River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1891-04-09
THE MAIDS OF PORTUGAL.
They Lead Lives of Close Conhnement in
Their Homes.

lnetF hofhtS'
In Portugal the girls lead a compare
lively secluded life. In childhood they
are bright, clever and precocious, very
much spoiled and very much dressed.
formal respect TO their parents is in
sisted on, however; they address them
in the third person. kiss their hands and
ask their blessing at bedtime. They
are constantly in the company Of
grown-up people, sit up late at night,
and are frequently taken to the theater
and opera.
Conversation is not restrained in the
presence of children, so they are early
initiated into that freedom of ideas and
freedom of expressing them that is SO
marked feature of society in southern
Europe.
The education of Portuguese girls is
superficial. consisting chiefly in what
used to be called accomplishments
music, embroidery and languages. In
all three they attain great proficiency,
and in the latter they excel. The Por-
tuguese, unlike the Spaniards and Ital-
ians, are first-class linguists; they are,
in many cases, as fluent in French,
English and German as their mother
tongue, and conquer the difficulties of
accent and idiom with great accuracy.
There are schools of all sorts in Lis
bon; Government schools, private
schools and convent schools belonging
to the French order of st. Vincent de
Paul; for, since the suppression of the
national religious houses in 1884, these
nuns have quietly spread their influence
and multiplied their institutions, and
have now almost exclusively in their
hands the education of girls of the
higher classes. They leave school at
fifteen and sixteen, sometimes earlier,
and marry very soon after.
Among the upper ten thousand the
young people meet each other constant
ly at balls, receptions, bull-fghts and
at the summer resorts, and their court
ship is cosmopolitan, rather freer than
in France, much less so than in England
1t is in the middle and lower classes
that it is characteristic of the country
and the nation. The Portuguese are
very conservative in their ideas of the
position of women in society, and they
got their ideas from their Moorish mas
ters in by gone centuries. Consequent
ly, girls lead very shut-in life: they go
regularly to mass on Sunday mornings
and take occasional walks during the
week. always accompanied by one or
two chaperons. Young men never call
at the house, and if they did would not
be admitted except on business" This
strictness leaves but one way open for
an interchange of sentiments and that
is the window. and il is quite the thing
TO make use of it.
1t is not considered ill-bred to stare
in Portugal; a man may stare at girl
he does not know as long as he likes
he must not do so to a girl he has been
introduced to unless she gives him some
encouragement by returning his glances.
A girl win sit at her window all the
afternoon looking into the street, and
her adorer from the street looks at her.
and this is so much the custom that it
attracts no attention from the passers-
by. From looks they proceed to bows,
to smiles, to "A few words, then he fol-
going to the theater and goes, too, sere-
nades her with his guitar on moonlight
nights, and finally makes an offer to her
father. He is then received by the fam
lily, and allowed to come to the house
in a quiet way till the wedding. and
after that the young couple usually live
either with her parents or with his, and
the even tenor of their life continues
n. Y. journal.