and vivid, sometimes epigrammatic, always entertaining, was her own.
It could not be copied, it could not be imitated, it stood by itself;
her career, filled with a large measure of the courage of her success,
belonged in the broadest sense to women as women. How many worthy
ambitions that career has stimulated to fruition we know not, and
never shall know. One thing, however, is certain--that if you deduct
from the literature of America the names of women who have followed
Mrs. Croly's example and have been cheered by the fact that she did
not fall by the wayside, you leave a void that never could be filled.
How consciously they have been affected by Mrs. Croly's blazing path I
cannot tell; but the influence has been none the less real and none
the less powerful.

Woman's battle for literary recognition will not have to be fought
over again: it belongs to the past. The old contempt of editors and
publishers, aye, and of readers as well, has gone to join slavery and
polygamy and human sacrifices in the chamber of horrors. But we can
never forget the woman who braved that contempt, and faced it down by
achievement that could not be ignored. Mrs. Croly belonged to the
period of that early struggle. In her sweetness of temper she lent to
its very asperities the charm of a tournament, overcoming evil with
good, and triumphing at last over prejudice which thousands of women
had feared to face. We loved her for herself. We are sad in spite of
ourselves that she has gone. But we shall only remember her as one of
the greatest benefactors of woman in literature; one of the most
delightful of all the delightful characters that we have ever known.

"This laurel leaf I cast upon thy bier;
Let worthier hands than these thy wreath entwine;
Upon thy hearse I shed no useless tear--