mother remained with her children, but followed her husband with letters of loving appeal.  After long separation he was taken seriously ill in the far Southwest.  She left children, home and school work to go to his bedside.  Her watchful care brought him back from the very door of death, and her prayers were answered in seeing him forsake the cup and hide for safety in the cleft of the Rock of Ages.  He returned with her to their home, but soon after passed away.  She buried him beneath the green Missouri sod, planted flowers about the grave, paid him tribute of her tears, and returned to her work.

In the course of these years she had joined the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union and was recognized as one of its greatest leaders.

Several years ago I gave an address in Hot Springs, Ark.  A card was presented at my door, which bore the name of the heroine of my story.  Going to the parlor I said:  “What are you doing here?”

“My boy has been very ill with rheumatism and I have been here with him for several weeks.  He is better now and I return to my work tomorrow.”

Months later she was called again to the bedside of this son, and with all the tenderness of mother-love, he was cared for until he too passed over the river.  Again she took up her work on the platform, where she inspired many young women to do their best in life, and called many to righteousness.  She was the salt of the earth, the embodiment of nobility, the soul of truth; and not only her own state but the whole country is better because she lived.

Ask the author of the novel for the real to his story; he cannot name her; she does not live in England or America.  Ask me for mine and I answer Clara C. Hoffman, for years the associate of Frances E. Willard as national officer of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, and state president of the white ribboners of Missouri.

In a magazine article an author said:  “Out of one hundred and forty-five graduates of a certain female college, only fifteen have married.”  A Chicago editor quoted the statement and asked:  “Is it possible education breeds in woman a distaste for matrimony and home life?” In the first place, I would answer:  “You never can know how many are going to marry until they are all dead.”

Another explanation is that the average school girl goes out of school at that impulsive age when “love acts independent of all law, and is subject to nothing but its own sweet will,” no matter how many years father has toiled to give her the comforts of life, nor how many sleepless nights mother has spent to give her rest.  She meets a young man; he is handsome, dresses well and talks fluently.  She falls in love, and sees in “love at first sight,” the “inspiration of all wisdom.”  In a week, though she knows nothing of the young man’s character or disposition, she is ready to say to her parents:  “I appreciate all you have done for me:  I love you devotedly, but I have met such a nice fellow; he has asked me to marry him, and I have accepted; ta-ta!” She’s gone.  If her parents ask about the prospect for a living, she answers as did the young girl whose father said:  “Mary, are you determined to marry that young man?”