew, which shows the wisdom and patriot- ism marking his contribution to the common cause. In a previous article it was stated that James Madison's paternal ances- tors lived in Orange County. It is true, however, that at the time of his birth his mother, who was the daugh- ter of Peter Conway, was visiting her father at Port Conway on the Rappa- hannock, in King George County. The house, which was delightfully located in the fertile river valley, has long since disappeared, but its site is easily ascertained. Among the early clergymen of the established church were the two Stu- arts, who had charwe of the King George churches. Dr. David Stuart, a native of King George, was the grandson of one of them and the son of the other. When, under authority of Congress. Gen. Washington located | A’ the seat ot Wederal Government where it now is, he appointed a ‘®ommission of three, one of them Dr. Stuart, to survey the District, to accept and pur- chase land on the east side of the river and to provide suitable buildings for the accommodation of Cohgress, the President and the executive depart- ments. Dr. Stuart, commended by all the writers who have discussed him as a man of flne qualities, may be thought of as the personal representa- tive of the President on the commi: sion, since he was Washington’s con- nection, his family physician and one of hia closest friends H Immediately across the Rappahan- nock from Port Conway is Port Royal in Caroline County, and near there John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of President Lincoln, met his death in a barn where he had taken refuge. One leg was broken in escaping from the theater in which he shot the Presi- dent, but notwithstanding he man. aged to make his way through Mary- land and cross the Potomac into Kin, George near Cedar Grove, thé ol home of the Stuarts, and then traverse the county and get south of the Rap- pahannock. In King George County, among many of the notable places which it includes, “Take her down | to the operating room she ordoredq the attendants. “Stay with her, Miss Johnston, You'll have ta he the scrub for any one who ta » 8" She turned to Mark as they Dora down the corrido ‘Do you want Dr. operate? ny one you trust.” Il see if she can She ran down the s standing in troubled dis was he thinkinz? I wondered, waited her return. Was his merely common he . or was it strenzthened by some force of that infatuation that had led him to her from Amy? Would he be ultimately, to he fres to marry . or would he choose Dora, vith trivialities, her prettiness, her dependence upon him? e had h-n a coward when he had married Dora. Would he be coward eno now o see nothing in her death but reloase? Whatever his thouzhts, he waited for Amy in troubled silence. he came slowly up the stairs, hold- ing the rail as if for support. Then she faced him. “Dr. Lebcovie can't operate,” she said. ‘“She broke down tonight, and she daren't try now But she must know some one,” he declared. “Yes,” she said, her voice trembling with excitement. “She knows a doctor who has never vet performed an operation, but whom she’s been training for months.” “She's here?” es.” We'll take her.” “I don’t know if she dares said slowly. “She’ll need all her nerve for it, and this is the one case where she hasn't i “Why not? “It's myself. Dr. Anna has left it to me, She says that, if I feel read I can take it. Do you think I dare?” “But_if—" “If she lives, Lebcovie to irs, leavir m What as he site she said, “she stands . 1f she dies under she stands between us foreve 5 “I can’t tell you what to do, Amvy.” He watched her with pleading ey “No,” she eaid, “You ean't. No one can tell me what to do.” * k% % HE stood a moment, staring down the corridor toward the operating roor, then lifted her shoulders. “All : Chin up, she re- reed of crisis, “The chances in ands, and the knife steady in my own. From the operating room came the nd of Dora’s groans. Coming, Johnston.” Amy called. “Get little Sawyer anesthetic. Il be there minutes.” Five minutes later, swathed in the enveloping white apron and tisht, white cap of the surgeon, she came back through the hall from her room, her arms bared in readinoss for the nurse’s ccrubbing. Not one look did she give to Preston as she passed Miserably he moved after her as th door of the operating room closed. Wretchedly he strode the corridor as the minutes dragged. It seemed hours before she came out, pallid as her_raiment. “Safe,” was all she told him. A nurse came breathlessly up the stairs. “Oh. Dr. Brooks.” she cried, “a_child's just been brouzht in with a broken pelvis. It's another emer- gency operation. Do you think you can take it?” “Yos, id. She stood aside as the wheeled Dora into the hall. her to 41" she bade them. She did not even give Preston & glance as he followed Dora’s bed down the corridor, but she spoke to me be- fore she went back to the table. “Tell one of the nurses to take vour old woman's temperature every hour.” she counseled. ‘Yes, Dr. Brooks.” T said, for T Kknew even then that the last of the old Amy Brooks. who had played, and strolled, and laughed through say ay with me, had died in ating room, instead of Dora s Brooks for the in five nurses ake Preston. (Copyright. 1027, Metropolitan Newspaper Service. New York.) i Songs by American Women. N entire program of songs by American woman composers will be offered during the coming season by Esther Dale, prima donna soprano. The list includes Mrs. H. H. A. Beach, Gena Branscombe, Annabel Morrls Buchanan, Dagmar Rubner, Rh a, Mar rner _Salter, Constance Herreshoff. Alice Barnett, Marion Bauer and Rosalie Housman. Such a list indicates the variety and scope cavered by the talented grour of American women who have chieved success in the comperition of vocal music. Nor is Miss Dale's list complete by any means. It has been charged that there is a persistent and tiresome “‘sameness’ to the work of American woman com- posers. Therefore it is interesting to note the way in which Miss Dale has rounded out her program, in order to give it the necessary firmness and completeness. She selects for her first group Mre. Beach's “Old Prayer” and Gena Branscombe's “Three Ships” and “Tyme, ot Holiedayes.: 1In the second group ‘Mrs. Beach is again represent: ed. this time by the beautiful *‘Amalfi Night Song.” in company with An- nabel Buchanan's “Old Song,” Dag- mar Rubner’s “Plerrot” and Rhea Sil- there I8 none more stately or of great- er antiquity than Marmion, a Lewis home, the construction of which shows that the necessity of guarding against Indian attacks was not overlooked. Bo most unusual are the interior ar- rangément and carving that a few years ago the owhers \ere pérsuaded to allow the paneling and mantel. :)let;nl of one lthe l:-mm;u l& be tused n it rq uction by the Metropoli- tan Mu 'Jfl"« New York. e Rosalle berta’s “Samson Said.” For the mid- dle of her program, Miss Dale selects Mary Turner Salter's “Cry of Rachael™ and Constance Herreshoff's four songs of the “Beloved Stranger” cycle. As a concluding group Miss Dale offers tvo songs by Alice Bainett—"Night. ngale Lane' and “Music When Soft ‘olcés Die”; two songs by Marion Bauer — “By pitaph” and “Star Tryst a final climax, ‘God's World,” } “