The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-11-30
THE "GIRL" OF TODAY
Contrasted With Herself Half a Gen.
turV Ago


In no particular has our social and
domestic machinery shown more Sc
rious deterioration than in the pro-
cesses by which the girl has been
eliminated from the scheme. One
rarely meets today the girl, who half
century ago was factor in the
home. both potent and beautiful. AS
to whether the change which has given
knowledge of affairs and a liberal edu-
cation on subjects that We're kept out
of her GRANDMOTHER reach until after
she was of age is a change for the bet
ter there may be more than one opin-
ION. Once in her teens the modern girl
laws aside many of the time-honored
attributes of girlhood. In the category
of these relinquished characteristics
there are unfortunately many sweet
and compelling charms which While
they may have served no very prac-
teal end, gave to girlhood an aureole
Of sanctity, hedging about that mystic
age between the quiet of secIusion and
the Sterner activities that await the
woman when she has moved into the
important sphere for which nature in
tended her At twelve years of age
the child passes presume bly, into girl
hood, and at eighteen she emerges
chrysalis-like, into the full glory and
beauty of young Womanhood. Under
modern conditions this intermediary
age has been ruthlessly invaded by de-
mands and customs that rob it not only
- AtS SC16Illy Oh nina ana S6cIuS1On
from gTosser contact but dispel in
large measure the holy idealism that
possessed the maidenhood of which
Lolnlgfellow so beautifully sang:
Standing with reluctant feet
Where the brook and river meet
Womanhood and childhood fleet"
In associations today the young girl
mas wider latitude and thereby comes
INTO contact with influences that tend
TO brush the. bloom from the cheek and
give the eye steadier CLEAN when it
looks out upon the world. To catalogue
the losses and gains as between the
glrI of the past and the miss" of the
present day is a difficult and delicate
task Certainly the modern miss lacks
In reserve and the modesty of ignorance
that are always such potent and allur-
Ing charms at that uncertain age be-
tween childhood and womanhood Ac-
cess TO nlppant and falsely conceived
views OF life is so much easier for the
girl OF today She reads tinsel literatui e
and becomes, through the matinee habit
an almost daily student of the unreal
and flashy views of life that the stage
too often gives. 1t is an astonishing
fact, but nevertheless true, that very
many stage enterprises are vitalized and
made profitable by pandering to the sill
ly taste of what is known as the matt
nee girl. Her adOI alton for the hero
keeps that hero in frOck coats and dia-
mond pins, for without this alteration
the hero would be a poor sort of stage
circumference. This may be all very
well for the hotel bill of the hero. but
the process robs US of our girls, makes
them foolish and forward misses at
time when they should be cultivating
the modest charms and graces tina. hon
est and desira BILE wouId-b be husbands
seek IN the woman they hope to marry
1t is perhaps an advance over the past
that our young girls from II to Is are
better equipped as members of society,
that they can make themselves infinite
~ more useful in variety of ways than
could their little sisters of half a century
ago. All this may be granted, and a
proud word justly said for the bright,
vivacious type of young girlhood that
we find in this modern day, but never
theless, the real girl, the natural child
with her dolls at II and is and her in
nocence and reserve at sweet 16, is fast
disappearing. Her passing means the
loss from the domestic and social scheme
of the tenderest and sweetest human
flower that the good God ever permitted
to blossom in the garden of humanity
Pittsburg Gazette.