The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1888-03-22
GIRLS AS THEY WERE.
A Glance Lack Over Two or Three Decades
The Books They Once Read.

Ilere was klnO OF literature mQcn
in vogue some two or three decades
ago which seems to have entirely
ceased to be-to have indeed no longer
any reason for being. 1t belonged to
the time when there was great faith in
genius, pure and simple, great pity
for the pseudo miseries of highly-strung
sensitive souls; when calm cheerful
Irving even was charmed BY the mus
ical plants of Margaret and Lucretia
Davidson; when Poe bemoaned Ia
radiant maiden whom the angels
named Lenore;" when Mrs Hemans
asked all manner of depressing, unan-
swerable questions; Mrs. Sigourney
reused a soft gentle pity for rosebud
which would never be rose, and eyes
that to-day read Howells and James
through glasses then were often wet
with tears for '.Soldier of the Legion
who lay dying in Algiers."
Side by side with this literature of
sentiment and romance grew up and
hourished more practical one spec.
tally designed for the young girls of
the time. The girls for whom those
books were written are many of them
here to-day, and the Easy Chair is
confident that SO long as they hold sa-
cred the memories of the givers the
books they gave will not be forgotten.
They generally bore such titles as
Letters to a Daughter, 'To Young
Lady Leaving School," The Young
Lady Friend" .The Young Lady at
Home" etc.
They held a great deal of good,
practical advice on everyday behavior
and small duties; they were amusingly
realistic in their counsels relative to
the toilet, the number of strokes to be
given to the hair night and morning;
the hygienic value of cold bathing,
and numerous kindred topics; but the
gist of all of them was in the last two
or three chapters. These always held
an earnest appeal to the young de-
butants, whether wise or foolish, mer-
ry or pensive, to put aside the all-pre-
yailing fallacy that their educations
were finished. They were admonished
that though they had left school Ohey
rarely graduated in those days. they
had yet much to learn. Their deep
and varied knowledge was not ques-
toned; their dancing and music were
admired; but trey were earnestly be-
sought to remember Lady Jane Grey,
to think of the sister of Herschel, and
kindred lofty souls, and to determine
not to end their studies with their
school life. A course of reading was
mapped out, generally one of dreary
intellectually.
They were warned against the read
ing of novels, advised to temperance
in poetry; charged not to let home
pleasures, or social claims (they were
not dignitied as society duties then)
interfere with or hinder the develop
ment of their minds. o me! how long
it seems, all this period of delicious
self-cOntidence which awakened the
pity of the wiser, elder souls; that time
of serene satisfaction when warning
word was thought necessary to prove
to whole generation of maidens the
amazing fact that they had not learned
everything. How different the stand
point OF to-day, when every girl seems
to measure her good-for-some-thing-
ness by the number of classes she be-
longs to, and her right to have a good
time in the ballroom at night by the
number of studies she pursues in the
day.
If housekeeping and plain sewing
were thought dangerous rivals to the
study and pursuit of knowledge they
must have had attractions then which
dancing. visiting, or the opera wholly
lack. To-day it would almost seem
that to the much misrepresented So
ciety girl the supreme delight of each
week is found il her French, her Ger
man, her SpellinG-nO, no, L mean her
literature and art classes-while all
her so-called amusements are merely
diversions planned to rest and refresh
her jaded mind after the days labor
Perhaps it is only fad like venure
work, a fashion like decorative art,
and many another fancy which has
ruled and died.
Perhaps very few girls really do
study, or perhaps all the things which
the clever elderly men and women say,
with seeming malice, but with real
interest and sympathy, about the
young people of to-day are true. But
the Easy Chair loves to think that the
standards of culture are all higher
than formerly. and that both mothers
and daughters have learnt to order
their living in ways that admit more
time for study and more incentive to
mental progress and intellectual
work than hitherto, and that perhaps
in some dimly-recognized way all this
growth and blossoming of to-day may
have terminated in those same old
fashioned books it has been speaking
of.-Nea0 Orleans Picaguae.