The Heart of Old Hickory and Other Stories of Tennessee

ONE day in the summer of 1890 I received a manuscript entitled "Fiddling His Way to Fame," accompanied by a brief note. Both were signed Will Allen Dromgoole. I read the sketch, and at once remarked to Mrs. Flower that, in my judgment, this was a case of the hand of Esau and the voice of Jacob, or, in other words, though the name signed was that of a man, the sketch was certainly the work of a woman or had been recast by a woman. There were certain fine strokes and delicate touches, in a word, a general atmosphere evincing a fine interior appreciation of the working of the human heart which characterizes woman's thought at its best and which stamped this as the work of a woman. I know this view does not accord with the opinion held by many of my friends in regard to mental differentiation, but my experience thoroughly convinces me that there is a subtle quality and intuitional power which is distinctly characteristic of woman, though there are men who possess this subtle something in a more or less marked degree.