The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1891-07-03
they are very generally petted aud

they are very generally petted aud
pitied.
| "Poor thingw says Society, putting
up its eyeglass to scan admirably the
| beautiful heroine of the latest aristo-
cratic scandal-''she had such brute Of
| husband! No wonder she liked that
dear Lord So-and-So! Very wrong of her
| of course, but she is so youngl She was
married at sixteen-quite child!-could
not have known her own mind''
The husband alluded to might have
been the best and most chivalrous of
men,-anything but "brute, yet he
| always figures as such somehow, and
gets no sympathy. And, by the way, it
is rather notable fact that all the beau
tiful, famous, or notorious women were
married at sixteen" How is this man
aged? l can account for it in Southern
climates, where girls are full-grown at
sixteen and old at thirty,-but l cannot
understand its being the case in Eng
land, where "miss" of sixteen is most
Objectionable and awkward ingepue,
without any Of the "charms wherewith
to charm" and whose conversation is
always vapid and silly to the point of alb
solute exhaustion on the part of those
who are forced to listen to it. These six
teen-year-Old marriages are, however, the
only explanation friskY English matrOns
can give for having such alarmingly
prolific families of tall sons and daugh-
tiers, and it is happy and convenient
excuse-one that provides satisfactory
reason for the excessive painting of their
faces and dyeing of their hair. Being
young las they SO nobly assert), they
wish to look even younger. A la bonnie
heurei II men cannot see through the
delicate fiction, they have only them
selves TO blame. AS Tor me. / believe in
the old, old, apparently foolish legend of
Adam and Ewes sin and the curse which
followed 1.-THE curse on man which is
inevitably carried out to this day. God
said:
Because" mark that becauseD "thou
hast hearkened unto the voice Of thy
wife, Tor thv woman, whoever she be-
land hast eaten Of the tree of which /
commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt
not eat of it" (the tree or fruit being the
evil suggested first 10 man by woman,
''cursed is the ground for thy sake; in
sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days
of thy life!''
True enough! The curse is upon all
who trust woman too far-the sorrow
upon all who are beguiled by her witch
ing batteries. OF what avail her poor
excuse in the ancient story-'"The SER
pent beguiled me, and l did eat" Had
she never listened she could not have
been beguiled. The weakness, the
treacherY, was in herself, and is there
still. Through everything the bitter
ness of it runs. The woman tempts,-
the man yields,-and the gate of Eden
the Eden Of clear conscience and an
untrammelled soul, is shut upon them.
For ever and ever the Divine denunci-
alton re-echoes like muttering thunder
through the clouds of passing gener-
ationS; for ever and ever we unconscious
ly carry it out in ourown lives to its full
extent till the heart grows sick and the
brain weary, and we long for the end of
it all, which is death-Death, that myS-
terious silence and darkness at which we
sometimes shudder, wondering vaguely
Can it be worse than life.
ITO BE Continued