The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1891-01-10
A GIRLS TRUE SPHERE.
Marriage Not by Any Means the
Only Course for Her.
New York World

| GtHL . tNOE OIL ENEs
Marriage Not by ANY Means the
Only couI Sc for Her.
New York World
What have women done? / know
what these fingers have done. To re-
member all carries me back to Virginia
through the most exciting pages Of
American history. They were trained
to do elegant embroidery and to play
well the best classical music. During
the Civil war and since they have done
everything that fingers could do. In
war times they plated and sewed my
children's hats, made all their garments,
even little kid and cloth boots, while
their father was in prison.
After the struggle, in the experiment
we made to earn living, these hands
copied briefs for the lawyer, then too
poor to afford clerk, the while sewing
for the seven dear children. They made
every robe from the christening to the
bridal for my two elder daughters, and
the work in which they have engaged
since has been most varied.
Womans sphere is where the Lord has
placed her. We all deplore the condi-
tons that reduce young children and
tender women to hard labor for which
they have neither fitness nor strength,
but | believe that things adjust them
selves in the end and we mold circum-
stances till we find our level. Home is
sweet place, but it is not the only place.
nor are maternal the only duties of
womanhood. Life is made up Of a Sc
ries OF conditions, and the talents Of men
and women are equally varied.
EDUCATION IS NECESSARY.
deny that woman needs special
training for what you are pleased to
term the profession of motherhood. Ma
ternal love is innate. 1t is part of wo-
mans nature. She may be holden in
her youth, a heartless lover or q treach-
erous friend, false to every trust. and
still be good mother. Even the savage
brute is kind to her young, and viii risk
her life in protecting it. l believe that
the training and education necessary to
the perfect development of womanhood
will fit the girl for any sphere in life she
chooses to enter.
do not believe that marriage is all
this world holds for the sex, nor that a
wife should round herself to the four
walls of her home. 1t is necessary for
the height and breadth and freshness of
Its atmosphere that she go out, mix with
the elements and become imbued with
the spirit, the progress, the thought that
is accelerating the motion of the earth.
The world is moving with velocity
SO great that one cannot afford to stand
i I'll, and the mother must be up and
q aa h aEaanas sFs8 jd if sSa t il Gs,iseS
watch the swelling tide. am always
so glad to welcome the young woman in
any new line. When take up the news
paper begrudge the valuable space given
to the reports of the Four Hundred. /
do not care to read about their coats of
arms, their coaches and coquetry.
want to know what the brave, bright,
gifted young men and women are doing
and thinking about and striving for.
This talk about girls losing their
femininity and unsexiDg themselves in
industrial enterprises think idle and |
senseless. The very word 'sunsex' is to |
me misnomer, and if woman becomes
coarse and bold and rough in business,
in the art world or in the industrial
school she would not be lady in a
parlor or gentlewoman in any CON
dition. The decollete dress does not
make a woman vulgar
MISTAKEN TRAINING.
The girl who stands behind the counter
to serve us and the one who stands be-
hind the footlights to entertain us may
have the same nobility of purpose and
the same lofty principles as the one
privileged to i'll use and criticise her. 1t
is barely possible that our ladies do go
to. Delmonico's for dinner or supper, that
they are even reckless enough to sip a
glass of wine, and at the same time be
as intrinsically worthy and noble as the
woman in quiet russell garments who
views the scene from the other side Of
the window.
That our girls want training there is
not doubt, neither has the inability of |
some mothers been questioned. They
don't want piano lessons unless there is
an Unborn love of music. The piano has
been the ruination of more than one
generation of women. Another fallacy
is the hitherto universal tendency to di-
rect all energies to marriage. In the
south as soon as a daughter reached her
young ladyhood the mother at once pro-
ceeded to refurnish the house.
The girl went to the hair dresser and
had her tresses arranged in dozen differ
ent ways to find out which would be the
most becoming style; colors were tried
against her pretty face to get cher
color" she took her beauty maps, and
from every source, even the old servant,
hint ''to be sweet"
In discussing new acquaintance one
heard that she was very beautiful and
clever and nice, but she was not pretty"
Being what we called "pretty" was con-
sidered a superior virtue, and everything
in the girls training tended to this one
characteristic.
The victim was being decked for the
sacrifice, although the fond mother
would never admit that she was busy at
the art of matchmaking. Prepare a
girl for the altar. for the duties of wife
and mother, before even lover has pre-
sented himself? There is not only dron-
cry to such situation, but the tinge Of
indelicaoy. | believe in giving the girl
the advantages of good training and
leaving her to decide whether she is bet
ter fitted for the inner or the outer
world. for the home or the professional
life