The new dominion. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 1876-1904, 1884-09-06

women" said gentleman of this city.
recently returned from visit to Caps
Cod, lit exists in the peninsular vii
lages of Massachusetts, villages which
depend on the fisheries for the support oil
their inhabitants Nowhere else in all
New England will one see so high an
Average of female beauty, especially in
symmetry of form and freshness OF
complexion, as is noticeable among the
young girls of these Cape Cod fisher
mons towns, girls ranging from fifteen
to twenty years of age. But it will not
take one long to discover the startling
and melancholy fact that if this girlish
beauty and freshness is unusual and
unexpected, it is also only too apparent
that its duration is brief The change
produced in these girls by the lapse Of
a few years Is painful in the extreme.
No matronly graees are to be seen
among them after their girlhood days
are past. The charming middle stage
Of maturing womanhood. between the
freshness and buoyaney of the girl OF
twenty and the woman of thirty-five or
forty, is entirely absent The height
ened color of the cheeks is gone. The
eyes are sunken and wear a constant
look of sadness and anxiety. Gray hair
10 heads over which a score and halt
Of yearsshave scarcely passed, and deep
lines in faces which should show no
trace of age for twenty-five years to
come, are rather the rule than the
exception. These women, besides suf-
fering from all the inevitable sorrows
which fall to woman's lot, no matter in
what station she may be placed, have
an added intense and perpetual sorrow
all their own. Theirs is life of CON
tinual suspense and anxiety which is al
most certain in time TO be embittered
by an overwhelming grief.
"The most obtuse observer needs moi
to ask the cause of this lack of complete
matronly beauty among those women
whose budding days open with the
greatest promise of a superb physical
womanhood, and for the utter extinc.
ton of that light-heartedness and
brightness which marked their girlish
life. The cause suggests itself at once
to one who sees the congregations OF
women on the benches aud in the quiet
streets of the sleepy villages. He will
notice occasionally feeble old man
among them, generally supported on
the arm of some female companion,
who, most likely, carries ON her other
arm a chubby-faced child of lusty lungs.
But in these groups, or anywhere about
the village, the observer will look in
vain for the presence of males between
the lettering years of these relics of the
past and the prattling days of baby
hood. 1t is the fishing season, and
there are no men or boys on shore.
Their smacks are tossing on the treach-
erous waters Of the fishing banks, and
their return, if they return at all, is as
uncertain as the weather, which forms
the one great subject of conjecture and
apprehension among the villagers.
Husbands, sons, fathers, brothers and
sweethearts are somewhere out on the
bosom of the sea, probably homeward
bound, perhaps steering for still more
distant waters, perhaps struggling for
life among the waves. Fair weather
keeps hope warm in many an anxious
woman's heart; the bowling northeaster
chills it with doubt and despair. Con
stantly watching by day, waking in the
night to listen to sounds from the sea,
whether they may be the roaring of the
dreaded tempest or merely the moan of
the surf on the beach. is it any wonder
that the torture of mind and heart, and
strain of nerve and vital force that must
follow this perpetual suspense and long
ing should destroy the fountains OF
youth and beauty in these patient,
suffering women and place upon them
the marks of age while they are yet
young?
.'Yet the girls grow up with but one
thought of what their future lot will be,
with but one object in view upon which
their visions of happiness are based.
Go among any group of these bright.
buoyant girls in any of the villages of
the class am speaking of, and you will
find that nine out of ten of them look
forward to a union with some one who
will spend his life fishing in the sum-
mer and coasting in the winter The
idea that there might be any other flu
ture for them than the one which is to
come to them as fishermen's wives, or
that the life of a fisherman's wife is
anything different from the natural Sc
auence of married life, never seems to
occur to them.
Looking at one of these bright, hap
by girls, chatting and romping amid
half dozen sad-eyed young wives and
mothers on the beach or at the landing
where some one is always waiting and
watching for sail in the offing. one
cannot prevent his imagination from
seeking a most melancholy channel.
There is the girl how. 1t will not be
long before she will be q wife. Imag-
inc her two years married, sitting alone
in her little home, her baby in the era
die, and the north wind bowling with
out. She knows too we'll that at that
moment the one for whose return she is
longing and praying may be struggling
in the breakers, while the Highland
light, which she can see, is shining pit
ilessly on his agony, for she has only to
climb spur of land that rises behind
her house to see the skeleton of ship
which foundered only a few months
ago, and all her crew were lost in sight
of home. The gravestones in the little
churchyard recall to her every Sunday
how, in one night, by the wreck of fishing
craft homeward bound, over seventy
women of her own village were wild
owed, or those already widowed left
childless, and nearly every home made
desolate. 1t is to future attended
with painful suggestions such as these,
and with unceasing suspense and ever
present agony of mind, that these
bright, fair young girls sacrifice all
their youth and beauty and buoyancy
of spirits, and pass voluntarily within
the pale of blighted womanhood. y
~ Y. Sun.