Patti A Heroine

Few people have been more interviewed than Madame Adelina Patti, and yet here is a little story about her which, I think, has never seen the light of print before. It was one of those things which the interviewer misses through his victim's modesty. When A-delina Patti was a girl, she was as fond as a boy of running, jumping, swimming and climbing. She was aot by any means a tom-boy, and everything she i'ouncf to do she did with decorum and grace. Adelina Patti was short, and generally sturdy. Her powers oL endurance were simply marvelous, and among her schoolfellows there were none with whom she could not hold her own. It was on a Saturday morning in October, and Adelina, with a bevy of schoolfellows, had strayed into the woods and discovered a wonderful rocky ravine called tlie "Devil's Glen." Overhead the great trees interwined their branches so as to effectually exclude the sun at all times. And below, In the central chasm of the ravine, lay a pool forty feet deep. On three sides the rocks rose precipitous, and slippery with the moss of countless ages, sheer up from the inky surface. On the stepping stones above the fourth the party stood throwing stones into the stagnant waters, and awakening the ceaseless echoes of the rocks. Suddenly a shrill cry went up; one of the girls had slipped and fallen headforemost into the murky waters. Patti alone of the whole party retained her presence of mind. Shoutlng to some of the girls to run for help, she gathered up her skirts and leaped from rock to rock until she stood by the rippling, circling waters. Then, throwing off her hat and cloak, she plunged in to the rescue of the drowning girl. Seizing her by the hair, she dragged her through the water to a floating log, and, clinging on to this frail support, she rested and soothed the frightened child. Then, half swimming, half paddling, she urged the log to the lower end of the basin, there to wait in the water for more than half an hour, when, at last, help came. Throughout this terrible ordeal Patti's courage never failed once.