The Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1837-1867, 1862-10-10
The English DOwager.

"To say the truth, have been holding the
pen over my paper purposing to write de-
scriptive paragraph or two about the throng
on the principal parade of bennington, SO ar
ranging it as to present sketch of the Brit
ish out-of-door aspect on morning walk of
gentility; but find no personages quite suf-
fciently distinct and individual in my memo
ry to supply the materials of such panora-
ma. Oddly enough,the only figure that comes
fairly forth to my minds eye is that of dow
ager, one of hundreds whom used to mar
vel at, all over England, but who have scarce
ly a representative among our own ladies of
autumnal life, so thin, careworn and frail, as
age usually makes the latter. l have heard
good deal of the tenacity with which Eng
lish ladies retain their personal beauty to a
late period of life; but (not to suggest that
an American eve needs use and cultivation
before it can quite appreciate the charm of
) English beauty at any age) it strikes me that
an English lady Of fifty is apt to become a
creature less refined and delicate, so far as
her physique goes, than anything that We
Western people class under the name of wo-
man. She has an awful ponderosity of frame,
not pulpy, like the looser development of our
fat women, but massive with solid beef and
streaky tallow; SO that Ohough struggling
manfully against the idea) you inevitably
think of her as made up Of steaks and sir
loins. When she walks her advance is ele-
phantine. When she sits down, it is on q
great round space of her makers footstool
where she looks as if nothing could ever move
her. She imposes awe and respect by the
muchness of her personality, to such de-
: gree that you probably credit her with far
, greater moral and intellectual force than she
can fairly claim. Her visage IS usually stern
not always positively forbidding, yet calmly
terrible, not merely by its breadth and weigh,
of feature, but because it seems to express SC
much well-founded reliance, such acquaint.
ance with the world, its tolls, troubles and
dangers, and such sturdy capacity for tramp
ling down foe. Without anything posi-
lively salient, or actively offensive, or,indeed
unjustly formidable to her neighbors, she ha.
the effect of seventy-four gun-ship in time
of peace; for, while YOU assure yourself thai
there is no real danger, you cannot hell
thinking how tremendous would be her on
set, if pugnaciously inclined, and how futile
the effort to inaict any counter injury. Sh.
: certainly looks tenfold-nay, hundredfolt
better able to take care of herself than oul
t slender-framed and hagsard womankind; bu
have not found reason to suppose that th'
) English dowager of fifty has actually greater
: courage, fortitude, and strength of character
/ than our women of similar age, or even
tougher physical endurance than they. Nor
D. ally, she is strong suspect, only in society
and in the common routine of social affairs
II and would be found powerless and timid il
% any exceptional strait that might call for Ell
e ergy outside of the conventonalities ami,
which she has grown up.
You can meet this figure in the street, an
4, live, and even smile a, the recollection. Blu
u conceive of her in the ballroom, with tn
bare, brawny arms that she invarisbly dis
t. plays there, and all the other correspondent
development, such as is beautiful in the ma
den blossom, but spectacle to howl at
such an oyerblown cabbage-rose as this.
Yet somewhere in this enormous bul
y, there must be hidden the modest, violet-ni
10 ture of girl, whom an alien mass of eartl
" illness has unkindly overgrown for an En-
of lish maiden in her teens, though very seldol
Ct SO pretty as our own damsels, possesses, ,
,d say the truth, certain charm of half bio
+ som, and delcately folded leaves, and tend
womanhood shielded by maidenly reserve
a with which, somehow or other, our America
girls often fail to adorn themselves during
=. appreciable moment. 1t is pity that Il
- English violet should grow into such an ou
u rageously developed peony as have attem
ted to describe. wonder whether middl
% aged husband ought to be considered as
gally married to all the accretions that ha
overgrowE the slenderness of his bride, sin
in
- he led her to the altar, and which make h
80 much more than he ever bargained for !!
~ Is it not sounder view of the case, that {
matrimonial bond cannot be held to inclu
, the three-fourths of the wife that had no e
:, istence when the ceremony was performed
And as a matter ofconscience and good me
!. ais, ought not an English married pair to
~. w sist upon the Silver Wedding at the end
- twenty-five years, in order to legalize and n
., o tually appropriate that corporeal growth
which both parties have Individually col
into possession since they were pronounc
,ed one flesh ?"-Hawthorne in October Atdnt
~ e The prospects of the coming fashie
able season are not very encouraging to
all worthy pater tamilias who has to foot
n a bills. There is no symptom ofretrenchme
tv on the part of the ladies and their oracles, t
~ milliners. While the materials of which DIRE
n'' es are made are higher in price than ever
ing fore, the demands of fashion require an in
for dinate amount of material for each dress.
So TThe travelling season at the VIII
,,f Mountains is nearly over. The hotels