FROM THE COTTAGE TO A PALACE.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 193, 21 July 1916, Page 3 (Supplement)

FROM THE COTTAGE TO A PALACE.

THE ROMANCE OF MULTIMILLIONAIRES' WIVES.

There are to-day across the Atlantic, scores of women living in palaces and surrounded by a wealth of luxury which queens might well envy, who can recall the days when they were thankful to be able to "make ends meet" on the equivalent, of two pounds a week, and when an annual Income of £3OO seemed unattainable riches.

In her old age. when Mrs. Russell Sage, widow cf the famous "Wizard of Wall Street," is "wonied to death," as she pathetically puts it, in her efforts to dispose ol a few of her husband's millions in charity, she confesses that she looks back with longing to the days when she was the happiest young wife in the States — "passing rich," in happiness if not in dollars, in her modest framehouse, proudly keeping her domestic expenses down to thirty shillings a week. "We were just able to keep the wolf from the door," the Croesus of later years said: "but my wife quickly adapted herself to the poor home which was all I could offer her. There were struggles and trials and disappointments enough In all conscience; but we smiled through them all and went on side by side until I began to see land. And poo. as we were, thanks to my wife, "v\e were able to put by at least a quarter of my small income every year. Mr. C. M. Schwab was earning a modest ten shillings weekly in a Bradford grocery store when he had the courage to ask Emma E. Dinkey, a school teacher as poor as himself, to share his life; and when he found employment to drive stakes at a dollar a day for tlie Carnegie Company he considered himself rich enough to lead his bride to the altar at Loretto. And never did a poor man's bride find in wedlock such a dramatic revolution in her life

Within a year of his wedding day Emma's husband was earning £IOOO a year; and before she had been a bride a score of years he counted his millions to more than his fingers on his hands; was drawing a salary, in addition, of £160,000 a year as president of the great American Steel Trust; and had installed his wife a:s chateline of three of the most palatial homes in America. Little less dramatic was the experience of Mary Mahegan, a pretty Irish girl, who, fifty years or so ago. was maid-of-all-work at a small inn on the wharf of St. Paul, Minnesota. Mary's runny smile and dainty freshness play, d havoc with the hearts of many of the wharf labourers who called at the inn to quench their thirst; but she laughed at all their clumsy wooing until James J. Mill, of the brawny muscles and strong capable face, joined the ranks of hrr admirers, and alter a brisU wooing had little diilic\'.lty in catrying off the prize. It was but a poor home to which the wharf-porter, with his couple of dollars a day, was able to take his bride. "We lived largely on love," he said in later and very different ycai.s" am' were as happy as two rung birds: and it was a long, uphill struggle before 1 could offer her a home which 1 considered at all worthy cf her." But the lons laiw turned at last, and led to such a lan i of gold that, before Mary had worn her wedding-ring a score of years, she was mistress cf :i mansion which had cost £l4 D,OOO to build, and from whore windows she could look down on the little inn in which as maid-of-all-work she had won the heart of the porter who was destined to be one of the world's richest men. .IESTIXG AT POVERTY.

Air. Ilorton, president of the Westem I'nion and a. millionaire many times over, has often told the story of his early wedded life, when iie would gladly have bartered all his prospects of riches for an assured t:jf)o a year. "They were days of terrible struggle," he says, "for 1 married on £.">o a year, with small lie lie at the time cf expanding my income. 1 had not sufficient money to furnish even a couple of rooms decently, and I remember it took my wife six months to save enough to buy our first carpet H it I can truly say, in spite of our poverty, it was the happiest time of my life. You see we were both young, we loved each other dearly, and our very struggles were only material for light-hearted laughter." When .Mr. W. M. Strong, another American Croesus, made his plunge into matrimony, it was a plunge of desperation. At the time he was a salesman < n a very modest income: l:e was burdened with the support of

a widowed mother and a family of brothers and sisters, and his bride had, as he tells us, "been accustomed to many of the refinements and elegancies of life. Yet she was content to accept my poor lot, and we had to do a lot of managing in those days to keep up appearances. I remember how we scraped and saved, cutting a little here and a little there, to buy our first drawing-room set, and the joy that filled our hearts as we sat in the midst of our newly-ac-quired household goods can only he known once in a man's life." John D. Rockefeller, the world's richest man, was sorting beans in a dingy Cleveland warehouse, with a very precarious income of a few collars a week, when he invited Laura Spelman to share his unknown and unpromising Suture, and there were several years of povery and struggle before lie at last struck the oil which was to float him to riches beyond the dreams of avarice. "And yet," he says, "small as my income was, we managed to live and save money, thanks to the most thrifty wife a man ever had, and our joy in spending five dollars to the best advantage was far greater than the spending of a million ever gave me hi later years." How these millions came when once the corner was turned is shown by the following statement: —In ISG.j. his capital all told was £1000; in LS7O it was £10,000: in 157.1 it had grown to £1*10,000; ten years later it was ten millions: in IS9O it had reached twenty millions; and in 1899 fifty millions. To-day John I). Rcckefelic r's fortune is estimated at £100,0:00,000; and, as he confessed not long ago, "I would Dart with it all to live again the happy, care-free days when the heart was young and life was full of joy for us both." .Mr. Henry Clews, the millionaire banker and financier when recalling the days of his early wedded life, says:—".My wife had been accustomed to wealth and a fine establishment, while I was a poor man still struggling to get my feet on the ladder, and almost despairing of ever getting a foothold. Yet she did ffbt disdain to share my poor lot. The worst of it was that my position was better than my income, and no one but a man in that predicament can realise the shifts to which I was reduced to keep my end up. How bravely and self-sacrificingly my wife helped me is one of the sweetest memories of my life." A LESSON IN THRIFT. "There," Mr. Clews adds, "is an example for all girls and all men to follow. Unhappily, in these days, women look out for wealth and demand it ail the time. They want dresses; they want luxuries; they have no real love of home. They look upon a husband as a convenience." When Mr. Ransom, another Croesus, was once asked, "How did you begin your married life?" he answered, "I began it on ten dollars (£2 1 a week up in Elmira. I had come back a year before from the war. broken, penniless, and wounded. I had about 200 dollars (£4O) besides my pay. 1 loved a girl who was still poorer than myself. Well, we decided that we would marry anyhow ami take our chances in the lottery. We went to boarding at six dollars a week in a little two-pair back. ir. seems strange to look back on now. But we were very happy, and when things improved a little we moved into a little frame-house of two stories. Dear me! To think of the day that we bought the ormulu clock «ind put it on the mantelpiece lr the best parlour! We sat right down in front of It, arm In arm, and feasted our eyes on the most prized of all our earthly treasures." Air. Chauncey Depew, the wuliknown millionaire lawyer, confessed that he started wedded life, not only a poor man but heavily in debt. "T loved a lovely girl," he tells us, "thr« daughter of a prominent business man who lived In a handsome style. All the world supposed him to be a very rich man; I knew that he was on the verge of bankruptcy, and before we had been married many months the crash came. As for me, I was not only practically penniless, but heavily in debt; so we had to practise self-deniai, study a thousand little economies, and yet keep up a semblance of style before the world in which we lived. In those times, when fifty dollars a week was a goon salary, 1 was often for the prominent position I held, poorer than any mechanic because my expenses were so much heavier."

When George Stephen led pretty Annie Kane to the altar, 6,1 years ago. he had not long left a warehouse tn St. Paul's Churchyard to earn a few dollars weekly in an American store, and he little dreamt that one rt.iv he would wear the coronet of a British Peer, as Lord Mount Stephen, and own more millions than he then possessed hundreds. THE ASTOR MILLION'S.

Such are a few stories of the earlv wedded day;) of the world's wealthiest men of recent times and tlicy might easily be multiplied almost indefinitely. And s'milar stories are told of the davs when a multi-mil-lionaire was almost as rare as a dodo. Thus the first Jacob Astor, who left a fortune of £4,000.000, took his bride to a very sordid home in a New York skim, whtre they spent their honeymoon in tending their little music-shop, and "curing and packing skins." Commodore Vanderbilt, who accumulated £ir>,ooo,ooo before he laid down the burden of his riches, was making a verv precarious income by carrying vegetables between New York and Staten Island, when he made a wife of his cousin, pretty Sophia Johnson: and Jay Gould, who was able to leave £l,">.000,000 to his six children .had only just emancipated himself from street-hawking when lie made his venture into matrimony.