WOMEN WHO WON FAME AFTER FORTY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9674, 16 October 1909, Page 4

WOMEN WHO WON FAME AFTER FORTY.

" Mere beauty," said Dr F. Mortimer Lawreroe,- a noted physician and scholar, recently, " may reach its full perfection at twenty, but woman's mental powers generally do not fully unfold until she is past thirty. Woman is usually at the height of her power from thirty to forty. During these years she attains the full development of her physical being, and during the same period her intellect unfolds, petal after , petal, like a glorious flower. " Between thirty and forty woman is best able to resist disease, to work without fatigue, her recuperative powers are at their height, and if she expresses herself in literature or art, her work is most likely to last." The same authority points out that women who develop precociously are abnormal. Where is that girl who, at the age of twenty, wrote that clever hovel, tho title of which escapes us for a moment, five year 3 agoP What has become of that sixteen-year-old phenomenon who did that masterful canvas which created such a stir when it was eshibited somewhere or otherr-we don't reoall just where — and which had such an alluring name that it was on our tongue) just a moment agoP They write ©7i« book or play, paint one worthy picture, awi — fiaz, flash, bang! — they illumine the world with their genius and then — go out! Likewise beauty. You have met, perhaps, the women of the South American republics who are young women at fifteen, mature matrons at ' twenty, and toothless hags at thirty. • On the other hand, there is Mrs Amelia E. Barr, who iwrote her first novel at fifty-five. She began the real work of hor life at an age when most men are thinking of retiring. At the age of nerenty-nine she began writing her sixtieth* novel. She believes that women do not reach the highest mentality of which they are capable nnrU they are about middle-aged. Harriet Beecher Stowe published " Uncle , Tom's Ca.bin " when- sho was forty George Eliot was close on forty when' she 'bogan to write, and her better work came several years later. France never produced a greater woman writer than George Sand, who. unknown and untrained, came to Paris nt the age of twenfcy-fiy/a to begin her career. She wrote in collaboration with Jules Sandeau, and published her first novel when she was twenty-seven. At thirty-six die publis' cd a newspaper. Her greatest success came when she was forty. Mme. dfl Mnintenon lived an inconspicuous life until she was thirty. She married Louis XIV. when she was fifty. Her influence over the king was absolute. Her power in French politics was tremendous. She was a patron of literature and art. Mrs Julia Ward Howe did nothing notable until she was forty-iwo. Then •:he wrote " The Battle Hymn of the fteyabUc."