The Portland daily press., 1882-05-16
The "Jolly GRIP in England.

Il6 WOIQ6u WuO COpy Vuo Woyo Va AASA toeJe
the Pail Mall Gazette) at best succeed in re-
sembling boys. The special habits and inter
ests of men, their athletic and sporting tastes,
their melancholy experience of what is called
slife," can no more be appropriated by
girl than our top-boots and riding-breeches
She only approaches that unnatural monster,
the boy who is aping man. I am not so old
or such misanthrope but that 1 find myself at
times among young people at dance or gar
den party. 1 see a handsome young fellow
from Aldershot talking to fine girl, the, pic
ture Of youth and grace. ''They are flirting,
hope, as they should be, says match-loving
old thing. Flirtingl my dear lady, he has been
telling her about that awfully jolly run with
the Quorn, don't you know. And now she is
asking him, with an anxious look, If it is real
~ true that No. is not fit.
For an hour, as I sat within hearing on the
bench, she has patiently committed to memory
the merits of barrack after barrack and station
after station-a form of feminine curiosity
which he has but languidly satisfied, though
he has no other topic with which to entertain
her. "Aldershot," says he, " is such an awful
ly jolly place, don't you know" "Is it real
ly?' says she, with feeling. II mean" says he,
"such jolly place to get away from" And she
knows who is bound to win the mile race unless
Jigger Mowbray can stand the training, which
is not to be thought OF, don't you know. And so
they 90 on, from mere habit, talking the talk
of the smoking room, or 80 much of it as can
be dribbled into the ears OF pure young girl.
By all that is sacred, glow with shame when
see beautiful woman thus put of her sex,
when she certainly can never put on ours.
TTTl NIxarx 80. ~ntx flrnoA nj N
regiment and the hunt, that they thus humble
themselves, that they SO disfgure and weary
themselves in laboriously ceasing to be women?
1t is not husbands, assuredly. they are seek
ing. Our young friend from Aldershot does
not trouble himself to flirt with girls; he has
not the remotest idea of marriage; nor, in
deed, has his fair partner, at least with the like
of him. She is not thinking OF fascinating him
at all; would, indeed, that she were! Mar
rage is an affair of carriages and horses; for
these she must look to older men, and she does
not like older men. Mol she is only filling her
appointed part-the awfully jolly girl-which
her society expects her to be. Dolly and OAR
ling, Judy and 10, have to do 1t, and SO must
she.
i wonder il she knows how little men really
care for this strange receptivity OF hers. To
the young fellow this girl, with her manly &C
quirements, just so far ceases to be woman
without advancing step toward man. She
listens to him as the fag at school listens to the
ant to him that the young 'un wears skirts and
has lips ruddier than fag. 1t is pleasant to
him; but not wholly to us elders and fathers.
Girls in my time expected us to treat them
that they very soon would be. If we could not
entertain them as women all the world over
love to be entertained, they turned to one anoth-
er and amused themselves When we sat with
sweet young thing in tho veranda, as the
band PLAYED the last notes of kathleen Nav
ourneen,', we had something, VOW, to talk
about besides cricket averages, the club cigars,
and the right cut of bulldogs ears And as
we never saw cigarettes in the lips OF our part
ners, it never occurred to usato smoke between
the dances.
have no turn for satire, but I love to watch
our social moods and to trace them to their
causes and effects. suppose the work began
with that wave of athleticism which OF late
has swept over the land, turning the heads OF
not few lads and importing some laugnable
customs; but, if its effect upon man was more
or less manly and wholesome, its effect indi-
rectly on women was, perhaps, more doubt
full gain. When the gymnastic idol was set up,
and the muscular type OF virtue became In, ne
girls to suppose it the whole duty OF woman.
Physically, it may be, it strengthened those
whom it did not slaughter outright. But as
the girl could, after all. only join in the new
the social position of the slower school" at a
cricket match. The jolly girl. in fact became
a fag. When athletics are the business of life,
the tone of society is naturally set by men.
Was not second cause at work in the trl-
umphs of the famous American beauty? This
fascinating being, doubt not on her own side
of the Atlantic has planted the germs OF new
feminine epochs. There was nothing OF the
playground or hunt about her; her important
discovery was the freedom of her sex. It may
be doubted if our ancient system, on this side
of the ocean, is duly prepared for such dash,
such originality, such angelic self-possession.
The type, however brilliant, is perilous one
to adopt For the American girl, who SO start
les us at home, has her own traditions and hab-
its. When she shook from her airy skirts the
conventions OF the Old World, she founded the
conventions of the New. At home she reigns
still, and imposes her law on men, concerning
herself but little about mess-rooms and gum
clubs Young ladies, you who think OF adopt
ing her adorable freedom Of manner, be sure
that you also adopt her shrewd and original
spirit.
But, be the causes whatever they may, the
result is curious social inversion. The rela-
tive place of men and women is reversed in this
rapid and dazzling world. Ofold, the idea was
that in things social the woman was mistress,
queen and leader. Men, in her presence,
we're to study her tastes and submit to her law.
IF thew could not exist without tobacco, they
might 90 elsewhere; if they wanted to be kill
ing something, to a shooting party; and the
matches discussed in a drawing-room had moth
ing to do with Lords.