Miss America [Illustration] [Illustration] MISS AMERICA PEN AND CAMERA SKETCHES OF THE AMERICAN GIRL BY ALEXANDER BLACK _Author of “Miss Jerry,” etc._ _WITH DESIGNS AND PHOTOGRAPHIC ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE AUTHOR_ CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS NEW YORK: _M DCCC XC VIII_ _Copyright, 1898, by_ CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS _All rights reserved_ University Press: JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A. TO _THE AMERICAN GIRL WHOM I HAVE KNOWN BEST_ MY WIFE _THIS BOOK IS GRATEFULLY AND AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED_ [Illustration] _The_ APOLOGY: _It will be suspected, perhaps, that in saying “sketches,” I have wished to escape some of the responsibility which might have been incurred by a more formal approach to a momentous theme, though the entire truth of the description should carry its own justification. And if the term be permitted in describing the text, it has equal appropriateness in describing the pictures; for the photograph seldom can be more than a sketch, and must be content with the limitations as well as with the privileges of the sketch. The feminine eye will discern unaided by data the chronological range of my pictures. To other eyes, possibly, I should explain that the portraits represent a period of six or seven years, and that those in conventional dress are supplemented by various costume sketches with the camera recalling eras in which there was no photography. What I have said of the American type in the first chapter will explain my own difficulty in expressing the American type by the aid of the lens, a difficulty which has not been diminished by the privilege of wide travel. If I have not revealed the geographical identity of any of the types reflected here, the reservation may, I hope, seem to be as fully justified as certain other reservations which the American girl herself so frequently chooses to hold._