Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1888-06-01

Is the date at which ell )r, scence begins
| 10 the homestead when walls and win
| dows and floors and furniture put on
their beautiful garmente, snd the doors are
flung Hospitality wide for friends and ad-
mirers Pspilia enters he. kingdom with he
| feeling that it is special creation for
| her, and her only, and those who gave her
| life are chiefeet among her courtiers.
Life is never 50 fresh and fsir to any
other of her fathers children as to her st
hei debut. She seems to herself TO begin
then really to live.
Provided-her wings have not been TN
folded befJre they were grown. *
The proviso is grave and broad, add
merits more than passing remark e AZ
premsturely ripened fruit, as blossaihs
dwarfed in the forcing,ss all kinds Of man
ufscture turned out in haste from crude
materials-so is the girl (not Ours this
time, thank Heavenly who at fifteen IS
sumss the place and prerogatives Of
twenty.
How well we know her through much
seeingi Knowing, pert, self satisfied,
slow to hear and quick to utter her whole
mind, she sets our teeth on edge after the
manner of early summer apples, tough
with thin, uucu!ed juices. she is gener-
ally the eldest or The only girl in the
home. Mothers are unfortunately prone
to hasten ths msturi y Of such in the de-
sire to have q young lady in the house.
Back Of Ibis superficial and childish de-
sire to SET the pretty toy in place lies the
natural and touching longing TO relive
her own life, impotence to ialsiiy the
pessimistic sigh:
"There IL in Life but one short Spring,
And It can meier return"
The mother would see herself tske root
sgain and blossom anew In autumn. This
reproduction Of our individual girlhood,
with its isncies, hopee, loves and rap
lures, is one OF the sweetest OF the Pc
culisr joys Of motherhood. 1t is not q
figure of poetic speech that we are
"courted in cur girls" A cool head is
required for the patient waiting until
time brings the consummation to us Of
the beautiful dream, and strong hand
must hold back the esger, ignorant child
who would overleap the boundary SET by
nature and reason.
Miss Pert keeps grown peoples hours
and looks Older each day for the loss Of
"besuty sleep" she reads grown peo-
pies books, has her ssy-snd liberal
share OF it-in grown peoples talk, snubs
her mother uespsringIy, schools her
father, hectors the younger children, and
orders the servants; is delighted when
she is mistaken for nineteen, especially
Affects the society Of men, and in nothing
else Is SO successful So in making herself
the most disagreeable specimen CT ami
mated nature thst ever invited classifcs-
ton from modern Goldsmith or Cuvier
She has her besux at 3 preternaturally
early age, and Is omniverous OF admlra.
ton. By the time Our Girl-who has
been sent to bed at o'clock and other
wise treated as q growing student until
she is eighteen-is ready to take her place
IS young woman In the society selected
by her mother and entered under her
mothers chaperonage, Miss Pert is olsse,
discontinued, and already beginning
to ego or" Critics, who remember
her as "on the course four years
ago." sre skeptical as to her reputed sge;
"eligibles" begin to look away from her
to "rosebuds" and gessips hint that she
is "a long time on hand" She lost the
best things Of childhood; she can never
taste the morning freshness Of girlhood.
Her hasty foot has brushed the dew from
clover and daisies; she never filed her
lisp with violets and her roses ere all
full-blown.
1t is cruel, cruel! and 30 impolitic when
viewed from o unitarian standpoint that
the sillieet mother might see the unwis-
dom of running her chlld's ''prospects"
in lie 5y crowdipg her, unfinished, into
the sho w-window.
Said the mother Of grown giIls to me,
twenty odd years sgo:
"Take all the comfort you can get In |
your daughters while they are babies |
When they sre grown TO womsnhood they |
will be nothing but care snd anxiety"
did not credit the statement then, |
utterly repudiste it now. But 1t is easy to |
see why she and others should hold the |
opinion. Our Girl is made queen when
she should be only princess s1d sub
ject. Her dominion is violence done
70 natural laws. Her mother may be
inferior to her in intellect and educa-
ton. The disparity may be 80 far on
the wrong side that the daughter bushes
to present her parent to her choice
friends. The case is by no means uncom
mon. We rise fast in Americs, each gen
GRAFTON recording q higher water-merk
han the preceding, and old-fsshioned
people soon get out OF their depth. The
)usy house-mother hiss rot time TO keep
lp with the age Cor so she thinks when
he children are small, and when leisure
I