Rensselaer Republican, Volume 13, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 August 1881 — A Representative Woman. [ARTICLE]

A Representative Woman.

Philadelphia Press. A thoughtful lady asked your correspondent yesterday if there was anything unusual in Mrs. Garfield’s devotion—if the average American wile would not have done just the same. Yes, unquestionably, and it is because she is a representative American woman rather than an exceptional one that she has settled down into a warm place in each of their hearts. There are at least 250,000 in this great commonwealth of States, as “nnstampedable," and as Mrs. Garfield. ! Your mother and mine were were each, and their children know it. It is the pride of our civilization that its average womanhood would not disgrace the home and the heart of its chief citizen. Mrs. Spoopendyke, delicious type of confiding womanhood, would rise to the occasion in the same heroic way did some “measly” assassin assail her bosom’s lord. Our America has the finest womanhood in the world—the worldly embodiment of Ben Jonson’s ideal: I meant each softest virtue there should meet Fit In that softer bosom to' abide; And yet a learned and manlyfsoul I purposed her,that should with even powers The rock, the spindle and the shears oontro Of destiny, and spin her own treOsjiours. One act of beneficence, one\ act of eal usefulness, is worth aU tbo abstract sentiment ip the world, \