Page:Woman of the Century.djvu/644

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failed, and she and her husband removed to California, where she now lives. In addition to her voluminous newspaper and magazine work, she has published "Notable Men of the Thirty-Seventh Congress," a pamphlet (1862); "Idyls of Battle, and Poems of the Rebellion" (1864); "A Little Boy's Story," translated from the French (1869), and "Sounds from Secret Chambers" (1874).


SEAWELL, Miss Holly Elliot, author, was born in a country-house in Gloucester county, Va. Her early education was irregular in the extreme. She was not allowed to read a novel until she was seventeen years old. She read history and encyclopaedias, Shakespeare, Shelley and Byron, and went to school at intervals, to learn the common branches. MOLLY ELLIOT SEAWELL. She learned to ride, to dance and to conduct a household. After the death of her father the family made their home in Norfolk, Va., and there Miss Seawell began to devote herself to literature. She visited Europe, and on her return wrote a story, which was published in "Lippincott's Magazine" She then became a contributor to a number of leading periodicals, using rive different pen-names to conceal her identity. In 1888 she began to use her own name. She removed with her family to Washington, D. C., where for a time she wrote political correspondence for the New York dailies. Her first novel, "Hale Weston," was written for "Lippincott's Magazine" in 1887. It was translated into German and had a large sale. Her next book was "The Berkeleys and Their Neighbors," in 1888, and her most successful book, "Throckmorton," appeared in 1889. It has passed through a number of editions. Another of her books is "Little Jarvis." She contributed to the "Youth's Companion" a story that won a prize of five-hundred dollars. Her books are pictures of life in Virginia before the Civil War. She is fond of society, and her home in Washington is a resort of well-known people.


SEDGWICK, Miss Catherine Maria, author, born in Stockbridge, Mass., 28th December, 1789, and died near Roxbury, Mass., 31st July, 1867. She was a daughter of Theodore Sedgwick, the well-known lawyer of Boston, Mass. She received a thorough education. Her father died in Boston, 24th January, 1813, and she started the private school for young women, which she continued for fifty years. Tier brothers encouraged her to make use of her literary talents. Her first novel, "A New England Tale," was published anonymously in New York, in 1822. It was favorably received, and she next brought out "Redwood" (two volumes, 1824), also anonymously. It was reprinted in England and translated into French and three other European languages. The French translator attributed: the work to James Fenimore Cooper. She then published "The Traveler" (1825); "Hope Leslie, or Early Times in Massachusetts" (two volumes, 1827): "Clarence, a Tale of Our Own Times" (two volumes, Philadelphia, 1830); "Home" (1836), and "The Lin woods, or Sixty Years Since in America " (two volumes, 1835). In 1835 she issued her collection of "Sketches and Tales," which had been published in various magazines. Her other works include: "The Poor Rich Man and the Rich Poor Man" (New York, 1836); "Live and Let Live" (1837); "A Love-Token for Children" and "Means and Ends, or Self-Training" (1838). In 1839 she went to Europe, where she remained a year. Her travels were described in " Letters from Abroad to Kindred at Home," which were published in two volumes in 1841. In that year she published "Historical Sketches of the Old Painters" and biographies of the sisters "Lucretia and Margaret Davidson," followed by "Wilton Harvey, and Other Tales" (1845); "Morals of Manners" (1846); "Facts and Fancies" (1848), and "Married or Single?" (1857). In addition to her school and novel work, she edited and contributed to literary periodicals and wrote for the annuals. Her work in these lines fills several large volumes.


SEELYE, Mrs. Elizabeth Eggleston, author, born in St. Paul, Minn., 15th December, 1858. She is a daughter of Edward Eggleston, the novelist, and she comes of a line that has produced students, writers and professional men of mark for several generations. Her mother was of English parentage and of a family with talent for graphic art. Mrs. Seelye early showed the "book hunger" that has characterized members of her family, but, on account of her delicate health, her parents were obliged to restrain her eagerness for study. In 1866 the family removed to Evanston, Ill., where her father had built in his own grounds one of the earliest kindergartens in America, that his children, of whom Elizabeth was the oldest, might be trained correctly from the start. After the removal of the family to Brooklyn, N. Y., in 1870, Elizabeth attended Packer Institute for a short time, but the methods of teaching that prevailed did not satisfy her parents, and she and her sister were taught mainly at home by private teachers. She also attended for some years the classes in French and German in the Brooklyn Mercantile Library, and was the only child in classes of adults. She early became an eager reader of the best books, especially in English and French. In the midst of tier cares as the mother of a family, she reads works of philosophy, natural science and political economy with the keenest relish. Her study of the literature of the Middle English period enabled her to supply the editor of the "Century Dictionary" with five-hundred new words and definitions In 1877 she became the wife of Elwyn Seelye, and she