"The story without a suspicion of rhyme,
And dim with the mists of the morning of Time,
Is told of a goddess, who, wandering alone,
Did go and sit down on the Sorrowful Stone.
We find our Gethsemane somewhere,
though late;
The Angel of Shadows
throws open the gate.
We creep with our burden of pain,
to atone,
For all of life's ills,
to the Sorrowful Stone.
Above is the vault of the pitiless stars;
The trees stretch their arms all blackened
with scars;
The gales of lost Paradise are faintly
blown
To where we sit down on the Sorrowful
Stone."
"From a Poem 'Vagaries'" warns of * * *
—the product of the age and clime,
We do too much! grow old before our
time,
Yet—would we stray to Morning Hills
again?
Unlearn sad prophecies, and dream as
then!
Ah, no! with sense of peace the shadows
creep,
There droppeth on tired eyes the spell of
sleep—
We left the dawn long leagues behind, and
stand,
Waiting and wistful in the Evening Land!
The patient Nurse of Destiny, at best,
Leads us like children to the needed rest!
A ghostly wind puts out our little light,
And we have bid the busy world "Good Night!"
Mrs. Stockton was married twice. Her first husband was the father of her two sons, one of whom, Dr. Henry M. Downs, in his practice, came often to St. Margaret's. The second marriage, as the wife of the late Judge John S. Stockton, was a very happy one. Last year, a brother the only surviving member of her family, died, leaving Mrs. Stockton the last of a family of five children. The two sons have also passed into the Great Beyond.
In her younger days, she contributed many poems and some prose to newspapers and magazines over the name of Cora M. Downs.
Ex-Gov. St. John appointed her one of the regents of the University of Kansas.
Her beautiful poem: "In Memoriam" to Sarah Walter Chandler Coates was her last.
"'We seem like children,' she was wont to
say,
'Talking of what we cannot understand,'
And in the dark or daylight, all the way,
Holding so trustfully a Father's hand.
And this was her religion, not to dwell
On tenets, creeds, or doctrines, but to
live
On a pure faith, and striving to do well
The simple duties that each hour should
give."
MARGARET HILL McCARTER.
The most successful Kansas woman writer financially and the most prolific is Margaret Hill McCarter of Topeka. From the advent of her little book in 1901, "A Bunch of Things, Tied Up With Strings" to the hearty reception of her latest novel every step of the way spells success.