WHARTON 



6261 



WHEAT 



WHAR'TON, EDITH JONES (1862- ), an 

 American novelist, one of the three leading 

 woman novelists of her day, the others being 

 Selma Lagerlof and Mrs. Humphry Ward. 

 She was born in New York City, was privately 

 educated and in her twenty-third year married 

 Kdward Wharton of Boston. Although before 

 This time she had contributed stories to maga- 

 zines, her ability as a writer of fiction seems 

 not to have developed fully until 1899, when 



wrote The Greater Inclination, a story that 

 analyzes most keenly the motives that lead the 

 soul toward good or evil. During the next year 



-econd novel, The Touchstone, showed this 

 quality even more plainly and disclosed her 

 talent for brilliant, sparkling style. The Valley 

 of Decision, The House of Mirth, The Fruit of 

 the Tree and Tales of Men and Ghosts show 

 her at her best, for in such stories she pictures 



: lately the pressure of modern social life 

 upon the individual soul and how the resulting 

 struggle may bring forth the purity and no- 

 bility of some characters while it crushes the 

 aspirations of others. Later books are The 



i, The Custom of the Country, Book of the 

 Homeless and Fighting France. 



Few women novelists have excelled her in 

 variety of methods, for she uses with skill such 



means of appeal as wit, sarcasm, pathos, real- 

 istic description and romantic adventures. Her 

 style is praised for its extreme conciseness, 

 clearness and brilliance. 



During the War of the Nations she engaged 

 in Red Cross work in France. 



WHARTON, FRANCIS (1820-1889), an Ameri- 

 can lawyer and writer, bora in Philadelphia. 

 He graduated at Yale University, studied law, 

 and in 1843 was called to the bar. From 1856 

 to 1863 he taught English literature, law and 

 history at Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio, 

 meanwhile studying theology, in 1863 re* 

 ordination in the Episcopal Church. For three 

 years he served as rector in Brookline, Mass., 

 resigning to accept the professorship of eccle- 

 siastical and international law at Cambridge 

 Divinity School and Boston University. From 

 1885 to 1888 he was counsel for the State De- 

 partment at Washington, and in the latr. 

 was made editor of the diplomatic correspond- 

 ence of the United States during the Revolu- 

 tionary War. He died before this work was 

 finished. His other publications include the 

 well-known Treatise on the Criminal Law of the 

 United States, a Treatise on the Law of Homi- 

 cide in the United States and Law of Agency 

 and Agents. 



HEAT, the most valuable and widely 

 distributed of the food cereals. It grows in 

 every climate but that of the torrid lowlands 

 and ;..!.: regions, and each climate has its pe- 

 culiar variety. Although a grass closely resem- 

 bling wheat is found growing wild in Southern 

 Europe, the grain is always sown by man and 

 has been cultivated for uncounted centuries. 



Its original home is supposed to have been 

 in Mesopotamia. It is known to have been 

 cultivated by the aboriginal Swiss lake dv 

 and it furnished the staple food of 

 Egyptians, Assyrians, Greeks and Romans. 

 The relatively high value of wheat among the 

 Hebrews is often mentioned in the Bil 

 the Book of Revelation we read of "a measure 

 "i" wheat for a penny and three measures of 



barley for a penny." As the choicest gift of the 

 harvest, it was used in the sacrifices of the an- 

 cients, and it is still held sacred in parts of 

 China. 



The grain was introduced into the western 

 hemisphere in the sixteenth century, when by 

 aid<nt seeds were brought with i 

 Mexico from Spain. 



Varieties. Wheat i- aiYectrd more by 1 iH- 

 climatc than by the composition of the soil in 

 which it grows, and the quality often varies in 

 the same locality with different climatic condi- 

 tions. It thrives best in a rich alluvial soil 

 containing much vegetable mold, and when 

 crops are not rotated and the soil is not rich in 

 humus the uso of fertilisers increases the yield 

 to a considerable degree. 



