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Georgie, from all accounts, appears to have been more of an embarrassment than a lunatic. It's easy to imagine John's exasperation with a 50-year-old sister picked up by the police for dancing on tables in a New York hotel. He did commit her briefly too, but after her friends rallied to her support, he released her, freeing her to spend time and money as she saw fit. Subsequent diaries show Georgie gallivanting about Brooklyn with friends, taking in concerts, learning to ride a bicycle, and then traveling down to Florida by train, where she helped a friend capture an alligator. If nothing else, Georgie was a free spirit. That she rebelled at midlife is perhaps a family trait as Ella's and John's correspondence reveals.

Wiki MarkupNot the wallflower depicted by the press, Ella had a serious suitor at the age of 44. Other men, earlier in her life, had also vied for her hand, but she intimates in letters to Georgie (who was traveling across Europe with her mother) that those suitors were less than genuine. This 26-year-old, she admits, "is too young for me [|although]\for me although[although\] he is perfectly devoted. He still continues to come three times a week, once in the evening and then in the afternoon to take me for a drive. He has been to dinner several times. Next Sunday we expect him to dine with us again, Mary and I take a walk with him nearly every Sunday afternoon. Never in all my life have I had anyone to love me so much and be so devoted. I hope you and Josie and Mama will like him. I should not marry anyone unless John and Ma give their consent."

A month later she writes, "Be sure you return in November as we would like very much to go to Europe this fall. I will go with my sweetheart a week after Ma returns. As for a wedding trousseau, I certainly shall not let that stand in the way. Delays are dangerous. I see that you do not want me to go to Europe with him but would rather I forget all about him. The world is large enough for us to live in it. I shall live on Fifth Avenue uptown and my sweetheart shall have all he wants, but we will go abroad for a year or two first. Beckie is going with us, and I would very much like to have the pleasure of your company. We will go to Spain and see a bullfight, take in China, India, etc."

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