The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1878-04-03
Managing MANN As.


Managing mammas' is a phrase of satiric
import applied TO mothers who are presumed
to be over ANXIOUS and unduly ambitious to
make desirable matches for their daughters.
1t is employed so vaguely and so indiscrim-
inately as TO have very little meaning and
very little justice but it always conveys, or
is at least intended to convey, degree of
reproach. Hardly any woman with mar
riageable daughters, whether. one or several,
can escape the imputation of being man.
ager. Not to be so labelled or libelled-the
words as used are nearly synOnymouS-She
must keep aloof from her daughter or daugh-
tiers in society, and wholly neglect the duty
which she manifestly owes them. Even
then it is questionable if she will not be
accused of doing more in a matrimonial way
by appearing to do less; it is only deeper
art, it will be said it is some new ruse she
is practicing to render more certain what she
assumes to be Indifferent to. Thus whether
she manages or do not manage, whether
she likes management or detests it, she is by
common report manager all the same.
Every mother of any fineneSs who has
daughters is society is naturally sensitive to
the suspicion to which she is aware she is
| necessarily liable. She lnstincityely shrinks
/ from it. While she knows she can not shun
/ it, and is therefore placed in perpetually
awkward and embarrassing position. BY
trying to avoid it, many mothers go to the
opposite extreme, surrendering such super
vision and direction Of their girls as are
simply prudent and proper, and they often
have occasion to rue their premeditated re-
missness.
The people who talk so much of managing
mammas would seem to believe that the first
obligation of a mother, when she has a mar
riageable daughter, is to remain in absolute
ignorance of her daughters masculine &C
( quaintances and associates, to have no pref
erence for men of character, refinement and
reputation over men frivolous, vulgar and
dshouorable, and to be totally regardless of
the kind of husband she may elect
Should a mother fail to show interest in
her girls matrimonial prospects, should she
permit her to be introduced to young men
of soiled name or of no worth, she will be
far more sharply criticised, and very deserv-
eddy, than she can be for any amount of the
most active and obvious management. She
has ever to steer between Scylla and Charyb
dis; if she avoids one, she is pretty certain
to go to pieces on the other. She must choose
between the. entire recklessness of her
daughters welded happiness. and the name
of an unflagging contriver and manipulation
in her connubial interest. If she be true
woman and a good mother, she will
not hesitate. Her girls safety, estab
lishment in life and future con-
tentment will prevail with her over any
apprehension of scandalous or censorious
tongues. To be manager is, after all,
errOr-to style it such-in the right dlrec-
ton. ANY mother had better be too careful
than too careless, had better take her daugh-
ter's peace and prosperity too much to heart
than too little had better be very earnest and
untiring in producing a certain con ugal re-
suit than needless in observing the drift of
compromising circumstances
Managing mammas are generally accused
of exerting their peculiar ability aud infu-
eDce in behalf of (expected) rich sonsin-law,
irrespective of any other consideration. Were
this true, many of the harsh things said of
them might be extenuated, if not excused;
but it Is not true of any number of mothers,
!, who are called managers when they are
, suspected of wanting any kind of son-in-law.
So many men, especially very young men
are afflicted with cOnceit 'coXcOmbry, or
egotism, or all three together that they are
apt to imagine that mothers cherish designs
upon them, when the mothers would not
annex them to the family on any account.
Rebuked for their pretensiOn or inso-
lence they comfort their wounded van
ity by declaring that their treatment is due
to their unwillngness to propose, as was
evidently the maternal determination that
, they should They are fond OF closing their
expressed grievance by asserting every man S
right TO choose his own mother-in-law, and
their mistaken resolution not TO be dra-
. gooned into matrimOny by any woman
|, alive. They seldom have any faith in their
! own ayerments, for they know far better
than they could be persuaded TO confess that
!. as sons-in-law of any mamma, managing or
, otherwise, they would be supremely ineligi-
BILE.
Most of the talk and cheap satire about
managing mammas Is in this country down
rightimpertinence. Women who are really
: such, in the full and offensive meaning
ordinarily attached to the words are not
admirable nor always estimable, though
something might be said in their defense.
, But there are really very few of them. The
majority are coinage of the brain or
creatures of cynicism. The men who
imagine that mothers and their daughters
are angling for them would be less unjust
, and less foolish if they knew that neither
those mothers nor those daughters suppOs-
! ing them 70 be addicted to mari to piscatorial
: sports, could be induced to fish in such
shallow streams Instead of too many man.
aging mammas, in the loose, merely satiric
, sense, we have not enough of them in the
, republic. American mothers, as rule. are
: VIGOROUSLY careless about their daughters
} matrimonial prospects and possibilities.
They need, in rational way, 10 manage
more than they have done or are likely to do
i'm many wears to come