The Hickman courier., 1877-06-29
SOCIETY COLUMN.
CUTS AND onrrloI.As ron OUR own ooor.
Editress, Maud Mueller.

SOME criticisms OF our home society its
peculiarities, eccentricities, and custom 5.
from the pen of a female, may result in
good, though it may displease some moth
ers some n hers who q lily imagine that
kindly indulgence to sons and daughters
is true culture. Editors, because nearly
always men, are generally too courteous
in their comments upon home society
they compliment or say nothing. To
my thinking, you could not better fill a
column OF your paper, than by a true ex-
hibit OF our society shortcomings. The
fufire of our children, boys anu girls, is
the stake at issue. If without wouuding
any, can sufficiently offend some moth
ers, by this writing, to provoke q self
criticism, good to our society is accom-
plished. Promising to shield the CouR
IER, from any such awakened female ire.
and to assume all the hsresponsibility, here's
for them. First, then, say, that Hick-
man and Fulton
SOCIETY IS DEGESFRATING,
and has been since the war why? The
cause is not found in the changed institu-
tions caused by the war. Let no one gay
that our women had more time, better ad-
vantages, or more inducements, to be
ladies', and to act the lady, before the war
than now. Oar schools, churches. moral
charitable inteiiectAl, and other socie-
ties are as good nov as then In my
opinion the cause is found in the fact,
that
coAauSIsFIc iUsA TREY Ais,
and that fathers a6i' mothers, without
weighing the consequences, are educa.
ting, and instilHng these mischevous
aud ultimately ruinous ideas into their
childrens social life. The idea that a
person is necessarily the equal of his
neighbor is false in every particular.
Animal creation, much less progressiv e
humanity, rejects the idea. l say, then,
that
CLASS DIsTISCTIoHs,
are absolutely necessary TO the we'll being
of society. and that children should BE- 80
taught at home. Let not some unequal
toad, conscious Of infsriority, charge the
editress of this column with being an ar
ristocrat. In some respects l am, aud
in some future issue may explain, but In
this Introductory column, my purpose is
to attack not defend, to expose faults Of
the general school and to avoid personal
tiles. = The field l have mappGf out ii
broad 3nd comprehensive, for L assure
GARDEN GROWN 10 WEEDS.
Sweet flowers are withering, and Lowell!
little vines are twining their delicate
tendrils around poisonous barks anC
deadly upas trees Il needs the prunin.
hook Of love, the hoe of culture, the rak'
of emulation, and indeed all the impie-
ments of intelligence, morals and religion
to save 1t from waste and ruin. The sur
roundings are alarming. Could picture
be drawn, in the which parents could se'
their children as ethers see them, il
process Of degeneration that is bearin
their daughters down in the scale of so
cieis they would rscoil with fear anC
. trembling. l lay it dswn as a philosophi
axiom of womanhOoi. that the natura
tendency Of a woman is to degenerate
The rarrst flower, neglected, dies, or sea
son by season grows cOarser, and in g m
instances in time pOisOns the hand tina
touches it. Oh, how many of our lit
girls are growing up neglected AM
those too, whose parepts are capable, bu
who from over-kindrsss, are permitting
the tares, and nettles and thorns Of GU
society TO grow up rank around them
/ choking out their neral life and socia
culture. Oh, mothers think of thisl
MOTHERS OF HICKMAN,
permit their daughters to accept compaDy Y
their graud-mothers would have turne,
from their doors This is so, and il is de
lnoralizjng Our daughters are faml liza
with Bill, John, "Dick, and Jim,
and spondiugly the boys reciprocal
the compliment with SAL aud Jane.
and ''Mollie." And fa:hers and mother
tolerate il! The yoang MAJ, he COY, :
ill-bred as TO address "a young lady {
even little Miss, afer such manner,
too i'll bred to be received into you
houses, and should be shown the door.
The errors leading to this unfortuna
degeueracy, are multitudinous, but
star, | say the commencing point w
little
MISSES BETWEEN and lG.
Unwittingly mothers tolerate promiscr
Gus associations. The irretrievahly ruin
GUS line of demarkatiOn to girlhOod,
familiarity" wOuld not have lit
girls Iaeld with icy coldness .5om Il
warmth Of genial companion ship. Oh, n
, But, those surroundings which oblitera
cltss distinctions in their young minds
would have them shun as the charm
house Of social death. The girl "
grows into womanhoOd under the inf
euce of such associate can never be
true lady. Such associations may be r
, spectacle, ehargeabls with no crimes
moral defiec,ions, yet it bIunts the your
mind to the.nicer sensibilities witho
which there eau be no polite cultuI
Schools, colleges, nor wealth, can ev
efface it. This social communism mt
be extinguished. Look at it's blight
effects in Hickman and Fulton coun
Are Hickman young ladies of this d'
: pure, innocent, pretty, sweet faced
5 they are, the equals in polite culture
the young ladies Of 20 years ago? Cou
they charm aud en,erlain in the drawi
rooms of the best society of the larg
! cities, as their mothers did, % years ag