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Esther Vandeveer. “The Origin of Love”
 

Esther Vandeveer. “The Origin of Love”
The Meeker Herald (Meeker, Colorado) 32:38 (April 28, 1917) : 2
via Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection : link

entirety below —
 

  1. It was in the month of October. The air crisp. The sun shone brightly, but not warm. The leaves were all colors, some still on the trees, but most of them on the ground.
  2. Beatrice Thorne and Edgar Swift were walking on this variegated carpet. They had both graduated from college the previous June and their heads were overflowing with knowledge — that modern knowledge which tells us that we are a conglomeration of molecules; that we are fortresses against incursions of bacteria; that our brains are a sort of photographic laboratory containing myriads of plates.
  3. “Do you believe,” asked Beatrice, “that life is indigenous to the earth?”
  4. “Sir William Hamilton.” Edgar replied, “suggested that it came from a neighboring planet A pretty concert. that of the vital principle wafted from Venus to earth as the wind car lies pollen from flower to flower.”
  5. If this dialogue were to continue in the scientific clouds mention of the planet Venus was unfortunate. While the scientific couple were talking of the vital principle they were really thinking of the love principle.
  6. “Do you believe love,” asked Beatrice, “is an entity or simply the result of chemical action within us?”
  7. “I cannot see why love should be different, basically considered, from hate. Two plants, the one containing poison, the other capable of producing curative properties, are built on the same fundamental principle.”
  8. The couple had passed from under trees into an open space. An inclosed field blocked their way. Edgar helped Beatrice over the fence, and they were crossing the field when she asked this profound question. Being absorbed in themselves they did not see a bull, who stood looking at them with evident interest. They had nearly reached the fence on the other side of the inclosure when the bull began a slow trot toward them.
  9. Edgar, glancing aside, saw the beast coming. Seizing Beatrice by the arm, he hurried her to the fence. Before they could reach it she collapsed, and, taking her in his arms, he carried her to it and had only time to drop her on the other side and get over himself when the bull’s horns perforated his coattail and held him suspended across the uppermost rail. Fortunately the cloth did not bold, and the man dropped beside the girl.
  10. While the bull was pawing the ground on the other side of the fence Edgar held Beatrice in his arms, his eyes bent on her face. She opened hers and looked up into his. The bull stopped pawing and, evidently satisfied with being left supreme in his domain, walked away.
  11. “Are you hurt dearest?” asked Edgar.
  12. “No. Oh, Edgar, what a narrow, frightful escape!”
  13. His hands were clasped under her shoulders; therefore his face was not far distant from hers. She closed her eyes, and, considering that she was not hurt he construed this to be the granting of an opportunity to take a kiss, which favor be accepted. This recalled her to her surroundings, and she sat up. while he said a great deal to her in which the word love figured frequently, but not scientifically. Then there was a cluster of kisses, after which they arose, and [sic] Beatrice, leaning on his arm, they walked slowly onward. Coming to a large flat stone that formed a convenient seat, they sat down. The place was elevated, and they could see the bull quietly nibbling at the grass. The man, having been satisfied with the quantum of unscientific love he had quaffed, turned again to its consideration as a principle.
  14. “Let me see,” he said: “where were we?”
  15. The girl showed the feminine nature by relegating the origin of love to the winds. Love itself was more interesting to her.
  16. “Oh, Edgar,” she said, “how noble it was of you to save me! You could easily have escaped by leaving me to my fate. Suppose the bull had gored you?”
  17. She shuddered and clung to him. He took up his coattail and looked at the rents in it.
  18. “I wonder what it was,” be said thoughtfully, “that prompted me to risk my own life to save yours.”
  19. By way of reply she felt for his hand, took it lovingly in hers and snuggled up closer to him.
  20. And herein comes one of the many differences between the man and the woman. Swift had received an education in scientific branches that he was capable of building upon until he might discover that love affinity is the same as chemical affinity and designate it in some such terms as M¹ W², or one part man two parts woman, just as water is expressed as H O². But Beatrice, who had also been thus educated, having once experienced love, had no desire to pursue its composition further. It might be expressed us X Y² for all she cared. To her it was “woman’s whole existence.”
  21. “Oh, Edgar,” she said, “how happy I am!”
  22. He looked down into her upturned face, her liquid eyes and her red lips, so near his own. Momentarily be forgot the origin of love in its enjoyment. He kissed her, and that was the end of her scientific education. He became the director of an Institute for expert mental research.
     

31 July 2024