The Irish standard., 1889-02-09
specimens from the aristocrats, is so al
together manner-perfect as the En-
glish one. She is an admirable exam

most trivial, the most ordinary little
piques and cranks of life, matters that
would hardly raise smile in you OF
me, she Will laugh immoderately. But
tell her rattling good story that has
sent you half an hour ago into fits,
and has grown so dear to your soul
that you must needs pour it into the
ears of somebody else. and grief, in
deed, will be your portion as you watch
her reception of 1t.
Perhaps sheer inability to grasp a
jest IS born of that great determination
have before limited at. 70 range her.
self credltably, to cake a high position
in society. that mightiest of all the
gods, that modern deity before whom
the dwellers on Olympus might well
have bowed the knee, that occupies all
her thoughts, sleeping and waking, to
the exclusion of such frivolous matters
as va merry tale we'll told"
TO day she is to be presented to the
soverign. to morrow night she will 30
to her first ball. Very few girls marry
in their first season, unless, indeed, a
very big fish happens to be )anded; and
this is seldom unless the debutante is
one of these rarely lovely creatures be.
fore alluded to. Sweet seveateen,
though very anxious to be appreciated.
by no means gauche or shy. is still lit
tie incomplete; and as the ingenue has
been rather played out by this. she has
to wait year or SO spent IL a; curing
the subtle charm that distinguishes her
more mature sisters, before bringing
her to the feet that ambition of her soul
"a ritch parti.
OF love the English girl often talks,
but it has as little to do with the mar
riage of the 2ristocracy in England as
with thoae OF the peasants in Ireland.
Once she is ffoated, some one Mlau is
singled out from among his fellows by
her mother, or married sister, Or aunt,
Or anyone else in authority, and marked
down as suitable husband for her.
He may be old or he may be young,
ugly or the reverse (that has nothing
in the world to do with it;) the one
thing you may be sure Of is, that he
will be of Importance In her set, and, ii
possible, titled. III all probability he
has never yet seen the gi,l, or. having
seen, has Shown 10 predileclion for her;
that is OF no consequences either. To
bring him to fancy her, is the object Of
the one in authority.
The chosen man; therefore, carefully
watched. his movements are studied,
his habits taken into account, the hous-
es at which he is most frequently to be
seen noted down. Invitations during
the coming autumn to these houses,
where he viii probably 20 for the grouse
or partridge, are eagerly sought for,
and of course obtained. The girl is
given q hint--an item almost unneces
sary in the programme, as this brilliant
settling of herself has been her own
never Tagging desire since she first be-
gan to think. She is, indeed, quite as
much alive to the advantage to be gain
ed by a satisfactory marriage as any of
her relatives.
If after much travel Of spirit, and
even greater travel of body from house
to house in pursuit of the chosen one,
he continues refractory, or so far for
gets himself as to marry some one else,
another eligible is picked out, and the
same old game is gone through, until
at length the girl is safely at the altar
and her name changed.
From that hour her life is her own to
do with it as she will; and sometimes,
alas, she wantonly destroys it. Old
fashioned as it may sound, still SIREN
ously maintain that marriage with
out love is nc marriage at all, and Of all
mistakes on this earth is surely most
fatal. To elect deliberately to go
through life with some enc utterly un.
congenial is nothing less than an act Of
madness. Yet how many seemingly
sane people commit this folly day by
day
1t is surely these loveless alliances
that are in great measure the cause of
the frequent scandals-often hushed
up, but more frequently made the Sub
ject of a divorce case-that darken the
glory of England's wives and mothers.
.sIhe God Of love, ah benedict,
How mighty and how great lord is her,
said one wise mal; and what satin the
wisest of them all :?
Better is dinner of herbs where loveis
Than stalled OK and hatred herewith" !"
Ha-Suppose We go by the W. K. &
Y line? It is said to have beautiful
line.
Sha-Yes. know it must look perfectly