Kansas Women in Literature

CORNELIA M. STOCKTON.

A cheerful little room in the East wing of St. Margaret's Hospital, Kansas City, Kansas; an invalid chair wheeled up to a window over looking the street; and the eager, expectant face and the warm hand clasp of the occupant, Mrs. Cornelia M. Stockton, assures the visitor of a hearty welcome.

Greatly enfeebled by long illness and with impaired sight, this bright, little woman's keen interest in current events and the latest "best seller" puts to shame the half-hearted zeal of the average woman.

For four years, Mrs. Stockton has lived at St. Margaret's, depending upon the visits of friends and the memory of an eventful life to pass the days. Prominence in club work in her earlier years has brought reward. The History Club of Kansas City, Kansas, of which she was once a member, each week sends a member to read to her and these are red letter days to this brave, patient, little woman.

Mrs. Stockton began writing very young. When a little girl, back in the village of Walden, New York, she stole up to the pulpit of the church and wrote in her pastor's Bible:

     "I have not seen the minister's eyes,
       And cannot describe his glance divine,
     For when he prays he shuts them up
       And when he preaches he shuts mine."

She was born in 1833 in Shawangunk, New York, and came to Kansas City in 1859, living in Missouri some years but most of the time in Kansas City, Kansas.

In 1892, she published a limited edition of poems, "The Shanar Dancing Girl and Other Poems." dedicated to Mrs. Bertha M. Honore Palmer, her ideal of the perfect type of gracious and lovely womanhood. "The Shanar Dancing Girl" was first written for the Friends in Council, a literary club of Kansas City, Mo. It has received the encomiums of Thomas Bailey Aldrich, John J. Ingalls and others for its beauty of expression and dramatic qualities. "Invocation," an April idyl; "The Sea-shell;" and "Mountain Born" sing of the love of nature. "In the Conservatory;" "My Summer Heart;" and "Tired of the Storm" hint of sorrow and unrest and longing. Then in 1886, "Compensation" was written. "Irma's Love For The King" is a favorite; also, "'Sold'—A Picture," written for her daughter, "yes, but she never came.

"The Sorrowful Stone" Mrs. Stockton considers her best.

     "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."