Year: 1876

THE YOUNG OLD GIRL.


AT the other end of the scale stands the
painted, trizzed, and frippery old maid who
mas not learnt the art of growing old, and
who carries into her fftieth year the
coquettish airs and graces which she began


to study before her glass in her fifteenth.


beauty in her heyday, she still maintains
her right to be considered beauty in her
decline, and believes that her rice-powder
and bloom of Ninon, her dyes and her false


hair, cleverly mask the truth of time, and


ontltle her to be still ranked among those


who have claims on the admiration of men


who give cause for the jealousy of woman.


She Is one OF those who, according to their
own account, have been beseiged all their
llves by lovers and adorers, but who for
some inexplicable reason have never found


the man to whom they would intrust


that queer mass of vanity and selElove to
which they give by courtesy the name of
heart. All the same, it is odd how very
much afraid OF them unmarried men are,
and how these oft-denying old maids carry
about with them the sentiment of a drag


net and a stout matrimonial hook, on
which should. any unlucky weight be
caught, he might bid adieu to all hope of
escape short of the fine to be paid for an


exposure in Court on breach of promise
case. Sometimes this kind of old maid
goes in for infantile innocence; and some.


times she thinks the piquancy of naughti-
ness more to the purpose, and better
game to play on the whole. In the first,
as an 'ngenue, she skirts by dangerous sub
Jects and lisps out risky double meanings
IN the most innocent way imaginable. And


how can you be so ungenerous as to think


that quinquagenarian, with nice red lips
and rose-red cheeks, well-preserved figure
and waist that is still only twenty-three


inches round, close measure, can have


learnt enough of the world and its wicked
ways to understand the true bearing of her
native remarks, and to know what inter
pretation her doubtful words and odd allu-
slons can bear? These very innocent old


maids posturizing for young ones are
perhaps the most embarrassing companions


to be met with anywhere. hlg,nucs Of half
a century good, they put girls under twenty


to the blush, and mako even men of the


world uncomfortable. But you must take


them as they offer themselves. Politeness


commands us TO except people at their own


valuation; and when fifty will pose for


fifteen, it is rude to whisper: "Thirty-five


years too late y Hence the innocent old


maid, with her bare shoulders and her


respondent tresses, her pretense at blush.


ing, her giggle and her coquetry, goes


through the world sometimes with the


honest belief that she is admired by the


men who laugh at her as they would at a


performing monkey, and treat her as a


ridiculous sort of marionette, the strings oi


which they pull and make to dance at their


will.


THE PRUDISH sPINSTER.


Then there is the typical old maid, the
starch and sour Miss Prue, to whom most


things are more or less shocking, and the


barriers Of the forbidden are set close


against all the avenues of human life
; This is the woman to whom youth is ot
itself something to doubt, to vilify, tc


depress; to whom the restlesness of child
} hood is naughtiness now and the prophecy
) of worse evil to come; to whom the vigor
Gus energies of youth are wrong-doings, its
! follies vices, its mistakes crimes its ignor
) ance sin to whom the frank FRIENDSHIP
; Of boy and girl is a misdemeanor, the grow
ing love of man and maid a shame, the


delights of young pleasure things which


no modest girl would accept, no careful
, mother permit; this is the woman who
passes her life in spying behind her curtain
and peeping over her blind at all tina
r passes before her window; who knows hel


neighbors' business better than those neigh
q bors know it themselves, and who is tn,
seourge Of the society in which she lives
: for the prying and suspicion, the slande
, and gossip of which she makes herself tn,
9 focus. Loveless in her own life, she denie
y the right of others to joys of which she ha
q been deprived, and would reduce tn,
: whole world of youth to the same barrer

!. withers ard grows sourer as she grow
o older, holding beauty and admiration
! dress, amusement, and making love a
: worse than the seven deadly sins whereve
, found. She would like to see all tn
pretty girls whom she knows put int,
i disfguring garments under the name o
. "neat and modest" She would keel
y them as much apart from young men as
i conventual discipline were the only righ
p teous rule; and such marriages as she mus
\ perforce allow she would have made on tn
;. basis of reason only-the youngest womel
!, paired off with more than mature men an,
. the brightest spirits with the dullest-fo
= ballast. For the matter of age indeed sh
. would allow of no very young marriages a
. all; five and twenty being the earliest o.
! the woman's side, which as a rule, sh
;. would couple with five and forty on tn
. mans, and approve in proportion to tn
, amount of coldness and the absence c
= nassion In both. For she dislikes the idle