Los Angeles herald., 1906-07-27
MODERN SOCIETY
GIRL IS SCORED
LONDON NEWSPAPER SAYS
SHE SOON GETS WICKED
Spoiled In Two Months-says That
only One May Debutante In Ten
Is Fit to Speak To
by July
Special Cable to The Herald.

Special cable to The Herald.
LONDON. July 21.-"out of 100
charming girls who came out in May,
only about one I'm every ten is fit to be
spoken to by the middle of the follow
ing July.
"such is the result of modern So
ciety Methods"
That is the sober, sorrowful declara-
ton which q periodical devoted to
chronicling the doings of the ."smart
set" permits a correspondent to say in
its columns.
The mere fact that this periodical
permits such confession Is even more
convincing testimony than the lashings
which Father Vaughan has been CIV
ing Mayfair in his fashionable church.
"Soclety in former days" the article
asserts, did not seem to be the glar-
ing, gittering thing that it is now,
enfolding all those who make trial of
1t in a noxious and deadly embrace.
The change seems to have been
wrought by the rise, or rather, the ex-
aggerated worship of two gods-wealth
and material success. The rise of these
two deities produced about the year
1890 marked change in society, which
took form in a definite and permanent
body labeled by that truly offensive
but well deserved title, "The Smart
Set"
Shudder at Dowdy
"The young married women of that
period suddenly conceived a horror of
what is called early Victorianism.
They shuddered at the possibility of
being called "dowdy," which meant in
reality that they thought it clever to
laugh at all the old standards of moral
ity and general good behavior that had
been set up by an earlier and far
wiser generation.
1.-THE training of the young by means
of example went out and parents gave
up practicing old-fashioned virtues
Mothers SHE'D at their responsibilities,
and then there appeared upon the scene
the modern society girls as we know
them today.
Certainly they are much more ele-
CANT than those of the 70s and early
sos. They dress better, they make the
most of their looks and their outward
manner toward the casual male has
enormously improved.
"If a man who had gone abroad at
the age of 20 in 1880 were to return to
London now and find himself seated
at modern dinner party near to one
of these charmers, he would-suppos-
ing he were young enough in mind and
appearance to engage her interest
leave the house vowing that the Lon
don girl of 1906 was an enormous i'm
provement on her aunt of 1880. He
would find the awkward shyness that
was sometimes to terribly difficult to
break down gone, and in it's place an
engaging frankness, an apparently
tender sympathy manifested in him
which, although often accompanied by
a lackadaisical and affected manner,
would gently sooth him, and he would
be astonished at her easy converse
tional powers.
But If, emboldened by the success
of his first meeting, he were to succeed
in becoming close friends with her,
then slowly but surely would disillu-
sion commence to dawn. The grace
full charm would then turn out to be
merely outward appanage. He would
discover that, owing to her education
and bringing up, she might have
acquired languages, but little principle
and absolutely no depth. AS for love,
as understood by an earlier generation,
she would laugh at the mere idea un-
less the object was well gilded, and
would consider marriage with a man of
moderate means a form of luxury to
be reserved for dull country people,"