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ATLANTA. GA., SATURDAY. MAY 29, 1875.
MARY E. BRYAN,
Editress.
Flowers, Bright Flowers!
Our balcony is a charming place—far removed
from dust and beat, shaded by a grand oak, in
whose branches the mocking-birds sing, and on
whose multitudinous leaves the dews glitter, and
the sun and shade dance changefully, and the
light-fingered winds play tunes of summer glad
ness. It is a lovely place in which to sit at sun
set or moonrise; but there was something want
ing to make it perfect—the grace and sweetness
of flowers. There stood not a flower on its broad
ledge to tempt the bee and butterfly, or to brighten
one’s fancies when dulled by care.
“ A flower do but place at your window glass,
And through it no image of evil can pass.”
We repeated this poetical bit of German super
stition and sighed wistfully at thought of the
windows and balconies and pretty rustic stands
full of flowers in bloom, which w r e had just seen
in a drive through the picturesque environs of
Atlanta. Did some kind spirit in the air waft
the wish to Mr. Cole’s flower store on Broad
street, and suggest to him the graceful kindness
of sending some of his fragrant favorites to shed
their sweetness in an author’s sanctum? No
matter whence came the suggestion, here are
the flowers, sent “from Cole A’ Co.,” all ranged
upon our balcony twenty-eight pots in all, filled
with the daintiest favorites among the house-
flowers — geraniums, heliotropes, mignonette,
fuschias, phlox, and many others — some with
brilliant, variegated foliage, quite new to us.
Every time a new blossom unfolds, we shall
feel freshly grateful to Mr. Cole, and breathe a
wish that his beautiful nursery, just outside the
dust of the city, may flourish like the gardens
of Gul.
Beautiliil Women An Answer to “Horatio.”
A correspondent, signing himself “Horatio,” j
asks The Sunny South to give a “ pen-and-ink” i
description of a perfectly beautiful woman. We :
couldn’t venture upon it, “Horatio.” If we should
sketch you a classic model, such as the father of !
amatory poetry furnished to
“ The best of painters, v
Prince of the llhodiau art,”
you would compare it disparagingly with some |
modern marvel of perfection photographed on a
will rave about a Juno form, an eye of intellect
ual light, and a brow that is “a dome of thought;”
and then, when he is a staid bachelor with side-
whiskers, will marry some pretty wax doll with
two ideas in her curly head and a petite figure,
which he adoringly declares
“Is just an armful of heaven to enfold.”
We have a theory that every woman has some
thing about her peculiarly attractive to someone
man—a theory by no means original, since it is
as old as the rhyme that begins,—
“ There never was a goose so gray.”
There are very ugly women who are personally
attractive to their admirers by reason of some
peculiarity that would never be observed by
those who were not these damsels’ “affinities”—
some look, or tone, or smile, some droop of the
eyelid, or swell of the throat, or dimple in the
cheek, or cadence in the laugh, that would mean
nothing to most men and yet touches a vibrant
chord of admiration in the breasts of certain
others, and throws over the ugly woman the
transfiguring light of love.
So you see, “ Horatio,” there is no infallible
standard of beauty. The Chinese belle is a
shapeless mountain of fat with a small head and
feet so infinitesimal that they support the limbs
in a tottery manner, which is there accounted
exceedingly graceful. The poets of the Flowery
Land celebrate their beauties in the following
style:
“ The fair Yang cha Loo,—
She is more beautiful than the sun, moon and stars.
Her eyes are lost in the puffed-out fat of her cheeks;
Double rolls of shining fat lie under her chin.
When she walks, hergait is that of a drunken elephant.”
The Hottentot belle is a hideous creature, with
tattooed cheeks, a nose like a mashed toad and
a mouth like a double link of Bologna sausage.
Contrast her with a beauty of our own race,—a
figure of slender and supple elegance, hair-crown
of golden brown with stray ringlets escaping;
cheek, where the color comes and goes in a
breath; mouth like a cleft strawberry, and rich,
violet eyes full of sweet meanings and shadowy
with tender dreams. Contrast this fair picture
(of which there are legions of originals in our
“ Sunny South”) with the Hottentot nightmare,
and you will cease to wonder that the monkey
is regarded as a link in humanity.
And yet a Senegambia youth, fresh from a
dance around the roasting bones of his enemies,
would declare in favor of the sausage-lipped
damsel, and pronounce the other one poor ma
terial for a bride and hardly fit to furnish a de
cent stew.
ing up to him a political career through means
of money and influence secretly bestowed to for
ward his election. She also uses active means
to trace out a mystery which she hopes will re
sult in good fortune to him. At last, she finds
that instead of benefiting, she has injured him—
that the secret she has brought to light is one of
shame. Overwhelmed with pity and remorse,
she bursts out with her own unsuspected secret
of love. The passage is at once highly wrought
and natural.
“I thought to have made you a hero, restored
to his rights and master of a splendid career. I
tell von now that you have no rights—that you
are a pauper—a very outcast; that you have not
a penny in the world; that your only hope here
is gone*, unless you care to accept the alms flung
to a ruined claimant—to a misguided, poor re
lation.”
“I have long thought it,” he said in a low,
gloomy tone; “ long thought it. Little skill as
I have in guessing, yet I have been able this
sometime back to guess so much. I am not
blind. But why do you tell me this ? Why
speak of it? Do you exult in my ruin?”
“I do.”
She spoke the words with the utmost calm
ness. He sprang to his feet and looked wildly
at her.
“I do, Paul. Yes, it is true; I do rejoice in
what you call your ruin. I exult in your being
poor, nameless, hopeless. I do, as surely as
Heaven hears me; and you know why.”
Paul sat down again and covered his face with
his hands.
“Yes; you understand me now. I have had
to speak out at last. I am glad of your poverty,
because I am rich; of your doubtful name, be
cause, since it is doubtful, I may otter to bear
and share it, Paul, Paul, I love you, and you
know it. See how I unfold my whole heart, aye,
and abase myself before you.”
She knelt by his side, took his hand and
kissed it passionately.
“Never should you have known of this, in
words at least, had that which I imagined for
you come true. But it did not, it cannot, and
now that you are poor and outcast, I may tell
j’ou how much I love j*ou; max’ I not, Paul?”
She smiled a wan and wild smile, and tried to
draw away his hand and catch an answering
gleam of love from his ej’es.
New Books.
Paul Massif.—A Romance. By Justin McCarthy. Shel
don & Co., Publishers. For sale by Phillips & Crew,
Atlanta, Georgia.
Justin McCarthy could not write a dull book
were he to try; though we are not prepared
to saj’ that his novels are equal in brilliancy to
Character Shown in Ankles anil Skirt-Lifting.
Our modern adepts in the science of biologj’
profess to discern indications of character not
only in the face, but in the foot, the hand, the
voice, the handwriting, etc. Dr. Holmes de
clares that if you will show him a bit of the
human skin no larger than a sixpence, he will
describe to you the kind of man or woman to
whom it belonged. And now Justin McCarthy
tells us that female character is best indicated
by the ankle and by the manner in which ladies 1 Had entwined bis arms around her, and the fatal web
was spun.
Soon her reason he defeated,
Her of virtue then he cheated—
Sunk her ’neatli the deep-mouthed billows and his fiendish
work was done.
[For The Sunny South.]
LOST BUT XOT DEAD.
BY WM. B. HAXLEITEB.
Once I loved a gentle woman,
Yet, alas! she was but human—
Made of roses, pearls, and gilted—nought, at best, but
flesh and bone;
Still I loved her—loved her dearly,
As I viewed her monthly, yearly—
Viewed her ’mid the human billows—viewed her when
she was alone.
And I've sat beside her often.
Till her diamond eyes would soften—
Till her waxen lips had melted and her pearly teeth were
shown;
And her sweetest breath would whisper,
Like an angel-wafted zephyr,
Of her darling, sainted mother, who to spirit lands had
flown.
At such times I've tried to gather
All about her absent father;
Yet I learned but this thing only,—that to other climes
he’d gone;
That in early years he’d left her,
Without brother, without sister;
Scarcely knowing good from evil, she had been thus left
alone.
Thrown upon the human ocean,
With its pitiless commotion—
With its selfish, tightened fingers, and its myriad hearts
of stone—
She had scarcely found a resting,
While the waves and tempests breasting.
But had floated safely thus far, by some unseen hand
upborne.
Low I tent my ear and listen’d,
And my cheeks with teardrops glisten'd,
And my very soul was hushed up as I hung upon her
tone;
Then my heart advanced, retreating,
And I heard it thunder-beating,
As I kissed her velvet forehead and her hand was in mine
own.
Then, as if by inspiration,
With a trembling intonation,
With my heart and knees low-bended and my arm around
her thrown,—
I upheaved my soul and told her,
That above the waves I’d hold her—
Hold her ’bove the rocks and breakers, guide her safely
through the foam;
That I’d be to her a brother,
. Till her hand she gave another—
Till she needed me no longer—till her maiden life was
done;
For I felt that self-same hour,
That so kind, so fair a flower
Would be sought by hungry fingers—from my grasp
would soon be torn.
But, O God! I thought no evil
Till the form of man—but devil—
[For The Sunny South.]
MASCULINE INCONSISTENCY.
lift their skirts. He saj’s:
“Show me the ankle, and*1 will show j’ou the
woman. A ladj’ once remarked that she did not
like an unmeaning look about the heel. Sarah
Massie would not have incurred this censure.
Her ankle indicated health, clearness, rtjprgy
and self-reliance. It is not nonsense to tlffk of
a woman's ankle indicating all this. There are
women who show their character in the verj’
ten, and in their delineation of character, their
c arte-de-visite and carried next j*our heart, or management of ^dramatic situations, and their
perhaps with your mental picture of the face
that leaned over the rose vines of the paling j’es-
terday evening, and blushed, smiled and dim
pled for a stolen half-hour, while the twilight
melted in star-blossoming space and the good
house-mother lit the candles and wondered
“where Nellie could be.”
Sir Joshua Reynolds, the great portrait painter,
declared there never was a perfectly beautiful
woman. There are thousands of young gentle
men in this country of “Horatio’s” wise and dis
passionate age (just twenty) who are ready to
contradict the painter flatly. We have just had
a peep into The Sunny South’s correspondence
box, and we find there no less than seventeen
young gentlemen under twentj’, who, in con
sulting The Sunny South concerning their
affairs of the heart, begin with the confession
that they are deeply in love with a most perfectly
beautiful and amiable young lady. Seen through
the glamour of love, a snub nose is a Grecian,
and eyes as dull as boiled gooseberries shine
like the kohinor.
Marriage is usually the “spectacles” which
disenchants the picture and robs these mundane
angels of their wings. But sometimes the illu
sion is kept up after marriage. We all remem
ber reading how Dr. Johnson praised and petted
his coarse, red-faced and ugly-featured wife,
calling her the “pretty’ dear” and the 4 ‘sweet
creature.” The one comic gleam in Sue’s
ghastly novel of Paris crime and misery is the
solemn old Frenchman who is alwaj’s fancying
that some man lias designs upon his “ Anasta
sia,” a gaunt, bony female of fifty’. Similar in
stances are to be found every day in real life. I
remember one most vividly. The wagon of a
“mover,” bound for Texas, had stopped for the
team to rest under the shade of a great Louisi
ana pecan tree, where a party who had been nut
ting were sitting on the grass, counting their
pecans and playing “hull-gull.” The woman
seated in the wagon, throned on a pile of pots,
chairs, chests and mattresses, was surely the ug
liest female in the world, a hooked-nose, red
headed specimen with buck teeth and freckled
visage. The good-looking driver proved socia
ble. and opened conversation by inquiring how
“fur it was to the Sabine river," and volunteer
ing the information that he came “all the way
from Alabam—the best State in the Union.
“Why did you leave it then?" was asked.
“Well, I had a small difficulty with a fellow
out there—broke two of his ribs and smashed his
nose. I reckon he won't feel like hankering
after other folks’ wives pretty soon. A man
can't have a good-looking wife in Choctaw county
without some fellow's en-ry-in’ him.”
He nodded his head at the woman throned
upon the pots and mattresses, and she grinned
complacently and felt herself as irresistible as
though she had been Helen or Messalina.
It is a noticeable fact that young men rarely
ever marry their “ideals.” A young gentleman
who insists upon a “classic nose” may be cal
culated upon to wed a piquant pug, and one who
writes sonnets in exclusive praise of “ brown
eyes ” is apt to succumb to a pair as green as
Beckv Sharp’s. A youth who reads Swinburne
aters his frail mustache with patchouly,
, ■ t i ,, wav' in which thev manage their skirts. One
his essays, yet they arte exceedingly well writ- w V man ftllows hVr clothes to drAggle along the
streets and lick the dust or mud; another, if she
has but to step over the least perilous of cross
ings, suddenly and convulsively gathers? her
petticoats above her ankles,Idisplaj’ing flannels
and fixings not meant for the public gaze, and
then, perhaps affrighted, lets them drop at one
side, while tliej’ remain uphoisted on the other.
Sarah Massie was never negligent and never
affrighted. Her skirts were always raised to just
the proper height, and the beholder could there
fore appreciate the character expressed in her
graceful walk and firm ankle.”
And now we understand (and appreciate) the
motives of those “ nice ” young men who, on
windy or muddy afternoons, lounge at windows
and balconies that overlook the street, with their
rouping of incidents, evince careful study,
nice judgment, and considerable artistic insight.
The book before us is a sensational romance.
This is pointedly told us in a three-paged “Pro
logue” which introduces the story, and which
had far better have been omitted, since its inser
tion subserves no purpose and detracts from the
interest of the book,—first, by exciting expecta
tion of a higher degree of romance and mystery
than the story actually realizes; and second, by
throwing too much light upon the mystery, which
is the ground-work of the plot. The author, pre
supposing great dullness in his readers, tells us heels elevated to a right angle with their noses,
that the prologue is “a torch held up to illu
mine a group in the far back-ground of the pic
ture.”
He had far better have left the back-ground in
the shadow until it was lighted up by the grad
ual dawning of the mystery upon our under
standing, as the story progressed. He could
j have moved and grouped his figures with finer
effect against this dark back-ground. His torch
reveals too much; we see to the end of the laby
rinth. Wilkie Collins would have shed no such
light upon it,—would have let no star even glim
mer over his “glioul-haunted region of Weir”—
only a will-o’-the-wisp that would bewilder rather
than illume. We should have groped after the
clue to the mystery, and followed it step by step,
through doubt and darkness, with the eager,
shuddering delight of travelers exploring the
labyrinthine windings of an Egyptian pyramid
or a Roman catacomb.
Mystery is not Mr. McCarthy’s forte, but not
the less is he a brilliant and graphic story-teller.
His romance of Paul Massie is interesting
throughout. The characters are ably drawn and
made more striking by contrast. For instance,
Paul Massie—the brave, active, unconventual and
rather reckless Bohemian, with his brown cheek
and Mexican mustache, overshadowed by an in
souciant wide-a-wake— is put in juxtaposition to
his cold, calm, clerical cousin. Eustace, side-
whiskered and carefully combed, with well-regu
lated heart-beats and well-defined ideas of duty’
and praiseworthy desire to trim down every
body's idiosyncracies to his commonplace pat
tern. Then again, the weak, timid, selfish Mrs.
Massie is well contrasted with generous, brave,
large-hearted and quick-witted Salome De Luca.
Madam De Luca is the finest character in the
book. She resembles Disraeli's “ divine Theo
dora," only she lias more femininity and less he
roic earnestness of pui’pose. She had entered
into foreign politics for amusement and distrac
tion. She had become the counsellor and confi
dant of political exiles and intriguants by reason
of her largely sympathetic nature, her active
mind and liberty-loving impulses. Her parlors
were the rendezvous of all men of note, of wit,
genius and courage. She was the fascinating and
brilliant hostess, dispensing smiles and encour
aging words, it seemed to all alike; yet “To say
that Salome De Luca had no favorites would be
to say that she was no woman, and she was every
inch a woman.”
She proves that by falling in love-—in spite of
herself — with the handsome Paul, so much
younger than she is. She seeks to become his
unknown protectress and benefactress by open
a stump of cigar between their lips, and their
eyes (with perhaps an opera-glass attached) fixed
upon the side-walk.
We had supposed that these j’oung gentlemen
belonged to the genus “loafer,” and possessed a
well-developed talent for impertinence and cu
riosity. Behold our mistake! They are stu
dents of human nature—pupils of the interesting
science of biology—studying character-indica
tions from the ankles and skirt-lifting of the
fair passers-bj’. Well, we live to learn.
Thus the demon did enslave her;
No extended arm could save her
But the One—the great Immortal—He upon the heavenly
throne.
V»w my eye-', are ever prying,
And my heart is ever crying,
Yearning, seeking for the lost one, though my hope is
near o’erthrown.
Had she died before he stained her—
Ere his horrid vice enchained her—
Then I’d weep, but oh! so sweetly!—then I would not
feel forlorn;
For again I’d hope to meet her,
And with bounding joy I’d greet her,—
Greet her where there is no parting—greet her where the
soul is born.
Then I’d feel that she was near me,
And I'd pray that she might hear me,—
Bid her wait this form's decaying—bid her watch till I
could come;
And I would not, as now, linger,
Waiting for Fate’s pointing finger,
Trembling lest indeed I find her on this side the spirit
home.
[For The Sunny South.]
THE WORK OF A BABY’S LIFE.
BY HULDAH HILL.
She was only a baby when she died. Do you ask
what work our baby did ? She made a new woman
of me. I had boasted of my dislike for children,
but when that little bundle of flannel, warm
and full of life, was placed in my arms, and the
new-made mother looked up and said, “Youare
an auntie now,” my heart bounded and I felt
indescribably responsible. An “auntie!” What
were the duties of the new relation ? Very soon
I found them out, for it fell to my lot to nurse
that little one through mimya night of suffering.
My woman's heart went out with a feeling that I
shall ever deem akin to maternity’, and my song,
my arms, were as soothing as the mother's breast.
How happy was I on beholding the first smile—
on discovering the first tooth ! Auntie was the
first word she spoke. At my- knee she learned
to trust her little feet. ’Twas auntie who held
her when the holy waters of baptism were poured
on her infant head.
For only a few happy years did we dare call
the little one ours; she had done her work; she
was taken home. Oh ! the grief that rent my
heart when she could no longer call me “auntie!”
Oh ! the agony of the moment in which her eyes
were closed by Death ! We laid her in the cem
etery, wreathed her grave with mocking gar
lands and came to our desolate home !
Four years of labor and love for a baby ! Could
I again spurn a child or scorn to caress one ?
No ! with that little one treasured above, my
sympathies are ever awake for children, my love
for them unbounded and my labor love, when
bestowed on one of these little ones. Whatever
work beside our baby may have accomplished. I
shall ever be thankful for the light she shed on
my life; for the better thoughts I've known, the
better deeds I've done, through baby's teaching.
Sometimes I grow weary and would lay down
the burden of life, asking. Wherefore?—what
good am I doing ? But the memory of the work
baby did in her short stay with us fills me with
hope again, and my task seems light; tor though
we may not see now. after awhile the reward will
come; it may be in the knowledge of having
cheered a fellow-creature or made the road less
rugged to some way-worn traveler like our
selves.
[For The Sunny South.]
“THE BRAVEST ARE THE TENDEREST.”
BY MRS. M. LOUISE CBOSSLEY.
It is a singular but interesting study—the ex
quisite affinity which some emotions of our
nature have with others of equal nobleness and
purity. The commingling of the most delicate
chemicals cannot surpass the synthetical combi
nation of these priceless but immaterial sub-
1 stances of the soul. While I do not think that
any effort of emotional synthesis could unite
: cowardice and tenderness into one indissoluble
body, I have never known a man who was truly
brave, in the best sense of the word, but his
nature was tender and sympathetic.
When our beloved and immortal Lee—God
bless him ! —walked over the battle-ground at
Malvern Hill, it was told me by one of his men,
who lav wounded himself upon that bloody field,
that he never saw more sympathy manifested by
a woman than was shown by his idolized chief
towards the men who had fallen under his leader
ship that day, and now lay before him, wounded,
dead, or dying. The great Southern champion,
just from the flush of victory over the defeated
foe, without one thought of the fresh laurels
about his brow, left his suite, and, alone, went
about among his fellow-men, to cheer and relieve
them wherever he could. With the tears stream
ing from his eyes, he here bends over a poor
wounded private in rags and tatters, and lifting
his head tenderly, puts the cup of water to his
lips; and while endeavoring to staunch the blood
of an ugly’ wound, speaks words of hope and
comfort to the sufferer, moaning so touchingly
in his pain. Over there, he bows by some dead
hero, fallen “with his face to the foe,” and
smoothing back the matted and gory’ locks from
the pallid face, reverently folds the iev hands
upon the pulseless breast and straightens the
stiffening limbs in the cold embrace of death;
then sadly passing on, now kneels beside one who
fell in a close encounter with his last enemy. The
soldier lifts his eyes to the pitying face of his
beloved General, who, with the tears still drop
ping down his bearded cheeks, tenderly presses
the clammy hand in his. and says in a low, quiv
ering voice: “ My friend, this is one of the heart
rending but inevitable results of war. You have
done your duty nobly and bravely; lift your
heart now to Him who can save, and He will
soon receive your spirit where there is no more
conflict and death."
••’Tis love, love, that mates the world go round.”
Though the earth is sadder for the loss of Rob
ert E. Lee. I thank God that we have known
and loved him. and that his life with us is a
precious and eternal memory ! Though we may
never look upon his like again, it is a sweet joy
to know that he is now safe where
“No wiDds of war will ever blow;”
that his “tender, crowned soul” is with God,
who is love—where no’envions enmity can ever
again vent its cruelty and malice against him.
and no Lost Cause break his great, loving heart.
BY H. R. R.
We have all heard of feminine inconsistency—
heard of it until we know it by heart; but we
have a word or two to say about masculine incon
sistency.
“Masculine inconsistency?” scornfully exclaims
some lord of creation. “My dear madame, you
are dreaming ! A more unheard-of thing ”
Dear sirs, have patience, and we will produce
our proofs. The inconsistency with which we
intend to deal at present relateth to the matter
of dress—woman's dress,—what man ever found
fault with his own dress? Our lord beginneth
to quail now; and well he may, for we have him
here, and he knows it!
But to the charge. A few years ago crinoline
came in fashion, and oh ! what a cry was raised
in the masculine world. Every man who could
wail, wailed and bewailed, and that most dis
mally. “Shocking!” “Indecent!” -‘Ungrace
ful!” “Unhealthy!” Oh! how they rang the
changes on the adjective. Papers and pictorials
; and illustrations were full of caricatures and
ludicrous allusions to the new fashion. But
having found a comfortable fashion for once in
her life, woman was not to be laughed out of it,
and she held on to her crinoline until within a
year or two, when they have been gradually
abandoned. And now what is the cry ? Is my
lord pleased? Not at all. “Women look like
, May-poles !” They “look as straight and stiff
1 as a pike-staff'!” Ungracefully slim!” “Their
dresses are so tight they can scarcely take a
j step !” etc. So much for inconsistency the first.
Trails came in fashion; but there was such a
■ wail from all masculinedom, that woman went
into short dresses forthwith, in the firm belief
| that she had one fashion which the males would
| approve. But lo! she was doomed to disap
pointment. The short dresses were “Horrid!”
“Frightful!” “Shameful!” Husbands hoped
i never to see their wives appear in such a dress.
| Brothers vowed to put their sisters in straight-
jackets if they were ever seen on the streets in
dresses above their shoe-tops ! “ There used to
be some enchantment about a lady’s foot, but
the short dresses had disenchanted it,” etc.
The Dolly Varden was introduced. Then every
man in the country sang “Poor old Dolly Var
den ” until their luckless wearers gladly dis-
I carded them, and rushed into redingotes and
bouffant styles, when lo! all newspaperdom rang
with woman’s folly and woman’s extravagance.
“When will women learn to dress sensibly?”
is the sigh of the masculine heart. When men
learn to be sensible!—when they pay’ as much
i attention to a sensibly dressed girl as to a fash
ionably dressed one. But does not every woman
know that such a time will never come? Does
she not know that not one of her accusers would
be seen on the street with a sensibly dressed
woman ? Not they, indeed ! Have we not heard
them, in the same breath in which they con
demned fashion, extol some fashionably’ dressed
woman ! “Any sensible man will prefer a sen
sibly’dressed woman.” Aj’e! any sensible man,
doubtless; but where is the said sensible man to
be found ? He is quite as scarce as Solomon’s
model woman, whose price was “far above ru
bies.” The fact is, he has not been made yet,
nor is he likely’ to be—for ayes, at least. A sen
sible man ! What a wonder such a phenomenon
would create in the feminine world! Would not
woman conclude that the millenium had come ?
We are not an advocate, nor have weever been,
for extravagance in dress, but we do think that
consistency is a jewel. And as for sensible dress
ing, why don’t they set us the example? Was
there ever anything more ridiculous than a swal
low-tail coat? Yet every man, big and little,
must wear one for a dress-coat. We want no
better opportunity for laughing than to see a
dapper little man in a swallow-tail coat and a
stove-pipe hat almost as tall as himself. What
is there sensible about a hat three times as tall
as necessary’, and stiff enough to make one die
of the headache? Sensible (!) isn't it? Yet the
wearers of these same hats are so fond of seeing
a sensibly’ dressed woman !
We remember an instance of this same lauda
ble desire. A friend of ours, who sported a stove-
' pipe, had been condemning the folly of our sex
in most unqualified terms. We felt rather badly’,
but took the matter quietly, as it is against our
creed to argue with the lords of creation. A few
days afterwards he came hnrrj’ing in, conjuring
us to “dress up,” “look our best,” etc., as he
had a friend to whom he wished to introduce us.
Sure of the fact that we were dressed “sensi
bly,” we announced our readiness to receive
any and all visitors to whom he might wish to
present us. He moved his chair restlessly, with
an uncomfortable, dissatisfied look. Evidently
something was wrong.
“What is the matter?” we asked innocently.
“Does'nt this dress suit you?”
“Oh! yes, I suppose it will answer; but—I
thought you had something better—something a
little more fashionable."
We saw our blunder, and hastened to correct
it. We mentioned a dress made in the aforesaid
condemned style.
“Oh! that will do admirably,” he said, with a
look of immense relief.
Again conjuring us to dress stylishly, he bade
us adieu; and leaning back in our chair with a
feeing of wonder and amazement, we sighed
audibly:
“O, inconsistency! thy name is—Tom, Dick,
and Harry!”
Jennie Collins, in commenting on some state
ments of a half informed doctor, says: “We
have not one woman too many’ in Massachusetts;
in the next place, they are more healthy’ than
men, and both facts can be proved by the report
of the city hospital, which received two thous
and and eighty-eight men, and in the same
period only one thousand one hundred and
thirteen women, although they are double in
number with half the pay. The next error of
Dr. Ames is the statement that manufacturing
and other kindred trade crafts are injurious to
health and morals in a greater degree than other
modes of life. This is contradicted by the
records at the State House, that will bear testi
mony that out of a hundred and fifty’ thousand
women, only one in seventy-five chargeable to
the State for support in sickness or old age is
from factories or shops. As for their morals,
another record will show that out of the appall
ing number of poor girls who are led away from
rectitude and seek redress from the State, very
rarely one comes from the factory or workshop.
A significant fact for themselves and their sur
roundings.
Mrs. Theodore Ouilette, of the Parish of St. •
Francis, N. B., died recently at the age of forty,
“ leaving a husband and twenty-two children to
mourn her loss.” It must have been very hard
for the poor woman to leave her little flock at
her age, but what an imm nse saving of sooth
ing syrup it would have been if she had left her
husband twenty years ago !
Why call him the “ groom ” as eight out of ten
people do ? A groom’s business is to look after
horseF. A bridegroom's business is to look
after his wife's mother.
When Solomon said that the “ glory of woman
was her hair,” we wonder if he suspected how
much “ glory ” would be bought for ten dollars ■
in our times !