Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1897-11-04
D~e~o~e~oo>o>oOo>G
!. MADAME IDA PREFER. !!
4 BY Alice King.
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES

a baby girl was born, and they baptized
her in an eminently commonplace way
by the name of Ida. The mother was
as stout, matter-of-fact German house
wife as ever ate sauerkraut, and she
brought up the infant in thoroughly
practical, ordinary manner, until she
was able to run alone. Then the I'M
usual and the abnormal began to step
into little Ida's story.
The father was man of a very orig
inal mind; he had peculiar ideas about
most things, and most especially he
had peculiar ideas about female educa-
ton. How he came to choose the very
prosaic mate, appears to us to be, in
truth, matter of surprise, as we look
at the strangely assorted pair, except
that the happiest marriages are some
times the result of strongly marked
contrasts, and this husband and wife,
certainly strong contrast in character
and opinion, yet proved to be very
happy and harmonious couple.
When their first little daughter was
born, the father at once made up his
mind that he would carry out with her
all his extraordinary notions with re-
gard to the education of woman; and
tie mother, though her opinions were
most Numerically opposite on the sub
ject, yet, nevertheless, put the girl, rs
soon as she could prattle, completely
into his hands.
Now, the system of education which
Ida's father proposed to carry out with
regard to her was simply this: He was
resolved that she was to be brought up
precisely as if she were boy. The little
girl was dressed as a boy, and was
! taught to join all boys games. She
engaged in all sorts of outdoor eXer-
cises and sports, and became expert in
running end leaping. She was taught
Greek and Latin, instead of music and
dancing and other feminine accom-
plishments; needle was never so much
as put between her fingers.
Thus things went on with little Ida
until she was about ten years old, when
the course of her young life was entire
1y changed.
The father died rather suddenly, and
Ida was Immediately, of course, thrown
under the sole care of her mother.
No doubt the troubles of the poor
lady, when left widow, were good
deal increased by the fact that she had
this anomalous being, this boy-girl
upon her hands. However, she made
short work of the problem which her
husband had left her; she solved it
ut once in her own matter-of-fact way.
She popped Ida into petticoats before
the girl could look around, and set her
to sweep the house, and learn to cook
and to sew, according to the fashion of
all German maidens of her rank and
nge.
But the good lady soon found to her
cost that she could not cut the Gordian
knot in this summary way as she had
intended. 1t was all very well to bid
Ida to do this or that in a proper house.
wifely manner, but it was quite another
thing to get her to do it. She had been
.coerced into petticoats, it was true, but
she still persisted in being boy to all
intents and purposes. She was forced
by her mother to do all sorts of domes-
tic offices, but never were such offices
performed in like way before. Pitch
ers were broken, buildings were spoiled,
rents were left in luckless garments,
as the recusant damsel went hither and
thither in the house performing her un
willing duties; and had not her moth
'er possessed very large fund of firm
resolution, she would have given the
attempt up in thorough desperation of
making her daughter into young lady.
If the good wife set the girl down to
study a cookery book, she found her,
when she returned to the room. deep in
a volume of travels; if she beheld her
on a summer afternoon sewing her
sampler in the garden, and her matern-
al eyes rejoiced in the sight, she was
sure, did she look away for few min
utes, to perceive, to her dismay, that
the girl had vanished, and after some
search, to see her seated on the topmost
branch of a tall tree; if she left the girl
trundling her mop diligently. as she
fondly thought, in the front hall, she
would find the pail left in the lurch,
while the young lady rushed after a
passing post-chaise and INDUCED in all
sorts of airy speculations about its
inmates. In short, never was unfortu-
nate middle-aged matron so hardly
bested through the pranks of maiden.
The civil war in. the household be-
tween the mother and daughter con-
tinued some five or six years, and still
the refractory damsel was unsubdued.
She chose to be boy, in spite of the
long skirts and braided hair. She de-
clared stoutly that she would be one,
and boy in all her tastes, in all her
aspirations, in all her habits, she re-
manned.
Then the mother hit upon a new ex-
pedient to subjugate the unruly girl,
who, Notwithstanding her protestations
that she was boy, and nothing but
boy. had become a very pretty girl.
with a step as light and swift as a
breeze, with a form as flexible as
young willow, with eyesall alight with
fancy and mirth and romance, she re-
solved that she would engage tutor
for Ida, and try the effect upon her of
instruction impaired by man.