Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1884-05-22
THE AMERICAN GIRL.
SIN Another English Attempt TO size
Her Up.

James has settled among us TO enjoy
his success. The time, therefore
would seem to have arrived for the
independent critic to examine the
popular belief that the American girl
is the final and most finished produc
ton of civilization, des tined to whip
anything else in petticoats Accord
ing to Mr. James, she is a combina-
ton of nervous force, vivacity and
feminine insight, while delicate and
subtle are epithets which convey only
the feeblest idea of the operation of
her mental being. Indeed, SO ex-
qulsite is this piece OF machinery that
when the novelist attempts to pick II
TO nieces for our editication, he rarely
fails to puzzle himself and his readers
A great deal Of her effect still depends
upon her novelty. English society
is naively slow to take the measure of
social novelties; and though London
has been flooded by our nasal cousins
the American girl herself is still I'M
perfectly understood If she is dis
tlngulshed by oGe quality more than
another among womanklnd, it is by
that attribute which is common to ali
her countrymen, and generated by
their restless life. She is cute; quite
cute enough TO take every advantage
Of the momentary confusion she has
produced Now is her critical time;
the eager competition of her ever-in-
creasing sisters will destroy her favor
able position; she is resolved to take
her fortune at the flood, and society
hears whispers of a determined inva-
sion Ia the course OF the season at
whose eve we have arrived.
The fashionable world of London
is in a state of chronic boredom, and is
always ready to welcome new SEN
sation. Together with her novelty
the American girl exercises some
thing of the charm which half edu
Gated visitor exercises on a conven-
tional society. Pocohontas might
have had tho town at her
feet; her successor is less sim
! pie and more schooled than
Pocohontas but compared with the
smart people of Europe she is unedu-
Gated. She has not, that is TO say,
lived in an atmosphere the creation Of
centuries, charged TO an extent i'm
possible to realize with social opinions,
conventionalities and traditions. They
are born and bred in the European
children. The American girl has
more or less to assume them; and
the assumption can be made very fresh
and very native. She brings a quick
and new susceptibility to things on
which we are the slaves of preconceiv-
ed impressions. 1t is the same with
her countrymen. They give you half
educated impressions of art and litera,
ture, whereas the European is cioggec
with traditional judgments assimila
ted from the hour of his birth All o
which is very piquant and amusiIl
both in men and women-for a time
Put an American girl by the side Of
her English sister, and the contrast is
as instructive as the jealousy of the
\ English matron is edifying. OuI
c0nventionalities have not sunk into
her beng, and she is shrewd enough
to discriminate what part Of them has
real and what a pretended worth
Therefore she can transgress then
without the transgression be imputed
unto her for sin, and she does. Her
/ transgressions and her criticisms give
her half her piquancy, but what il
amusing in her would be embarrassing
to her English sister Her natural
quickness of perception, has, moreover
been sharpened by more travelling
than falls to the lot of the ordinary
English girl. The Tables dh0te anC
second-rate foreign society, if they
have not added to her refinement
have taught her "a precocious
self-possession. Again. though q
run in the States is getting to be the
usual autumn holiday, and know
ledge of American ways is becoming
diffused, yet society across the water
does not present the same stable and
obvious graduations as in the old
country. Therefore the fair adventu
ress. with little maneuvering, may
shrowd her exact antecedents in mys
terry, and find herself credited with q
fabulous dowry founded on Chicago
lard or Denver beetle. poison Indeed
the popular belief that American WON
en- bring their English husbands large
fortunes dies very hard, in spite of all
demonstrations TO the contrary. The
English girl though temporarily
eclipsed by her rival, need not des
pair Her qualities viii tell in the
long run. The apparent distinction
and tact Of the American girl is as
SNOWY and as smart aud as little part
OF her as her Partisan dresses Real re
finement is the attribute Of leisured
class This does not exist in the states,
except in tho narrow Puritan circle al
Boston. The feverish pushing and
striving and barbarous ostentation Of
the men must react upon their sisters.
And, indeed, American women are
the most snowy, restless and unquiet
in the world. Repose and dignity
alien 10 them, smartness IS their ideal.
Nor are they physically equal 10 the
o.ershadowed English girl. haI
from evolving a superior, American
civilization seems destined to evolve
inferior type Of women. The Ameri
can girl is as different from her En-
glish sister as the women Of the in
sipid American parlor fiction are diff
r Al