Newspaper Page Text
Mrs. Vanderbilt’s Next-Door
Neighbor to Give Up Social
Frivolities and Become a
Missionary Among the
Savages of the Philippines
M llS LORILLARD SPENCER,
one of the most beautiful and
charming as well as one of
the wealthiest women in the fash
ionable Newport colony, will close
her lovely home on the harbor front
and go to the Philippines as a mis-
eionary.
At present Airs. Spencer's nearest
neighbors are Mrs. John Nicholas
Brown, mother of the “richest boy in
the world,’’ and Mrs. Elsie French
Vanderbilt, the former wife of Alfred
Gwynne Vanderbilt, in the future her
nearest neighbors will be the war
like, ferocious and ignorant Moros,
many of whom live on tree tops on
the island of Jolo.
Could any contrast be greater than
that between Airs. Spencer’s present
and future?
The members of New York and
Newport society are still dazed with
•astonishment over her decision. Her
only son, Lorillard, Jr., who married
pretty Mary Sands, is aghast, but no
Spencer
one is able to make Mrs,
change her plans.
“Think of the opera you will miiss,”
say her friends, to no avail.
“Think of the loneliness of life
away from all your friends,’’ say the
junior Spencers, but to no avail.
“Think of the money you will
spend on wretched, dirty savages,’’
warn her financial advisers, but their
warning, too, falls on stony ground.
No worldly consideration weighs
with this high bred, brilliant woman,
who might lead the Newport set if
she wished, and who has long been a
brilliant member of what Ward Mc
Allister named the “400.’’ Knowing
her firm determination to go to the
Philippines, at is interesting to dis
cover her reasons for giving herself
to such a mission; and equally inter
esting to see what she gives up.
Before her marriage, Mrs. Spencer
was Caroline Berryman. Her parents
were enormously wealthy, and her
fortune far exceeded that of the man
she married, the popular “Lardy”
Spencer, a grandson of old Pierre
Lorillard. Their combined fortunes
placed them among the wealthiest
members of the New York-Newport
set. From the day of her marriage,
which took place before her
eighteenth birthday, Airs. Spencer
became an important factor in so
ciety. The Newport mansion, which
had belonged to Mr. Spencer’s fathfer,
fell to the bride and bridegroom, and
their entertainments were lavish and
delightful.
As time passed, the Spencers be
came more and more firmly en
trenched socially. Their beautiful
town house on Fifth avenue was a
favorite place with the exclusive
members of society, as was their
Newport home. Their opera box
always held the gayest parties. From
a social viewpoint, Mrs. Spencer
could desire nothing else.
Three years ago Air. Spencer died,
and his fortune was left uncondi
tionally to his widow. This, with her
own fortune, made Mrs. Spencer one
of the richest widows in New York.
To fill in her period of mourning she
took a companion and went for a trip
around the world. On this trip she
visited the Philippines. Because of
her wealth and social position, she
was entertained in as elaborate a
fashion as the Manila and other posts
could devise.
One day she expressed a desire to
see the fierce Aloros in their native
islands. She was taken to the
Island of Jolo, which is the farthest
south of all the Philippines. There
she met Bishop Charles H. Brent, the
Protestant Episcopal head of that
wild diocese, and there she saw
savagery at its worst. Generously
she gave to the various missions, but
she returned to New York overcome
with the feeling that there was some
thing more for her to do.
When the Newport season opened
she threw herself into its gayeties.
It seemed as though she wanted to
test herself, as though she must see
just how strong a hold the Philip
pines had on her imagination. But
even at the gayest dance she would
•ou nds
i “Hod,
tch AH.'
Mrs. Lorillard Spencer.
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The Village Where Mrs. Lorillard Spencer Will Live Among
the Wretched Natives.
Instead of cruising in Alediterranean
waters on a perfectly equipped steam
yacht, as in the days when her hus
band was living, this beautiful widow,
who is still youthful in face and
spirits, will cruise in and out among
the southern islands in rude native
canoes, facing danger every day of
her life.
Danger? Yes. Not alone the pas
sive danger of disease, engendered
by the filth of the people and the
heat of the islands, but the active
dangers, due to the warlike charac
teristics of the Moros, the wild men
of the hills, as they are sometimes
called. When the United States
took over the Philippines, it assumed
charge of their more than 8.000,000
natives. Of these, more than 1,000,-
000 are Moro Mohammedans. They
have caused the Government more
anxiety than all the other 7,000,000
combined. They are divided in
groups, each group dominated by
fierce and lawless leaders. One
group of 350,000 are the descend-
ization. Of tlie 300,000 children of
her Aloro neighbors, only 1,000 are
receiving even the crudest education.
The United States Government pro
vides schools, under military rule, for
these children, but naturally the
Moro takes to schooling no quicker
than to bathtubs or soap.
Mrs. Spencer’s aim is to teach the
parents of these children the wisdom
of sending them to school. But per
haps the greatest need in all this
island is the social. In spite of their
warlike aggressiveness and their
prowess in treacherous war, these
Moros are a sickly race. Hospitals
must be established where the peo
ple can be cured of chronic ailments
such as malaria, hookworm, black
fever and other tropica! diseases
which come mainly from unhygienic
habits.
A large share of Airs. Spencer’s
fortune will be devoted to develop-
finicality.”
fen-lngr tuj
demonitr i:
•wd wer s
lntlmld. e
rank’s L. ,-J
fere laying
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tching at e
nted ltef if.i
Boat Used by the Missionaries to Reach the Natives far Up
the Rivers in the Interior.
uneel tr j
xrtators bej
:he trial, sra
now being J
re antic ipaJ
little incoj
ind tecbnid
overed.
■plain, bscl
affirmative
rd show: . 'G
■at they i-.i
t for the t
ne action.’ ]
hey show I
lurt eotne i
•er had any]
>n he gave 1
m the roqii
3ne of the Unconverted Natives
settlement will cost will be no greater
than the annual expenses of her
Newport house, her season in New
York and her trips abroad.
Mrs. Spencer has figured every
thing out. Instead of leasing an
opera box for the season, she will
equip a hospital for the Moros. In
stead of opening her Newport man
sion and lavishing money on her
friends, she will support, a school
where Moro children will be taught
the three R’s and habits of personal
cleanliness. Instead of spending
thousands of dollars o’fl*' gorgeous
clothes for herself, she will spend
that money clothing the savages.
iomplilnt
:her ’post-n
tother trial
fudge Ri
■ Dors*:
A Native Tree House,
A Poem That Offended a Poet
matter of pronunciation, and had
nothing to do with the poetic feeling.
I admitted the matter of pronuncia
tion, but argued that as authorities,
as well as poets, differed on that,
and as poetry was sublimated eu
phony, why make a trisyllabic word
of it and get a cacophonous result
that was harsh to the ear. “Wine”
to rhyme with “Proserpine!” Alight
I not as fitly have written;
To thee alone.
Lost Persephone.
Of course, I might, for Persephone
is the original Greek of it, and a
poet who would make a rhyme like
that ought to have his feel sawed off.
The Latin of it is Proserpina, and it
doesn’t rhyme with hyena, either.
He sat before me wagging his head
and crooning the lines of Lang to
himself ecstatioally. But I kept
right aheed, putting the plain facts
up to him. Following Mr. Lang’s
pronunciation—he’s dead and it isn’t
his fault that he isn’t here to defend
himself—I handed out this classic
bit:
I might adore
Sid I not hope
That Penelope
Would be my fate;
Unless Hecate
Or something worse—
That she-cat Circe—
Got in her curse
And fired my shades
Plumb down to HAdes.
Bui to proceed. Among the last
six lines—of Mr. Lang’s, not mine—
I find these three:
So gladly from the songs of modern
speech,
Alen turn and see the stars and feel
the free
Shrill wind beyond the close of
heavy flowers.
“Which gets my goat,” as the Satyr
said to the Dryad. Nothing short of
a search warrant or a magazine edi
tor could get the meaning of that, in
my judgment. What is a shrill wind
beyond the close of heavy flowers?
What shrills the wind and closes
the heavy flowers? I am inclined
to think the late Andrew, who was
something else besides a poet, was
he said he didn’t know; that it just
swept him on. When I asked him
what the “pale of Proserpine” was,
and how far from the gardens of
Circe it was located, and where were
the gardens of Circe, he wms
stumped. Then I wanted to know
how an island could forget the main,
seeing that everybody in this coun
try remembers the Maine—which is
no joke—and why the low lutes of
love should complain, in view of the
fact that Circe wasn’t a married
lady and Proserpine didn’t want to
be; and how the shadows of wan
lovers, or any other kind, could pine;
and why one should be especially
glad to know that brine was salt on
his lips, when brine never is any
thing else but salt—except possibly
in unusually saccharine verse—to all
of my insistent queries he failed to
reply, and gloried in his failure.
When I asked him at last about the
“large air,” he merely threw his
arms around like windmills and
made no answer.
Next I asked him why “Proserpine”
should be made to rhyme with
kJ that Fib
d these O:
sir real 1m
t the tac,
the moth :i
acluslvely f
: he did no-
to the drn
laid on the
that the'
•atlons ref
Lang’s poems, The uuys»ey, to ue-
light his readers. But Air. W. ,T.
Lampton, who is himself a poet,
read the editor’s poetry column and
had something to say. This particu
lar stanza especially attracted Mr.
Lampion’s eye:
As one that for a weary space has
lain a
Lulled by the song of Circe and
her wine
in gardens near the pale of Proser
I>ine* ,
Where that Aegean isle forgets tne
main, . ,
And only the low lutes of love
complain,
And only shadows of wan iovers pine,
As such an one were glad to know
the brine
Salt on his lips, and the large air
again.
A poetry poet read this to me m
rapturous tones, writes Mr. Hampton
and with bated breath, and when I
of Christianity in These Homes
the Sultan of Sulu shock the sensi
bilities of the former society leader,
with his lack of clothes, his habits,
his customs and his cruelties? Or
will he be shocked at her temerity,
her "immodesty” in attempting to
meet him. a Aiohammedau ruler, un
veiled and garbed in what he believes
to be indecent clothing?
There are. many among Mrs. Spen
cer’s friends who believe that her
going personally to the Philippines is
a sheer waste. Some students of
economics would call her going a
great economic waste. These friends
and students believe that more good
would be done by sending trained
workers, paid from her great w’ealth.
Their contention is that her culture,
her beauty, her education will be of
no great use in the taming of tha
Aloro.
But Mrs. Spencer believes, very
ing such a hospital in the city of
Jolo, where resides the Sultan of
Suiu, head of the Mohammedan faith
in the islands, the same Sultan who
gave to the then Alice Roosevelt a
pearl necklace. Jolo is the capital of
the Sulu group of Moros. many of
which are the so-called “Irreconeila-
bles” of the Philippines.
They are perhaps the most bar
barous of all the Moro groups. They
are highly immoral, their women are
little more the* slaves. Unless in
timidated by the presence of the
United Stale soldiers, a husband wil.
beat his wife whenever he feels like
it. Among the subjects of the Sul
tan of Sulu are men and women who
have never worn clothes, who fignt
and who live like wild animals.
It is among these unfortunate
women that Mrs. Spencer hopes to
most cases, wretched filthy huts of
straw and mud, so indescribably un
hygienic that words fail in the por
traying of them. There are terrible
Oriental diseases among tlie women,
there are scarred and blind babies,
crippled children. Among such as
these, Airs. Spencer will spread the
gospel of cleanliness. The mothers
will be taught how to care for their
babies, nurses will be provided to
attend these mothers in the wilder
ness. They will learn the efficacy
of certain drugs in the prevention of
blindness. These savage Moros kill
blind babies. They are looked upon
as something evil and even those in
authority over tlie groups order the
speedy kiltiug of these unfortunate
babies.
What will happen when this bril
liant product of a modern eiviliza-
+ ~ >inf.
Evidence,
brief are nil
m the adniis
i teetlmor i
of Frank 1
m In his stj
mmltted in I
In the re d
ourts of A mj
eh greatrv l]
this sort t'rj
and extendi
jt, apprei latl
n order to i