CHAPTER III.
TWO WOMEN.
We have all seen a manly young fellow go up to college. Full of life and vigor, he sees the world before him; but the thought of all its battles rouses no fear in his young heart, and, though his pranks are boyish and his manners rough, he stumbles good humoredly and persistently on into success. His upper classmen patronizingly smile upon him, while his natural enemy, the Soph, taunts and teases him, but is sometimes brought down and punished by his strong, young arms. Youthful, growing Chicago reminds one of this college boy. She has left the school of preparation and has taken her place among the great cities of the earth, where, full of energy and life, she is fighting her way to the front. Her mature colleagues of the Old World smile patronizingly at her efforts, but doubt her powers; while the cities of the East, seeing in her a young rival, taunt and ridicule her with jealous anger. She is young; but strong and active; and if she is sometimes carried away by the very energy of her youth, she is never daunted, and the older cities of the East have already felt the vigor of her sinewy grasp. Chicago, with her broad avenues and stupendous buildings, her spacious parks and stately homes, her far-reaching railways and towering chimneys, her bustling marts and busy, surging crowds of active men and women, is the archetype of American energy,—the creation of yesterday and the marvel of to-day. But the mortar is scarcely dry and the stones are still undimmed by time. She is as the mason, the carpenter, and the builder have left her—crude and fresh, without the dignified stains of age, without the majestic polish which time alone can give. Her social structure, like her brick and mortar buildings, is solidly laid and firmly built, but new. Her people built Chicago and she is the best memorial of their energy. They are still young and vigorous; in them the ardor of the pioneer is scarcely dead; the lethargy of long-held wealth has yet to come.
In the library of an imposing, but new, grey stone mansion on Chicago's Lake Shore Drive two women were dawdling together over Petrarch's "Canzoniere" in the original. A well-thumbed dictionary was in the lap of one, and by the other's side lay Volume IV. of Symond's "Renaissance in Italy." It was cold January, and the broad, low window showed the angry lake dashing against the great sea wall and splashing the sparkling spray far over the roadway. The moaning north wind furiously rattled the long casements and sent occasional puffs of smoke and cinders out from the brightly blazing hearth fire; but these outward signs of winter were unable to affect the inviting coziness of the apartment. Fortunately the decorator's work had stopped at the walls; so, although artistically arranged, it was also a room to live in. Though the chairs were carved to match the panels, they were also—pardon the term—sittable; and though the bindings on the low book-shelves blended well with the tapestries and rugs, the books themselves were readable. The same judgment which had chosen the books had selected bronzes and porcelain, tiles and tapestries, and the tasteful arrangement of the art objects at once bespoke the dilettante.
The elder student of Italian lyrics, glancing up from the "Rime in vita e morte" said interrogatively to her friend: "I wish I knew, Florence, whether Madonna Laura were once a living woman or merely the divine creation of the poet's soul."
"I am sure she must have been a fancy," the other replied. "She is too ideal for flesh and blood, and besides, she was married. I don't think it is natural for any man so sincerely to love another man's wife."
"You horrid girl! You forget that Petrarch was a poet."
"No, I don't, my dear Marion; but so were Shelley, Byron, de Musset, and scores of others. The same broad collar and velvet jacket often cover both an artistic temperament and a fleshly nature. Now I, for one, don't believe in pardoning in genius what we condemn in mediocrity. If Laura was an inspiration of Petrarch's soul, the poet has my admiration; if she was merely another man's wife with whom he was enamored,—no matter how delightfully he may have sung of her,—I lose respect for Petrarch."
"You have no appreciation of the beautiful, Florence."