The Irish standard., 1895-03-09
WOMEN OF ERIN.
In the Provincial Towns or In the
Country Life is Of e Slug
gish Nature.
SAD DEARTH OF YOUNG MEN,
Among Certain Classes the Match
making System is Found to be
@ Still in Vogue.

Among Certain Glasses the Match
making System is Found to be
Still in Vogue.
The life OF young girl in Ireland, it
she be in a provincial town or in the
country, is az sluggish as that of her
English sisters, with fewer resources
than the English girl has, writes Kath
arine Tynon in the Independent. In
Dublin it is different. Dublin damsels
have a gay time enough. The uniyer-
.sity counts for pleasant social element.
The official gayety is far less than in
Oxford and Cambridge. The balls
which mark commemoration in Oxford
and the like occasion in the sister uni
versity are never dreamt of in Dublin.
The scholastic year goes out with q
shabby ceremony of comforting degrees,
which is known to but one in ten thou
sand OF Dublin citizens. The maids of
the metropolis do indeed ardently desire
that such an event as the Tercen enary
should occur annually If that be not q
,bull-with it's garden parties, balls, con-
certs and the like. For one week OF
1892 Dublin bloomed like flower bed
with the fine gowna of the foreign dele
bates and the gay frocks Of the ladies,
pleasure bent But the like will scarcely
occur again till 1892, when few Of ns will
be there to see.
On the whole the lot of the Dublin
girls is fairly envlable. 1t is in the coun-
try that ennui dry rots. The Irish maiden
of whatever class has few resources. It
she be Of the Protestant and gentle class
the term is nearly synonymous is
reared in drowsy and gentle conserva-
tism that excludes, as rule, books, ex
cept OF the most goodly sort. art, politics
and any interest in her neighbors She
lis generally wrapped in love or in cotton
/ wool, is gentle and most innocent OF the
world and all appertalning thereto. Irish
girls have not the training of the fingers
that an English girl usually has; they
have not the resource of needle work or
fancy work except to slight extent
Any departure, euch as literary inclina-
tions, would be l;ttle short of scandal
The wings of home brood over such a
girl, and in the shadow Of them she is
! like to have sick dreams of discomfort if
she be Of the imaginative kind. There
are not even the poor to visit, as there
would be in England. The Protestant
poor are very few indeed, and the relig-
ious are far too sharply divided in Ire
land for such girls to visit the Catholic
poor. The gossip of new books does not
reach them, nor rumors of what is a.
doing in the world OF men.
OF course, tor scors Of families such
.as this there is one which enjoys itself.
whereof the young women follow the
hounds and the mother rides to the meet
in her pony phaeton. This is the class
which gives it's daughters season in
town, and has relays Of visitors, and en-
/ tertains the officers from the nearest gar
rison towns. But, as rule, the lives Of
Irish gentlewornsn are narrower, more
colorless and far more conservative than
those of their English sisters.
The dearth Of young men in every
place but the metropolis is melancholy
feature Of social life in Ireland. Families
cannot afford to keep their sons at home
idle, while in all classes except the most
humble it is tradition that the daugh-
ters should stay at home and go white
handed. have heard of evening parties
where half dozen cavaliers, ranging
eighteen to eighty. were apportioned to.
thirty or forty ladies. True, I have seen
nearly as much disproportion at Nor.
folk tennis party; but there one did not
60 pity the maids, who were In many
cases birds Of passage and in other places
had many opportunities for pleasure. 5
The higher education has scarcely
reached the Irish country homes. In
Dublin there is an excellent woman's
college, the Alexandra, but it's pupils are
mainly drawn from the professional and
mercantile classes of Dublin itself. In
the country places women are leading
very much the fstag.nant lives OF the
women Of the thirties. They have the
gentler virtues and are not numerous
Anough il that be not an Unfair and
!. sii9R1noble explanati to form the little.
3 ga. s@