Omaha daily bee., 1899-07-02
THE NEW SUMMER GIRL.
Outline Sketch of the Charmer mt He
FavOrite Haunts.


The summer girl has visibly changed. She
has not all changed and she has not changed
| altogether. The girl who is anxious, aim
| less and ice creamy, who never leaves the
hotel piazza, and bathes by promenading The
| beach instead OF by entering the surf, who
cumbers the corridor with her row OF trunks
and has an engagement a week, each good
for this summer only, Is still to be seen
and Stunned.
But she is passing. Her successor Is here
and before long will have driven her into
retirement or matrimony, which for the old
summer girl is exactly the same thing The
newspaper jokes tell all about the new ar
rival. She golfs. She bicycles. She has an
arm like blacksmith and she cam walk like
Weston. The surf has no fears for her and
a seat on the moonlit piazza no charms She
has got past the point at which she initiates
men and their clothes. She has learned bet
ter. She has her own athletic costumes,
always prettier than his and generally more
sensible.
She is out of the woods in many senses.
She is simple and direct. She has caught
the new idea among women that woman S
word must be kept as carefully as a mans
Her view OF Irritation is a comradery with
possibilities but she asks no ODDS in the
keep a man as friend when she has re-
jected him as a lover, and she has no dispo-
stion to lose him as a friend because she
has accepted him as q lover. She hears so
few compliments from the young man OF
the day that she SHES at them like an un-
broken colt and the early and artificial
stages OF the old approach to the possibill-
ties OF a new relation strike her as bore.
The open air, exercise, the familiar contact
OF athletic sports have made these slow
steps unnecessary. girl who can drive a
golf ball clean past mans stroke or be
the fresher at the end Of century does not
thank him for a neat reference to her COM
plexion, which is, to tell the truth. better
than was her mothers at the same age. A
girl who wears her shoes to walk In them
has ceased TO be anxious about her ankles
and either worried or pleased because her
bicycle skirt shows them and something
more.
The new summer girl knows more than
her predecessor. She is better educated,
She has calmly dissected too many creeping
things in her school laboratory to be scared
by mouse or startled by spider She is
not to be put off by airy masculine explana-
tions, and her knowledge OF the world and
its ways is precise enough TO make many
masculine excuses seem as diaphOnous 10 her
as the thinnest chiffon she folds and ties.
She is inclined to look on earning her own
living as far wiser than a foolish marriage
and she inwardly challenges the young man
she meets to prove that he can be suffi-
ciently agreeable to make up for her liberty
and freedom OF action. As for being an old
maid she hasn't the slightest dread cf the
life, and thereby does her own unconscious
share to improve the breed by making her
winning the harder and the winning man
work the harder and be the better and the
stronger so as to win her.
Won she Is, for marriage grows yisibly
wiser and more eyen-paced in its selection
and choice under these new conditions Of
camaraderle and exercise, OF fresh air and
health, of knowledge experience and open
souled candor. A quarter OF century OF
athletics has plainly raised the American
level and no one can today make the spring
round of score Of our schools for boys and
girls without seeing that the American boy
and girl OF today are bigger. stronger,
healthier and more wholesome than ever
before