The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1892-03-02
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CHARMING ELDERLY WOMEN.
They Preserve Their Activities, Like the
World and Please Young Men.

They Preserve Their Activities, Like the
World and Please Young Men.
The finest, ripest fruit of the present day
Is it's elderly women. Their appropriate
soil is a great city Physically they at
tract the eye. Their cheeks are as red
as pippins beneath early SHOWS Their
figures are luxuriant without loss of SYM
metry There is a modishness of dress
which seems to record not follow changes
of fashion As they pick their way over
street crossings they disclose well shod
feet and sprightly ankles. In walking
they neither waddle nor totter. They have
acquired and they retain an admirable
carriage They ignore the immunity
which their years allow, and are as well
set up as when they were schoolgirls
This exterior, sophisticated and alert,
reflects their mental and social equipment.
The higher education is a latter day phrase.
Life has given them their mental disci-
pine and layers of experience are packed
away in the choicest form of knowledge.
Greek conjugations and comic sections are
valueless for merely conversational pur-
poses With whatever occupies the public
mind they are conversant. They dip into
the reviews and magazines, take their own
daily paper, and read all the new novels,
having read the old. They can quote from
Macaulay and as far back as Swift and
The Spectator. They understand pertinent
references to Fielding as promptly as to
Tolstoi They may not know much about
psychology. but they have deal of knowl-
edge about human nature, and the differ
ence is not wide,
There is breadth of vision and easy dis
elimination of judgment and a liberal view
OF bumor in the elderly women of the day
that incline them to the society of men and
OF men younger than themselves Their
compeers have become triie too conscious
of Joints and want to compare notes and
swap remedies for rheumatism or govt.
Younger men bring them club stories and
Jokes of a superior sort. ask their Judgment
concerning affairs of the heart, social and
business matters
Privately, the young men regard them
as good stuff" and take them out to din
ners of the choicest ordering, for the young
men know that these elderly women know.
The men are fattered by the preferences
of such women and can overwhelm them
with attentions which in no case can be
misunderstood
elderly women regard as still in the age OF
bread and butter. They are sympathetic
over the broils with servants and concern
ing the diseases of children, but they
stealthily yawn behind jeweled fingers.
They smile at the social vanities, jealousies
and pretentions of younger women and dis
miss such condolences with a few discreet
words They like youth and encourage
the presence of young girls, for whom they
have golden words of wisdom
When the evil days come and they find
it difficult to get daily on their knees, they
get goidheaded sticks, which they use like
a marshal's baton or fairy wand The
pink ribbons in their caps are not signals
OF distress. By and by you will find them
at Hot Springs, Lakewood, in Florida,
where they hold court on sofas. If their
toes are bandaged they are hidden under
lace frilIs and pinked out founces, lest
they advertise for sympathy and check the
cheerful conversation which they like TO
hear flowing around them. Brave veter-
ans, they have their wounds and scars, but
they make them no affair Of the world s.
New York Evening Sun.