The Abbeville banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1847-1869, 1860-02-16

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Of the woman about her, and we find it
diaicutHo sympathize with Hartwelrs in.
tatuation. Such is not the bosom that er-
ring, repcnting, loving human nature would
like to shed its tears upon. One would as
likely think of caressing the statue Of Miner .
va as Of petting such a self.sufficient female
AS for marrying her, lie would as soon
th'pF of marrying library edition of
the Spectator or Webster's Unabridged.
Such characters are admirable, estimable
without doubt, but we arc talking now of
lovaJle herones Of the herones which, as
we read, we can fancy standing beside US,
with their large, loving eyes, and long to
put our arms around and call friend, or, if
we chance TO be of the masculine sex,
by names yet swceter and more ten
der.
1t is not to be understood, that such
strong willcd, self reliant, intellectual wo-
men should never appear as heroines in
the page5 of the novel. Since such ex-
ist in reality, and are needed and hon
ored in society they should be sketched by
the story. writer, whose province it is to
give us faithful pictures of men and
nature, but they need not be made to figure
so conspicu!ously and constantly in tales
of fiction thus seeming to assum. a
superiority over others, whose hearts do
not happen to be starved by their brains.
There are plenty of women worth being
made heroines of, who are yet innocent
Of printers ink, ignorant of German,
and not at all addicted to metaphys-
les.
Let our novelists remember that the two
heroines best known and best beloved in
literature-the Ruth Of the Bible, and the
JEANNE Deans Of Scott-wcre sublime only
i'll womanly tenderness and patient, self.
forgetting love. Neither of these had anv
pretentions to intellectual superiority, yet
none have ever written or spoken of them,
but with the rcvcrent affection due TO true
and noble women. Who shall say that
they are not more lovable than those terri
bic, writing and philosophizng heroines
who sit, stern and stoical, in the Diogones
tub Of their own "wiIl' and can anavze
you love i'll the crucible. Of philosophy,
until it is reduced to an abstract idea9
AT the risk of having the inky forefip-
gers of my ssterlood shaken at Inc in
ire and Indignation, protest that con-
firmed, dyed-inthe wool blue stocking of
the independent type is not lovable or
marrinyeodie woman, either in fiction, or in
real life.s, Now, there are milder forms Of
the cutoethes ScrtJendi, when the disease
only runs into rhymed vcrsiales, or breaks
out into little Fanny Fernish eruptions
This is not dangerous, and slight friction
with marriage ring, generally effects a
cure. Many young damseIs fancy them
selves smitten with poetic ,turor when in
fact, they are only love,smitten, (the COR
dltions are somewhat analogous) or they
write because of the superAuous life, energy
and feeling that are in them and which
soon find natural and safe vent when home
duties and Affections: keep hands and heart
empl' yed. Such blue stockings as these
who wear their blue chiefly in tlier eyes,
are often quite lovabIe enough; but the
real Simon Pure-solemn, and decided as
the Declaration of independence, with not
a veslige Of graceful coquetry, or archness
in her angular nature, and who has existed
so long in an atmosphere of books and
manuscripts that it is fair to conclude she
has undergone metamorphosis, and that
her heart~is changed to a roll Of foolscap
and the blood in her veins to ArnoId's writ
! ing: fluid-deliver us from loving such
monstrous and unlovable anomalies We
would set them on a PEDESTAL to be adj
mired, perchance, but would never give
them. the rocking chair by the freside,
with rose, checked children to cling to them,
like the fruit that burdens vines, and keeps
them ".low and wise.." They should write
as many books and newspaper articles rs
they pleased, and we wonid praise them
and pay them, but we couldn't love them
and wouldn't marry them-thats clear
that's flat.
So much for the most recent typo OF
story and novel heroines, who with far
more individuality and strength Of charAc-
ter-are hardly more lovable than the in
sipidities of the old remances.
: 1t has been admitted that there are ,ex,
ceptions to the prevalence Of unlovable he.
4 roines, and Jeannie Deans Eas already been
4 named. Miss Austen, whose s.cl,aracters
unfold themselves as gradually and natural
.tly as the blossoming of rose, has given
US some seally~ delightful heroines--lively,
\ rank, affeetionats; hnlnan. The sensi bic,