The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1878-04-20

charges are necessarily made against
American women, particularly those
who live in cities, and much of then
physical fragility and most of their all.
ments are ascribed to such cause. They
are compared or contrasted with Eu.
ropean women, who are ever paraded
as their antipodes, hygienically, and re-
ported as taking every sort of outdoor
exercise. Many of us, no doubt, have
come to believe these stories, partly
from mere force of repetition, and
partly from lack of opportunity to dis
prove them.
The truth is that American women,
whatever they may have done or failed
to do hitherto, now exercise a great
deal, and are so very fond of fresh air
that they will not do without it. No
people, unless the better class of En-
glish, so insist on pure air as we do. 1t
is absolutely indispensable to us. We
will have it at any price; we will sacri-
flee deal of convenience and comfort
to secure it, The French, Italians,
Spanish. and Germans care far less for
it than we. When their climate will
allow, they like to dine and seek pleas
ure under the sky; but they are not
prejudiced, after our fashion, in favor
of ventilation, as their residences, halls,
and theaters abundantly testify. They
can breathe with satisfaction an atmos-
phere that we cannot and would not en-
dure.
As to exercise, such as walking, rid
ing on horseback, and the like, only the
educated and well-to-do English women
assume to compete with our women
In fact, we believe that the Americans,
particularly the city bred, walk more
than their English sisters. In London
and other large towns of Great Britain
these hardly go anywhere on foot, de-
pending on conveyance of some kind
almost entirely, while American women
here, in Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago,
San Francisco, and other cities, walk
miles without thinking anything of it.
1t is in the main our city women, who
are addicted topedestrian performances,
not our country women who have little
TO tempt them forth; our rural regions
being for the most part devoid of the
smoothness, finish, and attractiveness
of English landscape. English women
do their walking in the country; Ameri-
can women do most of theirs in town.
because country life is the larger and
better portion of life in England, while,
until recently, it has been rather Incl
dental with us. OF late, however, our
women have begun to spend three, four,
and five months of the year out of the
city, and to employ much of their time
on foot. They can now be seen every
season making long pedestrian excur-
sions by the lakes, at the seaside, near
quiet hooks, and among the mountains
The Latin or the German women are
generally as disinclined to walk in the
country as in town 1--WE except, of
course, the peasantry and the lower
classes), driving well-nigh invariably
when they want outdoor exercise.
We are told unremittingly of the
feats of English women in the Tyrol,
Switzerland, Northern Italy, and other
high districts, and that they put to
shame the fair, but pale, puny Ameri-
cans, who look with envy and amaze
ment at the feminine British mountain
GERS. This may have been; it probably
was so, once, at least to degree, though
it is not so now; nor has it been for the
last fifteen or twenty years. American
women have grown to be remarkable
pedestrians and climbers, and very
sturdy ones, too, as tourists in the En-
gadine, the Rhetian Al ps, the valleys of
ChamOuniX and Zermatt, the region
oh hA Ttn1 1nl-n
passes can bear witness. Who has not
seen American maidens and matrons
doing the Jardin, the Grands Mulets,
the Corner Graf, the Tete Noire, alpen-
stock in hand, when English maidens
and matrons were borne on chairs, or
mules, or ponies? The sight is not at
all uncommon, and is growing less I'M
common every season. American wom-
en- are built for excursions and ascen-
sions, it may be said, being slight, nerv-
Gus, elastic, and enduring, while the
English woman, prone, after her youth
has gone, to stoutness, phlegm, and
sluggishness, cannot conveniently cope
with rough ways and snowy sleeps.
tits too late to arraign American wom-
en- as breed of invalids, hostile to ex-
ercise, outdoor life, and physical de-
velopment. They have ceased to fol-
low the foolish and harmful habits of
their mothers and grandmothers. The
members of this generation at least
have educated the body; have come to
regard health as one of the first essen
tials. They have learned, many of
them, to skate, to swim, to row, and
each year more and more are learning
these things. They have started on
new courses; they are truly ashamed of
their past, and will so use the future
that their British cousins must be alert
not to be outstripped in the race for
physical well-being.-N. Y. Times.
A Living GlyptOdOn.