Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/896

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Women in Professions
853


publication of the work to which she had for some time addressed herself, upon the position, history and wrongs of her people. This first book was called "Sons of the Semite" and opened with a five-act tragedy called "The Dance of Death," dealing with the stories of Jewish persecution in the fifteenth century. She wrote for the Century a number of striking essays on Jewish topics, among which were "Russian Christianity vs. Modern Judaism," "The Jewish Problem," and "Was the Earl of Beaconsfield a Representative Jew?" Her work also includes critical articles on Salvini, Emerson and others. In the winter of 1882, when many Russian Jews were flocking to New York City to escape Russian persecution, Miss Lazarus published in the American Hebrew stories and articles solving the question of occupation for the newcomers. Her plan involved industrial and technical education, and the project was carried out along that line. Her last work was published in the Century in May, 1887. It was a series of poems in prose entitled "By the Waters of Babylon," and the attention it excited and the admiration accorded it were general, here as well as across the Atlantic. Miss Lazarus died November 19, 1887. There was no art to which she did not respond with splendid appreciation—music, painting, poetry and drama—she felt keenly, intelligently and generously the special charm of each. For moral ideas she had the keenness of her race. She had, too, that genius for friendship which so few fully understood. That such a nature should have formed close ties of intellectual sympathy with men of the character of Emerson, in America, and Browning, in England, is not a matter of surprise.

ELLEN BLACKMAR BARKER.

Mrs. Barker writes under the name of Ellen Blackmar Maxwell. She was born at West Springfield, Pennsylvania. Her first husband, Rev. Allen J. Maxwell, died at Lucknow, India, in 1890. Wrote "The Bishop's Conversion," "Three Old Maids in Hawaii," and "The Way of Fire." Her second husband is Albert Smith Barker.

MARY CLARE DE GRAFFENRIED.

Miss De Graffenried was born in Macon, Georgia, May 19, 1849. Collector of statistics for the Bureau of Labor of the United States. Has collected data on industrial and sociological subjects in the United States, Belgium and France. Has contributed to magazines on these subjects.

ELLA LORAINE DORSEY.

Miss Dorsey was born in Washington, D. C, March 2, 1853. Daughter of Lorenzo and Anna Hanson Dorsey. Is a graduate of the Visitation Convent, Georgetown, D. C. For many years special correspondent for Washington, Chicago, Boston, and Cincinnati papers. Indexer and Russian translator, Scientific Library, United States Department of the Interior. Is a member of the advisory board of Trinity College, the Catholic college for the higher education of women in the United States, located in Washington, D. C. Member of the Daughters of the