The Potter journal and news item. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1872-1874, 1873-09-24
Sl.75 A YEAR


OF the steerage. Certainly one of
them got into the rigging. Being in
the stern. which sunk first, they hard
ly had time to escape. But this was
not true of the women in the cabin.
They had the same chance of life as
the men. They came on deck, or
might have done 50. They were
lashed to the rigging. For some of
them everything was done that dc
votion could Go, and one man died
beside her rather than leave his bride,
though entreated by her to save bis
own life.
To US this awful catastrophe sug-
gests lesson of direr import than
any one mans careleSsness or any
one cOmpany's recklessness. Our
women are brought up to be physic-
ally feeble and incapable. There is
no reason why a woman should be
sicklier than man. Her different
organization is no excuse for it. In
deed, of the two. the female posses
ses the strongest vitality in plants,
among the lower animals and in in
fancy. 4 vigorous pine tree viii
produce a redndance of the pistil-
late cones; depauperate one can
nourish only the staminate catkins
Statistics Of three countries prove
that boys succumb to diseases more
readily than girls during their child
hood. We have never heard that
among savages the women are less
hardy or healthy than the men. Does
any one believe that among cabin
full of EsquimauX or Modocs there
would have been mot one woman
saved?
1t Is one of the saddest blunders
Of our modern civilization that it dis
eliminates against woman's health,
while assuming to spare them. /.
should be the aim in the culture Of
the human race to secure to our men
all the best qualities Of women and
to ouT women all the best qualities Of
men. Physical strength is one of the
grandest possessions Of man, because
it is The foundation Of mental and
moral power. The education which
oisparages it III women is radically
wrong. Our boys are growing up TO
he athletes and our girls TO be m
valids. \ young man who cannot
march from twenty to forty miles III
a day is regarded with disdain. 4
Young woman who can do it is
prodigy. These things ought not 50
to be. The trouble is in a vicious
public sentiment. which thinks it de
grading for a girl to run barefoot,
like q boy. to be colored by the sun,
TO ride and shoot and fish and swim,
in short. TO live out Of doors and feel
as friends the wind and the rain, the
sunshine and the frost. Unless the
present vicious culture Of girls he
( corrected we shall have in q genera
ton or two. if We have it not already,
in the civilized variety OF the human
race. the delicate" health Of Its fe-
males developed asa genuine instance
Of what Darwin calls secondary sex
nal characters. as constant as the
name in the male lion OF he penciled
feathers in the female Hamburger
fowl.
The strength Of women at the crisis
of their life depends on their physi-
eai culture while children. Let pa
rents be no more ashamed of their
girls brown faces and fists than Of
their boys. Let them train. and
clothe them 50 that they can run and
climb and care for and protect them
selves. Let them take them with
their brothers into the harvest field.
/ A boy is not ashamed Of work: no
more should be 4 girl. The refine
ment that shuts a girl ont Of Gods
sunshine and allows her no roughcr
work indoors than to embroider
worsteds, or tap ivory keys. or dust
marble mantel, i refining her OF
/ the face of the earth TO give place to
the daughters of the servants in the
kitchen. Their coarse work is heal
thy and honorable. We honor it
and among our occasional contribu-
tors there is hardly one of whom we
feel more proud than of woman-s
lady-who Is not ashamed to earn
her living as cook and honsemaid,
working for months wages.
Natures Lessons
Tf,ara i a IesSop i'm each flower