Ashtabula telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1874-1880, 1874-10-31

4
1898, one of the years of terrors Of
the French Revolution, there wert
thirteen hundred suicides in the city
of Versailles.
NJ. Papillon also quotes from an,
other writer a most singular occur
renee which took place in Paris in
IS46. Four hundred women were
busy at work in factory, one day,
just as usual. But on this particu-
lar day one of the work-women sud-
denly 'turned pale, lost conscious
ness, and fell to the floor" What
next? No sooner had this poor crea-
ture fallen down in a fit, than the
other women, seeing her, began to
fall down in fits too, so that in two
hours thirty of them had lost con-
sciousness and tumbled over in ex-
actly the same manner. On the
fourth day as many as one hun
dred and fifteen of these unhappy
work women had the strange fit,
and were seized with suffocation,
dizziness, and convulsions.
These epidemic tantrums appear
to be particularly Frenchy. Fol
lowing NJ. Papillion's paper till still
further, we find that so late as 1861
an epidemic of Mysteries passed
the young girls of the parish Mont
martre. A number of them were
preparing for their first communion.
On the first day of their "prepara-
tion season of religious secluslon,"
threeof them lost their senses and
took convulsions in church. Next
day three more girls were seized
in the same way, on the third day
some more, and on the fourth day
thirty-two of them were suddenly
attached by this strange fit. On
confirmation day, just as the Arch
bishop was about to proceed with
the ceremonies, fifteen girls gave
scream and fell to the floor in con-
vulsions. Our author dosen't say
what measures the Archbishop and
reverend fathers took to break up
this epidemic tantrum among the
young ladies, but probably if one of
them had sought for DR.. Boer-
haave's remedy, and rushed in upon
the hysterical maidens with a red
hot poker, the alarming symptoms
would have disappeared like magic.
In medieval times, ladies who
took tantrums claimed and were be-
lieYed to be possessed of saints or
demons, as the case might be. In
either case, whether possessed with
saints or demon, on the Scotchman's
principle of 'tgude Laird, guide
Deevil," people had a wholesome
awe of them, and so encouraged tan
trums, and these possessed ladies re-
garded themselves as characters
privileged to do as they pleased.
In Scotland, not so very many years
ago, insane women were looked up
to somewhat in the light of seereses,
and in the minds of the common
people, their crazy rawlings were in
vested with much of the authority
of prophecy. 1t is rather curious
how even common people could get
it into their skulls, that a poor,
ignorant, crazy fool could see into
the future, when a sane, sound,
thoughtful person couldn't; but A.
any rate that was what these "can-
ny Scots" thought.
The modern world has outgrown
the belief in spirit-possession, at
least the sort of spirit-possession of
the middle ages. Also, we don't
believe that people are prophets just
because they are crazy. In these un-
believing and heathenish times, Ia
dies with tantrums don't call it spir-
its any more. They call it nerves.
Drat nerves!
Women who take tantrums don't
claim that they ought to be petted
and humored because they possess
spirits, but that they ought to be
petted and humored on account of
their "nerves." 1t is nothing but a
trace of the old superstition still lin
gering in the bones of the gentle sex.
"Nerves," so-called, are the excuse
of nine-tenths of all the feminine
peevishness, feminine unreasonable
ness, feminine laziness, feminine sell
fishness, and feminine cruelty in the
world. If woman nearly dies with
dyspepsia in consequence of tight
corsets, heavy suppers and green tea,
what does she do but call it 'nerves?"
If she can't have her own way about
some foolish whim, and in conse-
quence gives way to a fierce, frantic
ebulition of temper, and keels over
with Mysteries as fnishment,it isn't
feminine foolishness and feminine
cussedness that makes her do it. Oh,
no! It's nerves, bless your heart. If
she pouts for week at a time, and
sets the whole house in a broil with
her ill-nature and unreasonableness,
and beats her helpless children cru
ely one moment, and ruins them
with over indulgence the next, and
makes everybody about her wish in
general that Old Nick had her, she
is not to blame for it; no indeed! 1t
is her uncomfortable nerves, which
can't bear anything at all. She can
help it. In every single instance wo-
men could control and prevent these
tantrums, if they want
ed to.
But they don't want to.
1t is nothing more or less than a
of the old superstition that
women ought to be petted
and humored because a spirit has tax
en- possession of them. And of the |
two, am not sure but that the old |
of spirit-possession is
much more satisfactory than the new
one about nerves. 1t would be ever
so much nicer 20 be able to lay
woman's ugly tantrums upon the
shoulders of a supernatural power, |
Tantrums are not womanly, and
God knows they are not pretty.
They are net a sign of a superior
nature, but of a wllllullg ,wgy
weak, ignorant and bady balanced
=,
The oueerest thing in the world
obout -,1o,,,o,,- wbo have nerves Is