New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1876-11-18
LIFE IN PARIS.
~ ANCIENT AND MODERN TIMES.

BLONDE HAIR.
-, prGuIAR CORRESPONDENT or TIE TRIBuNE.l
PARIS. Oct-Silenee is gathering by degrees
.round the grave Of George Sand: 1t IS the tatai
law. Fashions in literature pass away IKE other
fashions 1t was quite in vain that George SAND
touched religion philosophy, and politics with OAR
49, hand all the stir she made has already sub
,i5ed It seems that authors nowadays write from
the very currents and waves of the time, they are
40 soon borno into fOrgetfulness. The widow OF
Edgar ouinet attempted an edition of the works OF
that thinker, poet. philosopher, and historian, but
she was forced to give il up while in progress, since
there were no subscriptions. The Frenehman is SO
constituted that he is unwilling to render homage
except TO the high peaks He subscribes Tor victor
Hugo and for Lamartibe he also pays his money 10
get Alfred de Musset and Bazac but the others are
very soon abandoned for the newcomers ana YET
what eloquent pages there are of George Sand
what marvellous landscapes, what throbbmgs OF the
heart! This famous woman made one mistaks-that
of attempting TO rapple with socialistie ideas.
Amateur philosophers have often desired TO force
opeu the door of politics in order that women might
enter. They have summoned her 10 the platform
not seeing in their blindness that the true platform
Of woman is the hearthstone. They say that it is
necessary to berate her, that is to throw her into
ell the preiudces of public life. They cry out that
woman requires place in society. Has she not
already the first place, she who watches over the
cradle
plato. who dreamed aloud-PlatO who is the wis
dom of antiquity TO the dreamers of to-day-says
that women in courage and intelligence, are men,
He demanded for them the study of music the
sports of the gymnasium he wished to see them
warriors and legislators "Let the women of our
soldiers be common among all, no one hylng apart.
with any single one. The children will then be in
fborf In fs
nor these their parents"
Philosophers have done well in securing to woman
IN the name of civil and religious right, the pre-
emnence of the mothers place; bat they dare not
90 so far as to accord TO her the privilege of making
laws and commanding armies. Apollo-a luminous
philosopher since he now calls himself the sun"
has determined in his quality of great legislator
The powers of man and woman. Has he not said
"Man is the father of Humanity, woman only ITS
nurser Also Homer, the greatest of poets after
Apollo well understood the duties of woman " Ii
the mother wishes 10 tie the knot of second
mptials,D SAYS Minerva to Telemachus, "let her re-
turn to her father house. 1t is there that the
suitors must go to asl 'or her hand" And Telema
ehus. in turn say ais mother: " Return to thy
apartment; resuu. Y occupations, the linen and
the distaff; direct ghe industrious hands of thy
womenp
In fact, after Penelope returned to her home, did
she not recover all the respect due to her as woman
wife, and motheri Xenophon has said that within
her own mansion woman is sovereign; there she
honOs those who merit it there she cOFrects those
who disobey the family law. IL we search further
back in antiquity. if go to HesiOd, we find that
admirable image which describes woman as between
man and the ox,-the union of the two in communion
with nature.
Therefore George Sand did well to write romances,
snd therefore she would perhaps have done better
for herself and those belonging to her if she had
stayed at home. But Genius has its destiny 50
much the worse for a woman If she is lowered with
the gift of writing romaneesl
It's long time since any fables have been in
vented in Paris. Too many stories and too much
history are made there; but, the other hand
the French spirit is not lost, for find it again at
San Francisco, in the fables of NJ Abel Laroche
This gentleman is a Partisan Of the genuine Paris
whom the chances of things have led to Americas but
In changing his country he has not changed his
tongue, for he speaks the supreme French of diet
tanti and men of letters Since he has the good
sense not to write an essay upon the apologize
neither will PROFOUND any theory thereupon. The
fabuhst limits himself to these eight lines, at the
head of his work 81 shall not spread myself over
long preface the obligatory vestbule Of all literary
structures shall not speak of the nature of the
apologize nor Of its qualities, of which, moreover
no one is ignorant. But here is a little work, the
fruit of my leisure evenings, which now appears in
the ambitious form Of book. did not design this
honor for it: some friends have decided otherwise
let their will be done! Go then, my verses. take
your fight; and since you are not pretenfious
enough to mount too high, shall the less fear your
brilliant fall p
We know how malicious was the genial Latontaine
under all his geniality. u. Abel Laroche uses the
slzof.o To- ia
his fables are told with the charm of abandon. He
forces neither his words nor his images, he gives
proof Of his literary culture bat never of pedantry
One seems 10 be listening to a man of the world who
knows his world 1t is the gossip of sage who
never speaks of his wisdom, for the moral of his
fables always strikes in the right place. Ii Lafon-
tame and Florian veritable masters in the charm
ing art of apologize could read to-day the fables of
NJ. Abel Laroche they could not help exclaming
more than once: Hold have forgotten this"
Our distant countryman has only written these
fables in the eatT actes of his life. i know some
Of his more serious WORKSHOP instance, de-
hghtfu family the brightest expression of which is
sbeautful young daughter of eighteen, who has all
the graces and charms Of poem, to say nothing OF
her singing like AdelIna Patti
And she is blonde
1t must be confessed, The Americans send the
iovelest blondes to us in Paris.
The Nineteenth Century will be decidedly the Age
Of Blondes, as the Sixteenth Century was,-as the
Seventeenth Century was the age of periwigs-as
the Eighteenth Century was the age of powder. 1t
settled: all women are blondes those of the South
equally with those of the North. Nestor Roqueplan
has said =" God gave blonde bair to the Northern
women, to console the men for the absence of the
sun" AT present, the Southern women blonde them
selves by virtue Of the Eau des F6es or by simply