The Coconino weekly sun., 1893-10-12
IN WOMAN'S BEHALF.
THE INCAPABLE WOMAN.
She Is Decided inachronism and Neve
 Wears We'll.

! Sne IS n beCiueu <tnatDrOntSm and NtNer | Wears Well.
 | Nowhere outside of an old-fashioned romance is there a spot in the world
 where the incapable woman can to-day
 maintain foothold. In the leisurely three-volume novel, dear to our grand | parents, Arabella and Araminta, gen tie, pallid, timid, submissive creatures,
 faltered and gasped and tainted grace | fully in their chairs at the slightest eX- cuse for such behavior To swoon with
 ease. was regarded as proof of ele- | gance and as distinctive line marking
 the difference between the milkmaid
 and the lady born and bred Possibly
 the tight facing then in vogue aided
 the lady in her ability to perform this
 part of her role to the satisfaction of She spectators, who were usually with
 in the receding vision of the fainting
 and fragile being, whose delicate nerves
 were proof against neither terrors by
 night nor shocks by day.
 Frankly, we doubt whether the old
 novelists were quite fair in their DOT
 traiture of the current life of their
 times. We find Jennie Deans able to
 undertake a long, difficult, and every
 way arduous journey, reaching its end
 as fresh and hearty and full of pur-
 pose and courage as at the beginning,
 her beautyanot marred by hardship and
 loss of rest. Mary, Queen of Scots, was able to sit for hours in the saddle, no cavalier of her period riding harder or faster or more bravely than the bold and beautiful queen. The famous woman who made the court of France splendid during successive changes and revolutions were not frail die-away creatures of ghostlike hues and will lowy outlines; they were substantial fiesh-and- blood women, equal to all the dangers and perilous adventures which are often their portion.
 Recalling the much harder conditions | of housekeeping of the times of our grandmothers and of their mothers be- fore them, we are impressed with the | fact that the women who surmounted | successfully so many obstacles must 1 nave been made of really tough fiber. The modern appliances which give us everything for our tables in highly con denscd and beautiful forms, ready for use, with the minimum of preparation, were then unknown. They pounded the pepper and pulverized the sugar and rolled the salt. So far from having electric lights to command at the touch of mysterious knob, they had not even lucifer matches. The fire had to be kept in by strenuous care, and some times one went to her neigh bors to bor- light her own. Nothing was easy verything required hard, perscvcring, and unremitting labor, so that we may well believe that the women of that cider day were far from being incap- able
 Once upon time, too, there was in the air general impression that the of our southern states were anguid, indolcnt set of people, seldom aroused to effort, accustomed to much service, and never expecting nor expected to fare on anything less dainty than the roses and lilies of fife. They lie still and are fanped," would have been the phrase used to describe them by some of that outer world beyond the magnolia and the 'repe"m myrtle, the cotton bloom and the 5assellcd corn, of the beautiful and mysterious southern land,
 This impression has been demon 'trated over and over to have been en- ,irely and completely mistake. women seldom had the oppor- unity to be specially idle or luxurious. Their large households developed in hem rare talent for administration. They had to care for crowd of grown ID children in the persons of their serv- ints, people improvident and irrespon- ible, who depended on the house-mis- ress as on a mother, and when the var was over and times had changed or them, our southern friends dis played of what stuff they were made. tmincntly capable, wherever tried they nave shown that they can take care of admira bly,.
 Incapable women may for the brief eason of youth, while the sea!shell ,olor tints the rounded check and the 'eauie de didJLe beams in the bright eyes, win passing tribute from thoughtless nen. But the women who wear well must know how to meet emergencies, , now to order and sec their orders obey ed, how to hold themselves in calm . ,omposure, whatever tempests are lbroad, The incapable woman was lever so much an anachronism as to- lay. ...
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