The Washington times., 1894-07-22
GIRLS or THEN and NOW
The Sweetheart Of Boyhood and the
Woman Of To-day.
WHAT EDUCATION HAS DONE
The Reliant Girl Of the Period Has the
Advantage Over tho Helpless Woman Of
the Past-Indepsndence and Courage.

Courage and the belief in the early tradi
tions predispose a man to love the helples,
women. When Tou were boy. il you art
a man, you had a little sweetheart, whose
head was covered with soft curls, which were
always getting around her face and into heI
big, brown eyes. She had very small, very
red mouth, Just such kissable mouth as the
painters always give to the god Of love. She
was smaller than you, OF course, and
could not row a boat or throw a stone or run
or swim as well as you did. She took it out
in admiring your prowess. She Pas dread
fully afraid Of snakes, cows and bugs. and
| whom you chased her with q caterpillar one
day she ran into the woods and got lost and
| you got terrible whipping that night.
Once when you robbed a birds nest and
made her present Of the pretty eggs, she cried,
| and although she was only eight. she read
you \ lecture. Her eyes flashed and her
voice trembled with indignation. You thought
she never looked SO pretty and stood looking
at her in open-eyed wonder until she broke
down and cried.
After while you grew up, you went to
school and learned to box, skate, bosst and
to have very big opinion OF a certain small
same as when you left her. She has grown
taller, but not SO tall as you, and her pretty
curls were tied back with bright ribbon.
She was still cowardly enough to let you call
her "fraid cat" and gentle enough to al
low you to boss her, but she was shy and
sweet and good to look at. and she could sew
up q chaps coat before his mother even
guessed, in that wonderful intuitiye way some
mothers have, that he had been sliding down
the icehouse.
She was a good surgeon, too. and could
bind up a bruised arm or take splinter out
OF q knee better than any doctor. though she
did give shivers OF dismay. You were very
good to her; you told her stories of what a
great, brave boy you were and how afraid all
the professors at school were of you. You
made her laugh at your descriptions of tricks
you played on the new boys, and told her
about the lessons and how hard they were.
and how you knew them in twenty minutes,
The key to her success with fellow like
yourself was that she adored you, she burned
incense before you. 1t shone from her admir-
ing eyes, from her sweet interested face, from
the gravity with which she listened to i'm
aginary tales OF your achievements. and you
read in her fearful eyes when you were in
trouble how very sorry she was. And then she
WAS shy. she never told you these things, but
you could have read them even If you had
been less egotistical than you were.
When you were about 20 and she was taller.
shyer. prettier. and more admiring than ever
you married her. She is still great believer
in you, and even when you wake up to think
the world ought to be down on you, when
you feel bitter and dishear,ened, she looks at
you with the old wonder in her eyes, and you
don't feel SO much that she is reaching out
her hand to help you. but that she is asking
you to help and guide her, and her helpless
ness. which in a womanly woman is only
another name for trust. is wherein lies your
strength as well as hers.
The girl of twenty years ago loved sweets,
hated cold water and firted with every man
she laid her eyes on. The man didn't matter
bit, if she was satisfied that he was Il man.
She did not question whether he had brains,
education or character. She found out if he
had pleasant manners, straight nose, rosy
cheeks and black mustache. and she was
happy. If he danced well, could squeeze
ones hand nicely and discreetly. and knew
how to make love we'll she married him.
Once and awhile she fell deeply and terribly
in love with a man who had neither character,
money nor manners, and then her father in
terfered, calling her ninny and condemning
the sex in general as romantic knownothings.
Those were the epithets the clinGing girl
brought down upon tho heads of woman
kind. Sho of the romantic disposition gen.
orally spent year, or probably two, dying OF
q broken heart. She looked very interesting
with her big eyes and her hollow cheeks and
the white muslin gown with the eternal rosa
now posing as the last one he had given her.
One day she married, and the adventurer, or
whoever the suitor her father did not ap-
prove OF, probably read the wedding in the
papers and laughed in his sleeve.
But Mysteries and muslin gowns, with red
roses, high heels and degrading sentiment
have gone out. The man of the period may
mourn for the helpless maiden who used to
hutton his fatber-S hoots iyht his
fathers pipe, grow fearful over cheap novels,
cook and sew. and let the men call women
fools because they would not allow them high
education; he can talk about the deeds of
valor which he could perform for woman
who would trust him absolutely; he can weep
because the girl OF to-day won't be hugsed by
anybody just because he is a man; he can
gnash his teeth because women get ahead of
men in school and in business, and be jealous
and envious and very much in love at the
same time, but the girl of to-day just laughs
in her independent way. She has more inter- |
ests in life than flirting, compliments. hand
squeezing and red roses. and don't bother her |
head about the men-until they bother her.
But don't trouble yourself about the exist |
ence of her heart. She has one just as well !
as the girl of twenty years ago. She is a |
mellowed, wholesome type of that other girl. |
She is helpful and wCmanly, and she can wear |
starched linen and black satin ties without |
being unsexed. The man of the period can |
talk; but men will always talk. They go on |
loving the masculine girl just as they used to |
love the simple young person who would |
turn in her grave if she could see the divided |
skirts and emancipated actions of her de- |
scendants. The sweet, helpless, clinging girl |
was lovely to kiss and play with or laugh at. |
But when illness or poverty or trouble came !
she was somewhat OF burden in her help |
essness. She was often querulous and did |
not know enough of the world to understand |
things intelligently and help you. When the |
roses and sunshine of life made your love |
sweet and bright the helpless girl was an angel, |
out little self-reliance and mental balance
would have improved her disposition in times
of trouble.
And that is the reason why sensible man of
,o-day does not marry u fairweather girl. He |
wants a wife whose brain is as full of COM
nonsense as her heart is of affection. whose |
md comforts him in dark ones. and who has
elf-respeet enough to be an individual as well
Is himself
This is the girl who, when she does love a
nan enough to marry him, brings him the
reshness and strength of a love which was
lot fritted away on Tom, Dick and Harry;
Who. if she is bookish girl. will bring an
.levating. Intellectual atmosphere into her
lone, and will live her life with energy. pur-
,ose and womanliness, and who. when the
rouble and the dark days come, will not only
lphold, trust and love her husband. but will
lclp him as only practical, energetic woman
an.
That is the girl who is worth the winning,
nd although she does not give public exhi-
tions Of her emotions with tears. Mysteries