amateur stage of the Seventeenth-Street Drawing-Room, and had never
had a lesson in declamation nor a suggestion from any one to help her
in the study of her parts. To be able to forget one's identity, and to
make one's audience forget it, is, after all, the acme of high art in
acting, or, rather, it is the touch of genius which is above art, since
it cannot be taught.
As Peg Woffington in "Masks and Faces," and as the Countess in the
"Ladies' Battle," she carried conservative and critical audiences by
storm. Ristori, who was present at one of the performances, expressed
unqualified admiration at the high order of Miss Schaumburg's talent,
for both _rôles_ are considered tests to trained actresses.
She scored another success in the little operetta, "Les Noces de
Jeannette," which she sang and acted in French, and in which the _pièce
de résistance_ is the great _air du rossignol_. There are many people
in Philadelphia to-day who yet recall the brilliancy and daring of
those _tours de forces_ between the voice and the flute, each one in
turn taking up the refrain and soaring higher and higher in imitation
of the nightingale; yet there was never a harsh or strained note in
her perfect voice, but all as liquid, pure, and full-throated as the
warbling of the veritable bird.
Another of the gifts she possessed was for versification. She brought
it into frequent and graceful play, but only for the enjoyment of those
who were admitted to the privilege of an intimate friendship with her.
It is little wonder that Emilie von Schaumburg should have made an
impress upon the city of her nativity which has remained proof against
time and absence. No woman ever won a more spontaneous admiration than
fell to her lot. She never appeared upon the streets that she was not
surrounded and followed by both men and women, who, frequently without
knowing her, came simply to look upon her beauty and glory in her
possession.
She married, in England, Colonel Hughes-Hallett, of the Royal
Artillery, and member of Parliament for Rochester. She resides now
during the greater part of the year at Dinard, in France, where she
built, some years ago, the beautiful château of Montplaisir.
Still a strikingly handsome and distinguished woman, she gathers about
her the aristocracy of both France and England as well as the most
eminent and charming of her compatriots. She entertains during each
season with that same graciousness of hospitality with which she once
presided in her uncle's home in Philadelphia.
She recently added a ball-room to Montplaisir which she inaugurated by
a series of concerts and balls, among the picturesque features of the
latter being minuets, gavottes, and a cotillon.
Gowned in a white and silver brocade Watteau, with panniers, over a
pink satin petticoat trimmed with flounces of old lace, headed with
wreaths of roses of a deeper pink, her powdered hair crowned with
a black Gainsborough hat with black, white, and pink plumes, Mrs.
Hughes-Hallett took part in one of the stately gavottes, making a
beautiful picture against the delicate blue background and Louis Quinze
decorations of her artistic ball-room.
A life filled with adulation, that would have been the undoing of a
less wise woman, has in no way impaired her charm of character. Her
fine mental poise, her exquisite humor, together with the generosity
and sweetness of her nature, have preserved her from that calamitous
sense of satiety that has overtaken many a man and many a woman who
have lost their balance completely in an altitude of admiration much
below that in which Emilie von Schaumburg has passed her life.
KATE CHASE
(MRS. WILLIAM SPRAGUE)
There was a name in America a little more than a generation ago that
possessed a power amounting almost to enchantment, the name of Kate
Chase, a woman who holds a unique place in both the political and
social history of this century. The story of her life, between the high
lights of its early days and the shadows in which it closed, presents
a peculiar succession of superlatives. There stands forth, however,
through all its changes, one unvarying dominant feature which must
strike us at once, whether we approach it in the spirit of a student
or actuated merely by a passing curiosity: her absolute devotion to
her father. Through our knowledge of him, therefore, we may, in a
measure, penetrate those mists in which she is enveloped by the divided
opinion of a public, some of whom loved and idealized her as a social
divinity, while others hated and maligned her as an opposing political
force. Thus may we reach some just valuation of a character that with
its man's virility and woman's delicacy was in itself singularly
enigmatical, of its incentives and ideals, and, indirectly, therefore,
of the failure and disappointments which have left their indelible
stamp upon the life of Kate Chase.
In her father, profoundly cultured and endowed with inexhaustible
intellectual resources, she found the complete realization of her
most exalted conception. She well knew the tenderness of the heart,
the sensitiveness of the nature, he carried beneath that superb
exterior of majestic and unapproachable dignity. She lived in close
communion with the man, the angry rebuke of whose eye, says one of
his biographers, no transgressor could support. She was the central
feature of his remarkable home. Upon both of his daughters he expended
a tenderness of devotion of which those who lived beyond the sphere
of a personal acquaintance with him had no conception. Yet there have
been inconspicuous women whom he might have fathered with more ultimate
happiness to themselves than the remarkable daughter who is the
subject of this sketch. Though he was a great man, winning justifiable
distinction in every branch of the government of his country, he was
yet not competent to cope with the problems which the life of such a
woman as Kate Chase was continually presenting. In her presence alone,
in the proud carriage of her regal head, there was that singular
power that, while it drew forth the love and admiration that are the
expression of a generous nature, likewise provoked in those of a baser
order a hideous envy and hatred that assailed her even as a young girl.
With his benignant belief in the universal goodness of mankind, Chase
was singularly deficient in that knowledge of human nature which should
have enabled him to throw about her that sort of aggressive protection
which she peculiarly required.
There is one little incident in his life that throws light upon his
own character, and upon the principle he pursued in directing his
daughter. He was a man of the most delicate tastes and with a high
appreciation of all the niceties of life. When he took the platform as
an abolitionist, he was rotten-egged. Removing as much as possible of
the offensive effusion with his handkerchief, he continued with what he
was saying. He made no modification in his statements, nor did he close
the window through which the unsavory missiles had made their entrance.
As far as possible he ignored the occurrence.
The scandal-monger he treated with the same silent scorn, continuing
the tenor of his life as if he had not been made aware of his
existence. But while he, a courageous man, might walk fearlessly amid
the storm of the angry nation that impeached Andrew Johnson, and,
regardless of its threats, discharge the duties of his high office with
that calmness that distinguished all the acts of his judicial career
and adds to the glory of his name in the eyes of a later generation,
his daughter, though no less courageous, was yet "too slight a thing"
to defy the gossips of even one Western town. "Ah! little woman,"
she once said, laying her hand on the shoulder of one of her loyal
friends to whom sorrow had come, "you, at least, have never made the
mistake that I made. I never cared for the opinion or good-will of
people. I ran my head against a stone wall. It did not hurt the wall
but it has hurt the head." This is perhaps the nearest approach to
self-justification she ever made for having essayed, with a man's
independence, to live that most circumscribed life of a conspicuously
beautiful woman.
Losing her own mother when she was scarcely beyond her infancy, and her
step-mother before she had reached womanhood, and realizing early that
she was treated in all things as his equal in years and understanding
by the man whose superiority among his fellow-men she conceived to
be beyond question, that spirit of self-reliance that is the natural
outcome of all positive characters was intensified in her to an
abnormal degree. While it gave her the fundamental qualifications of
that leadership which she maintained with unparalleled brilliancy, it
likewise, through lack of direction, developed that imperious tendency
that proved so fatal to her own happiness.
She was the first child of Chase's marriage to his second wife,
Eliza Ann Smith, and was named by her mother after his first wife,
Katherine Garniss, for whom she had had a tender friendship and sincere
admiration.
Of her birth, which occurred on the 13th of August, 1840, her father's
journal contains the following record, a characteristic statement of
the event from a God-fearing man whose knowledge, not only of children,
but of the human family in general, was largely drawn from "judicious
treatises."
"I went apart, and kneeling down prayed God to support and comfort my
dear wife, to preserve the life of the child, and save both from sin. I
endeavored to give up the child and all into His hands. After a while
I went into the room. The birth had taken place at 2 A.M. on the 13th.
After I had seen my wife and child, I went into the library and read a
few pages in Eber's book on children, a judicious treatise. At last I
became tired, and, though it was now day, lay down and slept awhile.
The babe is pronounced pretty. I think it quite otherwise. It is,
however, well formed, and I am thankful. May God give the child a good
understanding that she may know and keep his commandments."
Of the early age at which Chase elected to test that understanding, his
journal also furnishes an evidence. An entry therein, under date of
November 24, 1845, about two months after her mother's death, shows the
dawn of that remarkable intellectual intercourse which he maintained
with his daughter till the end of his life. "This day," it reads, "has
been marked by no extraordinary event. Rose, as usual of late, before
sunrise; breakfasted with sister Alice and little Kate. Read Scriptures
(Job) to little Kate, who listened and seemed to be pleased, probably
with the solemn rhythm, for she certainly can understand very little;
then prayed with her; then to town in omnibus, unshaven for want of
time."
Within that same year he also recorded in his journal that he was
teaching "dear little Kate to read verses in the Bible and listening to
her recite poems."
Thus early, without any particular system probably, but wholly
delightfully and under a most patient and winning master, begun the
training of one of the most astute and brilliant minds with which a
woman was ever gifted. She was keen and clever rather than profound,
and her quick intelligence caught and assimilated the fruit of her
father's years of study. Without having his absorbing love of books,
she yet read much and forgot nothing. Chase used to say that in the
miscellaneous reading of his boyhood, it was the pleasure he derived
from a stray law-book that determined his choice of career. He pursued
his profession with the ardor of real love, and his daughter imbibed
from him a substantial knowledge of its technicalities. He used to go
over his cases with her very much at first in the spirit in which he
had read Job to her, later because he delighted in her understanding,
and finally because she had become genuinely helpful to him.
Well ordered and simple was the atmosphere of the home in which she
grew up. As was his custom from the time he established his own home
till the end of his life, Chase called his household together at the
beginning of every day to ask the blessing and protection of God. There
were times, as seen from his journal, when little Kate seems to have
been his only companion, yet the duty was never omitted.
She walked with him often to his office or to court in the morning,
both in Ohio and after they had removed to Washington, talking
sometimes of the things which interested her, but more frequently of
those which engrossed him, for it was his life and his ambitions that
gave color to both of their existences. He had taught her early his
favorite games, chess and backgammon, which she often played with him
in the quiet evenings they spent together, or, if it were out of
doors, croquet or some simple childish game, for she was part of the
relaxation of his lighter hours as she was the repository of all the
confidences and hopes of his public career.
His third marriage, in 1846, to Sarah Ludlow identified him with one
of the prominent families of Cincinnati; Israel Ludlow, his wife's
grandfather, having been one of the founders of the city. Chase,
himself, though an Eastern man, born in Cornish, New Hampshire, whence
he had migrated on coming of age, was now one of the prominent figures
of Cincinnati, a busy, prosperous lawyer, with excellent political
prospects, which met their first realization when, in 1849, he was
elected to the United States Senate. When he came, six years later,
into the governorship of his State he was again a widower, and Kate,
though less than fifteen years of age, took her place at the head of
his home.
Accustomed since the dawn of memory to the most considerate attentions
from the most kingly of men, she already carried herself with that
noble grace that made her presence felt in every assemblage above that
of all others, no matter how simply she clothed herself nor how quietly
she deported herself.
[Illustration: Kate Chase
(Mrs. William Sprague)
From photograph by Julius Ulke]
Chase was the first of Ohio's governors to take up his official
residence at Columbus. There, for a year, Kate went as a day pupil to
Mr. Heyl's seminary, and later studied in the same institution music
and languages, having for the latter an unusual gift. She spoke French
faultlessly, especially after her long residence abroad, which came
later in her life. Her German, while it was fluent, had always a
suggestion of a foreign accent that in her seemed rather pleasing than
otherwise. Her native tongue she wielded with rare perfection, and no
one who has heard Kate Chase talk will ever forget the magic of her
voice, the life her graphic and discriminating language breathed into
every thought to which she gave utterance, while her wonderful eyes
expressed, even betrayed, every emotion. An old man who served the
Chase family for years in the capacity of coachman once paid a tribute
to the delicacy and power of her verbal delineations which many a man
of more enlightened intelligence more gracefully, perhaps, but not more
aptly acknowledged. He said he knew no greater pleasure than to take
Miss Kate off in the carriage with a book in her lap, and, without
opening it, for her to tell him every word that it contained from
beginning to end.
The positive element of her character had already manifested itself
by the time she was sixteen years old. She was, at about that period,
out of compliment to her father, elected to the secretaryship of a
charitable organization of women, all of whom were many years her
senior. During the course of one of the meetings, a physician, of
whose services the body had availed itself, and who had given offence
to some of its members, was made the object of an abuse as senseless
as it was verbose. The spirit of opposition was more timorous in the
feminine organization of that day than it is in those that have been
the outgrowths of later years, and Kate Chase, alone, had the courage
to rise in defence of the absent doctor. Appealing to the chair to
silence the undignified outburst, she won on the spot an ill-will
that followed her long after those who cherished it had forgotten its
original cause. But her young life was full of a sweet homage, and
such a graceful tribute as was conveyed in the knowledge that one of
the ex-governors of the State had named the most beautiful rose in his
famous garden after her, easily atoned for the ill-will of a few people
which seemed, after all, but a ripple on the ever-broadening surface of
her life.
The growing strength of the Republican party, which had been ushered
into existence in her father's law offices in Cincinnati, under the
inspiration of Dr. Gamaliel Baily, revealed possibilities to a man of
Chase's ambition and ability that haunted him thenceforth till the
end of his life. Kate knew intimately the strong men who formed the
nucleus of that great party. She knew its aims and purposes, and was
in possession of its secret history contained in her father's letters
and journals and in her own memory of its inception and progress. Yet
nothing ever wrung them from her, though she was frequently approached
by magazine editors with offers that would have been a temptation even
to those in less need.
Her father's ambition became the absorbing object of her life,
developing in her, before she had reached her twentieth year, a
scientific knowledge of politics that no woman, and few men, have ever
surpassed. "I know your bright mind," once wrote Roscoe Conkling, in
submitting to her a political problem, "will solve this quicker than
mine." It has been said that many details of the campaign of 1884,
against Blaine, who was Conkling's political enemy, were planned at
Edgewood.
To an intellect naturally endowed with many masculine qualities, she
added a woman's quicker wit and greater powers of divination and an
overmastering love for the father in whose interest she exercised every
faculty of her gifted mind.
When the first convention of the Republican party met at Chicago, in
1860, to nominate a president, Chase was a prominent candidate for that
honor. His daughter accompanied him to Chicago, and thence for the
first time her name went forth over the land. His confidence in her,
his reliance upon her, treating her in all respects more as if she were
a son than a daughter, her youth, and the purely feminine quality of
her beauty rendered her unique and conspicuous.
The choice of the new party fell upon Abraham Lincoln, and Seward,
who supported him and opposed Chase's pretensions, received later the
recognition of his services when he was tendered the first place in
Lincoln's cabinet. Chase was, however, elected for the second time to
the United States Senate, where he took his seat March 4, 1861. Two
days later he had resigned and gone into Lincoln's cabinet as Secretary
of the Treasury. His home was thus transferred to Washington, where,
going later on the Supreme Bench, he passed the balance of his days,
neither he nor his children ever returning to Ohio. Chase was even
laid to rest in Washington, and slept over thirteen years in beautiful
Oak Hill. In the fall of 1886, however, his daughter had him removed to
Ohio, that he might rest finally in the State that had been his home
and that was associated with his early fame. There, a few months ago,
she was laid by his side.
At the capital of the nation Kate Chase attained a social prestige
never before enjoyed by so young a woman, and a political power which
no woman before or since her day has ever possessed. Men of such
eminence and distinction paid her the court of an homage so absolute
that it would be difficult to estimate how much of her father's
prominence was owing to her. Radiant as she was in her youth and
beauty, the most lovable side of her character ever discovered itself
in her tender, worshipping affection for him.
In September, 1860, some months before Chase left Ohio, there was
unveiled at Cleveland, on the shores of the Lake to which his valor
brought fame, a statue of Commodore Perry, many of the States sending
deputations to do honor to his memory. At the head of Rhode Island's
troops, in the military parade which opened the ceremonies of the day,
rode the governor of that State, his alert young figure impressing
itself upon all the spectators of the scene. That night, during the
ball at the Kennard House which closed the event of the day, Colonel
Richard Parsons presented him to Kate Chase. She was twenty years
old at the time, and her slender young figure already possessed that
beautiful symmetry that later found such unqualified favor in the
eyes of Worth, that great modern connoisseur of the proportions of the
female figure, drawing from him such commendation as he never accorded
to any other woman. In a ball-gown showing the faultless contour of her
neck and throat, and the exquisite poise of her lovely head, she was
the revelation of a perfection which the human form rarely attains.
Hazel eyes, auburn hair, and the marvellous whiteness of skin that
usually accompanies this combination, a full, low, broad brow, mobile
lips, a small, round chin, and a nose whose suggestion of an upward
tilt added its own peculiar touch of piquancy to a face that was
altogether charming rather than classically beautiful,--thus to the
eye was Kate Chase, whose fame then superseded that of every woman in
Ohio, and was shortly to surpass that of every woman of her generation
in America. That she should hold the interested attention of not only
one but several men for hours at a time was no unusual spectacle to
the people among whom her belleship days had dawned early. Governor
Sprague's devotion to her, however, on the night that he first met her,
because he was a distinguished stranger and a man of prominence in his
own State, and because there seemed, perhaps, in the entire situation
many of the elements of romance, became at once a subject of interested
comment.
The outbreak of the war took him to Washington. Still governor of his
State, he had raised a regiment and equipped it at his own expense, for
he was a man of immense wealth. His generosity, his patriotism, and
his valor at Bull Run, together with his youth and the success of his
political career, appealed to the enthusiasm of his countrymen. The
news not only that he was to marry, but to marry a woman so universally
idolized as was Kate Chase, heightened the effect his achievements had
already produced upon the mind of the public. With a delicate sort of
beauty and a somewhat clerical appearance that belied his reputation
for military prowess, he had at the moment a fame quite equal to that
of his bride. Their marriage, which took place at Washington on the
12th of November, 1863, was the social event of that turbulent period.
All the details of the ceremony and of the reception which followed it,
and which were planned by her, were on a scale of magnificence worthy
of the woman whose advent into Washington had marked a new epoch in its
social history.
She was the inspiration of the wedding-march composed for the occasion
and played by the Marine Band. Under circumstances when a plain woman
is an interesting figure, of what moment was not the appearance of
one who could not, even on ordinary occasions, enter a church without
her presence being in some mysterious way heralded to its remotest
recesses so that every head involuntarily turned towards her! To those
who beheld her on that day she was the beautiful realization of the
ideal bride, and the life opening before her promised every possible
happiness. The ceremony was witnessed by many men and women whose names
were then household words when the eyes of the whole nation, watching
the direction of the war, were fixed on Washington.
The first days of their married life were spent in Rhode Island, where
Mr. Sprague built for his bride the beautiful home that was worthy of
her lofty conceptions of a magnificent existence, Canonchet. It was one
of the first of the palatial homes of that period, and of which this
country now possesses so many, and the cost of its construction was
unprecedented in the annals of a people incredibly rich in all life's
comforts, but with their luxuriant tendencies for the most part still
latent.