This section will be a complete guide to the art of preserving and acquiring beauty. How wide will be its scope can be seen from the following summary of its contents : Beaidiftil WoDien in History The Beautiftil Baby Beauty Secrets Mothers ought Treatment of the Hair The Beautiful Child to Teach their Daughters The Beauty of Motherhood and Health and Beatify The Complexioti Old Age Physical Culture The Teeth The Effect of Diet on Beauty How the Housewife may Pre- 7 he Eyes Freckles, Sunburn sei-ve Her Good Looks I he Ideal of Beauty Beauty Baths Beatcty Foods 'ihe Ideal Figure, Manicure etc., etc. BEAUTIFUL WOMEN IN MISTORY
- THE MOST GORGEOUS LADY BLESSINGTON "
rEW lives were more romantic than Lady Blessington's. A dramatist could hope for no better subject ; a poet might take it for his theme. Her father was an Irishman named Power — a good-looking man of high spirits and violent temper, fond of sport and cards, extravagant to an incredible degree, and obstinate and headstrong in all things. Her mother was a colourless lady, descended from the Desmonds, and never able to forget the fact, but she had no influence over her husband. Political and financial troubles, therefore, soon began to hem him in, and in 1804 his position was perilous. At this time, how- ever, a Captain Farmer asked for the hand of his second daughter. Margaret then was only fourteen years of age and had always been regarded as the ugly duckling of the family ; her sisters were very beautiful, and she herself was pale, quiet, dreamy, and almost plain. Her family, therefore, was surprised at the offer. Farmer, however, was eligible in the matter of worldly goods, and Margaret's extreme youth did not deter her father from giving his consent. His daughter implored him not to make her marry a man for whom she had nothing but a strong aversion ; but her father, with oaths and physical violence, asserted his authority. Her First Marriage At the age of fourteen and a half, there- fore, Margaret Power became the wife of a man whom she speedily discovered to be a drunkard and liable to fits of insanity. This Mr. Power appears to have known all along, and the fact that Margaret had another suitor, whom she liked, made his action the more dreadful. After two years of unspeakable misery to his child-wife, whom he treated with violent brutality. Captain Farmer received an appointment in India. His wife, how- ever, refused to go with him ; she preferred even her father's house to her husband's company. She returned, therefore, to her family, and surprised them. The ugly duckling had grown into a swan ! Margaret came back beautiful, the marks of sorrow only intensifying the loveliness ol her face. All her sisters' suitors immediately succumbed to the charms of the fascinating grass-widow of sixteen. This infuriated her father and caused constant lamentations from her mother. Moreover, soon she heard that Farmer was returning from India. Miserable, harassed, and seeing no pro- spect of peace or happiness anywhere, Margaret took what she thought to be her only way of escape, and went away with a gentleman of means, but with the un- romantic name of Jenkins. Jenkins she liked very well, but certainly did not love. However, she went with him to Hampshire, and there lived quietly for six years. This was the first peaceful time she had ever known. Her earliest recollections were of anger and violence, a constant struggle with overwhelming debt, and the cold looks given to the moping, pale-faced member of a brilHant and beautiful family. Then had followed the intolerable nightmare of her marriage, and then the wretched time at home. She had, moreover, had another sorrow ; she had come to care deeply for a nobleman of youth and great charm, and would have gone away with him, only that she discovered he was married, and not even for her own happiness would she sacrifice another woman. These quiet years in Hampshirp-
