The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1911-11-06
A ROMANTIC STREAK
Mrs. Austin, the Novelist. Thinks it
Is Hereditary

is Hereditary
Mrs. Mary Austin. the writer, want
ed to talk about divorce, she told the
members of the Legislative league at
a meeting at the Waldorf and wished
they had asked her to speak to them
on the day they had it up for discus
sion.
Il knew more about divorce than
most people" said Mrs. Austin, "and
l have reached the point where |
know that free love is as much of a
freak as kleptomania"
There is a hereditary romantic
streak in human beings. Mrs. Austin
told the women, and If that isn't
worked off normally in early years il
is sure to make trouble alter. 1t
comes from the days when men
fought chiyalrously for damsels who
did tapestry work in old castles and
waved their knights fond farewells
from battlemented towers.
She recommended football as an
outlet for the hereditary romantic ell
ement for boys and to keep them
from sowing wild oats later.
According TO Mrs. Austin it is
something like the unnecessary yer.
inform appendix in the physical life
and is apt to show itself in the girl
in romanticism and religion.
She didn't tell exactly how il
should be worked off in the girl but
she believes in the conservation of
the bloom of women, and she does
Mt wish young women or young men
either to be too much exploited in
the labor world 1t is one of the eau.
ses OF divorce, she says, and there
again she illustrated with the man.
You viii notice that a good many
men, when they get to be about forty
or little more, 30 to pieces morally.
II is about that time that their wives
begin to get old andahomely and lose
their teeth and they refuse to support
them and are dragged into the div.
orce court.
NOW when you hear of case like
that you will be pretty apt TO find
that the man had to take up moral
responsibilities, help support himself
and his family at an early age. per-
haps thirteen. His moral fibre didn't
have chance to develop and become
strong and vigorous and so there is a
moral breakdown at the time of
strain"
Inc present day bilboards was an.
other subject on which Mrs. Austin
touched, and she thinks they are had
for the children.
Il took the trouble to follow a
group of children Just out of school
one day" she said "and see how the
Dillboards affected them. II was with
them just as it was with the Bible
pictures our mothers used to give I'M
when we were little. They pointed
at the pictures and said. This is me
rms Is you just as we did with the
Bible women and II didn't make any
difference TO those children that the
ladies they were looking at wore
snort skirts and tights and had their
toes pointed to a quarter of g."
Mrs. Austin made an appeal for the
professional chaperon, who in one
form, Is found in the Dock Matron. 10
chaperon the daughters of the moor
as the daughters of the well-to-do are
chaperoned by their mothers.
And we cant get this by silent in.
nuence as our friends the antis saw !"
she concluded. I've tried it on sod. |
den' Ignorant narrow-minded public
men who were more influenced bv |
someone else who had more power
ana a bigger purse. think our best
way to help is by making a cross on |
a little slip OF paper and dropping II |
into box"
The Legislative league was founded
by Mrs. Lille Deyereux Blake. who
worked all her life for the cross on
the little printed slip" for women,
and Its members applauded heartily.