Page:The Great Harry Thaw Case.djvu/57

 of beauty in his work and in his play. He was generous and considerate. He would hide a $100 bill in a bouquet he ordered handed over the footlights; he would visit a poor, sick chorus girl when she thought herself friendless in a hospital.

Once in a while, Mr. White gave entertainments in the tower, at which the women and men of society were his guests. But there were other entertainments on which Venus, not Diana, should have looked down. At them, if a girl danced on the table she did not scratch the mahogany. Stanford White vastly admired adolescence. His death was a tragedy and is a warning. His last night was typical of his method of life.

He dined with his son; he went to his club. From his nearest kin and his honorable friends he turned to the structure his genius had raised, where was hid his "studio." The lights and music of the roof garden enticed him. And in the presence of the woman who vows he ruined her life he perished by her husband's hand. And the last jangle that sounded to him was a comedy song: "I could love a million girls."

Madison Square garden, which he created and where he met his death, was known as his "pleasure house."

What an awful warning, to the would-be-young-man-about-town! With all his subtle experience, with his fawning servants and paid detectives, even