The Enjoyment of the News: 1910

The cat had been put out, the children were in bed, and Lysander John Appleton, worn out with the terrors of another day, was prepared to spend an evening in peace.

“Dear, dear, dear,” said Mrs. Lysander John, looking up from her paper. “Isn’t it horrible?”

“What?” snorted her husband.

“Seventy-five people killed by a flood in Italy! Just think of the poor little orphans’.”

(Silence for two minutes.) “Oh, my, how can the Lord permit such terrible things. A man shot his wife and five of her sisters in Laurel, Del., last night. The rooms looked like a slaughter house when he got through. I am glad he killed himself and saved the people the expense of trying such a brute. His poor, poor wife! What she must have endured living with a man of that disposition.”

(The clock ticks about ten times.) “Oh listen to this. Oh, Lysander John, my heart aches so I can scarcely read it. Oh, my, oh my, this life is a troubled vale! Just think, five people killed in a train wreck in Georgia. The sorrow that goes into their homes to-night reaches my heart.”

Silence while Mrs. Appleton wiped the tears from her eyes, and turned the page. Then a scream, “A bride and groom killed on their wedding trip! The poor dears. Just think of the happiness with which they started out, and now the journey ends in two coffins. Maybe they will be buried In one coffin. I think that would be so sweet.”

(Silence for two minutes that was finally broken by violent sobbing.) “A girl of sixteen poisoned her own sister in Massillon, Ohio. It is too horrible to be true. Oh, Lysander John, how grateful we should be that none of our children ever did a thing like that! The poor, Poor, POOR mother!”

Mrs. Lysander John reached blindly for her apron to wipe away her tears, her handkerchief having been soaked in previous enjoyment of the news, and then she turned tearful eyes toward Lysander John, only to find his chair vacant. Upstairs there was a sound of heavy shoes being kicked off viciously to the floor.

“The men,” said Mrs. Lysander John to herself, picking up her newspaper and preparing to read some more, “are SO Unfeeling.”

The Atchison [KS] Weekly Globe 31 March 1910: p. 4

Mrs Daffodil’s Aide-memoire: Indeed. The press in the nineteenth century, particularly in the United States, was avid for a sensation. “If it bleeds, it leads,” about sums it up. Mrs Daffodil has previously examined some of the blood-thirsty themes of the press in this post: “Poison! Arson! Death His Bride!”

It was traditionally the role of the pater familias to read the newspaper to the family gathered round the fireside, eliding or pruning judiciously, when the gore or the body count was deemed harmful to the sensibilities of his listeners. Mrs Daffodil wonders at the patience of Mr Appleton at having his newspaper snatched away by a woman so lacking in womanly delicacy. She suspects that, one day, particularly when Mr Appleton longs to read of the outcome of some sporting contest, he will snap and there will be yet another horrid murder for the unfeeling public to slaver over in the morning edition.

Mrs Daffodil invites you to join her on the curiously named “Face-book,” where you will find a feast of fashion hints, fads and fancies, and historical anecdote

You may read about a sentimental succubus, a vengeful seamstress’s ghost, Victorian mourning gone horribly wrong, and, of course, Mrs Daffodil’s efficient tidying up after a distasteful decapitation in A Spot of Bother: Four Macabre Tales.

The Dear Old Bear: 1896

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Elderly-Bearded-Man-in-Frock-Coat-Carde-de-Viste-Stove-Pipe-Hat-Circa-1860/274362030888?hash=item3fe1405b28:g:9nAAAOSwpMNeuGB6

THE DEAR OLD BEAR

He Was Not Polished Nor Fashionable, But He Was Clear Grit and Loveable.

From the Detroit Free Press.

They were a pair to attract attention as they walked into the great vaulted dining room, of the hotel and were seated at the same table with several others. He was a massive man with fine face, curling gray hair and an air of thorough self-reliance. She suggested his reproduction in the finer molds of womanhood, tall, graceful, without a shade of embarrassment and wonderfully beautiful. He looked as if he would feel easier in the uniform of a soldier or the negligee attire of a ranchman. She added an indescribable charm to her elegant clothes.

They had been eating but a little time when she touched his shoulder and he inclined his ear to catch some whispered words.

“That’s right,” he said, without any effort at concealment, “keep prompting me and I’ll acquire civilized methods in time. I had no idea I was eating with my knife.”

At this the handsome giant would have stopped, but two silly creatures opposite set up a laugh without any mirth in it, and he calmly proceeded while the daughter completely ignored all others:

“You know, Jude,” he said, “I never had much time to fool away with trifles. Fortune so favors some people that they have nothing else to do. But you understand what I have done, Jude, looking first after mother and then seeing that the little one she left me would have to ask no odds of the world.”

“Don’t discuss it here, dear.”

“But I will. If I have offended I will explain. I have eaten with a two-edged bowie knife in the saddle. I have squatted behind a dead horse with the bullets whistling around me, and eaten with a bayonet. I have seen times when I would have given all I was worth even for the privilege of eating with my fingers. But, Jude, while they say when I’m gone that I occasionally forgot and was guilty of using a knife instead of a fork, they can never say that I did a dishonorable act, deserted a friend or that any man would be quicker to jump between his daughter and any trouble that might threaten her.”

The polished old gentleman from the head of the table came around and shook hands. The elderly ladies introduced themselves. Now Jude is so absolutely the reigning belle at that resort that envy does not touch her, and he is “the dear old. bear worth a million” to the ladies, while all the men of business seek the benefit of his judgment.

The Times [Philadelphia PA] 9 August 1896: p. 28

Mrs Daffodil’s Aide-memoire:  Mrs Daffodil wishes all of her readers who are doting Papas, a very happy Father’s Day.

Mrs Daffodil invites you to join her on the curiously named “Face-book,” where you will find a feast of fashion hints, fads and fancies, and historical anecdote

You may read about a sentimental succubus, a vengeful seamstress’s ghost, Victorian mourning gone horribly wrong, and, of course, Mrs Daffodil’s efficient tidying up after a distasteful decapitation in A Spot of Bother: Four Macabre Tales.

Her Lost Diary: 1902

Diary entries, 1901, Nellie Smith https://www.livingarchive.org.uk/content/catalogue_item/nellie-smith-collection/diary-entries-by-nellie-smith-1901-1920-2

HER LOST DIARY.

The Plaguy Thing Had All Her Dearest Secrets Recorded Too.

“Diary!” fairly shrieked the pretty young lady, with flashing eyes, as she walked down the avenue with a com­panion. “Diary! Don’t you say diary to me, again. What do you know about it, Kate?”

“Nothing, only that you told me that you had commenced keeping a diary, as usual, and 1 supposed you had dropped it at the end of a month, as usual. I didn’t mean to throw you into hysterics.”

“Kate, don’t you ever breathe a word of it, but I’ve lost that diary; dropped it somewhere on the street. And the plaguy thing has all my dearest secrets in it, I wrote just what I thought too. It just sends me crazy. There it is in black and white that Lillian looks like a fright, that Hattie is turning green from jealousy, that Charley is just too sweet to live and that Fred hasn’t sense enough to talk more than three minutes unless he rehearses in advance.”

“Why don’t you advertise and offer a reward?”

“Indeed, I won’t. I never want to see the thing again. If any one returns it, I shall declare that it’s a forgery from beginning to end. I’ll never own up the longest day I live.”

“What did you say about me, Edith?”

“Oh. I don’t just remember, but some­thing nice. You can depend on that, for you’re my very dearest friend.”

“I can help your memory. You wrote that I was the most inquisitive little minx in the city and that I thought it my special business to look after other people’s business. Here’s your diary. You left it at our house, and Tommy spelled out your estimate of me before I knew what he was doing. Good after noon.”

Then they looked at each other, both began to cry, fell into each other’s arms and in five minutes were criticising a mutual friend.—Kansas City Independent

The Bismarck [ND] Tribune 1 May 1902: p. 3

Mrs Daffodil’s Aide-memoire: Mrs Daffodil reminds her readers of the old adage: “Two can keep a secret, if one is not a diary.”  This sound advice is seconded by solicitors who specialise in divorce cases; they recommend that you put nothing in writing that you would not like read out in a court of law.

 

Mrs Daffodil invites you to join her on the curiously named “Face-book,” where you will find a feast of fashion hints, fads and fancies, and historical anecdote

You may read about a sentimental succubus, a vengeful seamstress’s ghost, Victorian mourning gone horribly wrong, and, of course, Mrs Daffodil’s efficient tidying up after a distasteful decapitation in A Spot of Bother: Four Macabre Tales.