Page:Sketches of representative women of New England.djvu/632

Rh sequently she studied with the late Harry De Merritt Young. She also received art training in Philadelphia and New York. She then opened a studio in Concord, N.H., where she painted many distinguished people. Her work soon began to attract notice, winning favorable comment from art critics, brother artists, and the general public, whenever exhibited. Since then she has advanced from high to higher planes of achievement, until now she may be said to have attained the full maturity of her powers. She prefers to work wholly from life, but her portraits from photographs show the same force of imagination, complete technical mastery of form and color, and deep and sympathetic understanding of her subject. She is absorbed in the personality of the face she is painting, thinking of it, dreaming over it, and never satisfied until she has transmitted not only the features but the very spirit of her subject to the canvas. She has received several gold medals for the excellence of her work, and numbers among her patrons" some of the most critical people of Boston and New York.

She has exhibited in New York and Springfield, at the Boston Art Club, the Portland Art Club, Poland Springs Art Club. One of her best crayons is the free-hand portrait of Maine's distinguished Senator, the Hon. James W. Brad- bury, which elicited much favorable conmient at the World's Fair in 1893. Two of her miniature portraits were accepted by the Boston Art Club for its sixty-second exhibition. One of these was of her son Frederick, the other of Mrs. Llewellyn Powers, wife of Governor Powers.

Among her pastels two — one of Dwight Carver, son of State Librarian Carver, and the other of Robert Livingstone, the little son of Rev. William F Livingstone and his wife, Margaret Vere Farrington—stand out prominently as representative of her very best work. Another fine piece of work, accurate and strong in character, is her crayon portrait of former President Geiders of the Maine Senate, which hung for a time in the capitol, but which has since been presented to Mr. Geiders by the Senate. In 1900 Mrs. Jones painted in oil the portrait of Governor Powers, which now hangs in the rotunda of the State capitol, and which has been described as a characteristic and speaking likeness.

It is, however, for her exquisite miniature work that Mrs. Jones has won the greatest praise; and it has been said that, if placed side by side with the work of the few really great artists in this line, they would not suffer by comparison. Gifted primarily with artistic talent, she possesses also in a high degree the power of concentration and a marvellous industry that, united, have compelled success. Mrs. Jones is a club woman, being a member of the Koussinoc Chapter D. A. R., of the Augusta China Decorator Club, the Cecilia Club, and the Current Events Club.

The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Jones occurred in Bangor, March 11, 1891. They have one child, Frederick Sawtelle Jones, who was born July 6, 1892.

BBY WILLIAMS MAY, the subject of this sketch, was born in Boston on April 21, 1829, and named for her grand-mother, Abigail Williams May, wife of Samuel May. Her parents were Deacon Samuel J. and Mary (Goddard) May. Her father, who was commonly spoken of as "Deacon May," was of the sixth generation of his family in Massachusetts. The Rev. Samuel Joseph May, a noted Unitarian preacher of the last century, was his near relative. Deacon May and his wife were at one time parishioners of the Rev. John Pierpont and later of Theodore Parker, and were devoted advocates of the abolition cause. Mrs. May was prominent among the ladies who held tables at the anti-slavery fairs, which were for many years a feature in the social life of Boston. I remember Abby very well at Parker's meeting. From him I learned something of a European trip which she made in her youth. Her father subsequently told me of her devotion to a motherless niece, whom she reared from infancy.

Miss May had many friendships, but she had also great capacities for public service. She was singularly free from any desire for personal prominence, but her ability of mind and soundness of character were recognized in all that she undertook. When the exigencies of the