The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-11-13
DEcLINE OF NEW woMANIsM.

Now that new womanism has shrieked itself out and Is visibly on the decline, it may perhaps seem rather \ late in the day to set about defining the term with something like precision. Such definition, however, is made ne- cessary by the prevalent tendency to the spirit of ''newness," in the invidious sense, everything that goes to differ enttate the woman-and especially the unmarried girl-of to-day from her pre- decessor of the early part of the centu- ry. The effect of this is practically to identify the lady cyclist, the femi- nine devotee of healthful sports, and even the girl who voluntarily seeks some form of occupation suitable to her sex as an alternative to life of ab solute idleness, with the pioneers of revolt" who rant on platforms about their equality with men, and demand entrance to fields of activity which for them are fenced about with insuperable barriers of natural disqualification.
 This confusion of ideas is as unjust as it is stupid, and suggests an ap- parent unwillingness to recognize any alternative to the man-woman, whose crazy doctrine implies the abolition of sex-distinctions altogether, except the 'bread-and-butter miss" of a by-gone dispensation. We say an apparent un- willingness, because it Is hardly to be believed that the recoi1 from the ugly extravagances of the real new wo- man has yet induced 8 desire to re- suscitate the simpering Miss Plues and Miss Innocences who stood to represent ideal maidenhood in the days when our grandfathers were young. Happidly the "emancipated" sisterhood hay , exhausted their energies before they have succeeded in provoking so drastic revolution. Nevertheless, it is just possible that in a. change-loving age some such reac ion may one day make itself felt, and that the old-woman-or shall we say the old girl?-will be re- stored, for a while 9t least, to her for mer pedestal. Accord ling to our present manner of looking at things, she was undoubtedly, in her way, as profound bore as the pioneer herself. It is | true that she was womanly instead of an unwomanly bore; and her blush | ing and fainting proclivities her con- versational poverty, her polite &C., complishments," and even her para | lyzing elf-consciousness, seemed only | to embrace her attractiveness in the | eyes of the youth of her day. He, in | fact, not only accepted her pretty airs of dependence and helplessness as by no means the least part of her charm, but would have been mortified at the very suggestion of the "chum' idea which so largely governs the mutual relations | of young men and maidens in these | days of advance. It pleased his fancy to regard the idol of his heart, or any | possible candidate for that post, as a l delicate, dropping flower, and he rather objected than otherwise to her display | ing anything approaching robustness either of body or mind.
 | But if we should ever be tempted to seek refuge from any future outbreak of pioneering folly in a reestablish- ment of the old-fashioned feminine ideal, it will behoove us to remember that the early century ingenue was, in her own fashion, a hardly less complete | fraud than the new woman herself l The latter, with her bogus rights and wrongs and her impudent ignoring of her sex's natural limitations has been, after all, a less successful sham than was the languishing little minx whose oppressive simplicity was reserved fol public circulation only, and who, like the diplomatic ''Maud'' of the doggered rhyme
 | "Never seemed to be able to eat when
 at table,
 But down in the pantry--O Lord!"
 an affectation, by the way, sufficiently discredited by the Lady Jessica Nepeans of an age in which, at the din. ner-table at least, the theory of sexua. equality is fully and unreservedl, accepted.
 For the present, at any rate, there is no sign that the effect of the passina phase of feminist folly has been tc
 foster a desire for any such violent
 reaction. The blatant masculinity ant absurd assumptions of the new woman
 have probably been no whit more ex asperating than the studied artlessnes.
 and inert insipidity of the old would