Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1902-11-20
A PRESCRIPTION OF DICKENS
1t IS Intended to Help Growing Girls
Through the SeIf-Conscious Ace.

There is time" writes a now
grown up woman of her early days
we all have known it, EXCEPT a few ia
vOred human beings-"Of that bewil-
derinS experience of being neither one
thing nor the other" time when
ones frocks have no permanent length
of skirt or sleeves. but are constantly
w and down. being either prOvidently
too long that we many grow into them.
or OutgrOwn to Il painful and ungainly
Sh0rtneSS, Or-bitter ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
than all. having just been let down
and the creaSes carefully irOned out
and tn" SPACES below the crease left
nOticeabiy different. We seem to be
made of arms and legs. and the utmost
charity Of our fOndest friends finds but
an apOlogetic expression. Poor child.
She is just that age,' We We're always
in the way then, or felt SO. even when
people We're very kind and forgot us
altogether-and how to dispose of our
selves was a sad problem.
Happy are you, growing girl" con-
tinues the writer out of her own eXpe-
ritnce. IF you take volume Of
Dickens and go up into the garnet and
forget that you are you, reading your
self into another world. 1t is the great
peaceful time of your life; perhaps in
this busy world there will never come
another like it, and happy is the girl
VINO knows that whatever unhappy
sense the phrase may have, just that
age. is the golden age of Dickens. No
stupid wise, critical inspection bothers
YOU: you know and care nothing about
literature: style and purpose are I'M
heard of. words, paragraphs and pages
have no real substance; you plunge
through them. forgetting that you read
and live and love and laugh and hate
and weep and are never so happy.
"One perhaps never grows too Old
for Dickens, and is not too young for
him very long; but however great a
pleasure he may always be. from 10 to
1c in the years of our life he is one OF
the joys of living. 1t may not be pc
culiarly true of Dickens-it is possible
that the pleasure of doing anything
again that we loved first and best to
do long ago is largely in the memory
of the first delight-but true 1T is GER
tainly that in rereading the joys and
sorrows of our old Dickens friends.
We laughed in the garnet and we laugh
again over Sam Wellers wise absurd
ties, over Mrs. Bardells anger and re-
venge, and. over all the adventures
and nonsense of Pickwick and his
friends. We followed poor Oliver
Twist breathlessly through his maze
of burglars and rascals, we wept ana
smiled with Peggotty and David COP
perfie,d. But of all the lives we were
led. and al! the sights we saw, most
of all did we wildly feel grief or nor
ror where some dearly beloved frieno
or dreadful rascal died. we cannon
! often weep over them now-we know
them too well. perhaps. and then we
have found out, with our prying. ION
I much of how it is done. we nave
learned the trick of analysing anu o'7'
covering ways and means. In the ga'
ret we felt the enchantment oil hrs'
balcony distance-nOw we nave conn
j down. and nearer, and understand too
| well the stage machinery.
Encourage the girls to read DICK
ems at the time when she is neither ort
thing nor the other, concludes this
wise woman, land so give her "a Wo' ~
of refuge from herself. New forf
Tribune.