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diff --git a/41735-0.txt b/41735-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..90c9ea5 --- /dev/null +++ b/41735-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8009 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41735 *** + + THE + GIRL OF THE PERIOD + ETC. + + VOL. I. + + + + + [REPRINTED, _by permission, from the_ SATURDAY REVIEW] + + + + + THE + GIRL OF THE PERIOD + + AND OTHER + Social Essays + + BY + E. LYNN LINTON + + AUTHOR OF 'THE ATONEMENT OF LEAM DUNDAS' 'UNDER WHICH LORD?' + 'THE REBEL OF THE FAMILY' 'IONE' ETC. + + IN TWO VOLUMES + + VOL. I. + +[Illustration] + + LONDON + RICHARD BENTLEY & SON, NEW BURLINGTON STREET + Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen + + 1883 + + [_All rights reserved_] + + + + + LONDON: PRINTED BY + SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE + AND PARLIAMENT STREET + + + + + Dedicated + TO + ALL GOOD GIRLS + AND + TRUE WOMEN + + + + +PREFACE. + + +So many false reports followed the appearance of these essays, that I +am grateful to the authorities of the _Saturday Review_ for their +present permission to republish them under my own name, even though +the best of the day has a little gone by, and other forms of folly +have been flying about since these were shot at. The essays hit +sharply enough at the time, and caused some ill-blood. 'The Girl of +the Period' was especially obnoxious to many to whom women were the +Sacred Sex above criticism and beyond rebuke; and I had to pay pretty +smartly in private life, by those who knew, for what they termed a +libel and an untruth. With these passionate repudiators on the one +hand, on the other were some who, trading on the enforced anonymity of +the paper, took spurious credit to themselves for the authorship. I +was twice introduced to the 'Writer of the "Girl of the Period."' The +first time he was a clergyman who had boldly told my friends that he +had written the paper; the second, she was a lady of rank well +known in London society, and to this hour believed by her own circle +to have written this and other of the articles included in the present +collection. I confess that, whether for praise or blame, I am glad to +be able at last to assume the full responsibility of my own work. + +In re-reading these papers I am more than ever convinced that I have +struck the right chord of condemnation, and advocated the best virtues +and most valuable characteristics of women. I neither soften nor +retract a line of what I have said. One of the modern phases of +womanhood--hard, unloving, mercenary, ambitious, without domestic +faculty and devoid of healthy natural instincts--is still to me a +pitiable mistake and a grave national disaster. And I think now, as I +thought when I wrote these papers, that a public and professional life +for women is incompatible with the discharge of their highest duties +or the cultivation of their noblest qualities. I think now, as I +thought then, that the sphere of human action is determined by the +fact of sex, and that there does exist both natural limitation and +natural direction. This creed, which summarizes all that I have said +_in extenso_, I repeat with emphasis, and maintain with the conviction +of long years of experience. + + E. LYNN LINTON. + + 1883. + + + + +CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. + + + PAGE + + THE GIRL OF THE PERIOD 1 + + MODERN MOTHERS (I.) 10 + + MODERN MOTHERS (II.) 19 + + PAYING ONE'S SHOT 27 + + WHAT IS WOMAN'S WORK? 37 + + LITTLE WOMEN 48 + + IDEAL WOMEN 58 + + PINCHBECK 69 + + AFFRONTED WOMANHOOD 79 + + FEMININE AFFECTATIONS 88 + + INTERFERENCE 99 + + THE FASHIONABLE WOMAN 109 + + SLEEPING DOGS 119 + + BEAUTY AND BRAINS 128 + + NYMPHS 137 + + MÉSALLIANCES 147 + + WEAK SISTERS 157 + + PINCHING SHOES 167 + + SUPERIOR BEINGS 176 + + FEMININE AMENITIES 184 + + GRIM FEMALES 193 + + MATURE SIRENS 203 + + PUMPKINS 213 + + WIDOWS 223 + + DOLLS 234 + + CHARMING WOMEN 244 + + APRON-STRINGS 254 + + FINE FEELINGS 264 + + SPHINXES 273 + + FLIRTING 281 + + SCRAMBLERS 290 + + FLATTERY 299 + + LA FEMME PASSÉE 309 + + SPOILT WOMEN 317 + + DOVECOTS 325 + + BORED HUSBANDS 335 + + + + +ESSAYS +UPON +SOCIAL SUBJECTS. + + + + +_THE GIRL OF THE PERIOD._ + + +Time was when the phrase, 'a fair young English girl,' meant the ideal +of womanhood; to us, at least, of home birth and breeding. It meant a +creature generous, capable, modest; something franker than a +Frenchwoman, more to be trusted than an Italian, as brave as an +American but more refined, as domestic as a German and more graceful. +It meant a girl who could be trusted alone if need be, because of the +innate purity and dignity of her nature, but who was neither bold in +bearing nor masculine in mind; a girl who, when she married, would be +her husband's friend and companion, but never his rival; one who would +consider his interests as identical with her own, and not hold him as +just so much fair game for spoil; who would make his house his true +home and place of rest, not a mere passage-place for vanity and +ostentation to pass through; a tender mother, an industrious +housekeeper, a judicious mistress. + +We prided ourselves as a nation on our women. We thought we had the +pick of creation in this fair young English girl of ours, and envied +no other men their own. We admired the languid grace and subtle fire +of the South; the docility and childlike affectionateness of the East +seemed to us sweet and simple and restful; the vivacious sparkle of +the trim and sprightly Parisienne was a pleasant little excitement +when we met with it in its own domain; but our allegiance never +wandered from our brown-haired girls at home, and our hearts were less +vagrant than our fancies. This was in the old time, and when English +girls were content to be what God and nature had made them. Of late +years we have changed the pattern, and have given to the world a race +of women as utterly unlike the old insular ideal as if we had created +another nation altogether. The Girl of the Period, and the fair young +English girl of the past, have nothing in common save ancestry and +their mother-tongue; and even of this last the modern version makes +almost a new language, through the copious additions it has received +from the current slang of the day. + +The Girl of the Period is a creature who dyes her hair and paints her +face, as the first articles of her personal religion--a creature whose +sole idea of life is fun; whose sole aim is unbounded luxury; and +whose dress is the chief object of such thought and intellect as +she possesses. Her main endeavour is to outvie her neighbours in the +extravagance of fashion. No matter if, in the time of crinolines, she +sacrifices decency; in the time of trains, cleanliness; in the time of +tied-back skirts, modesty; no matter either, if she makes herself a +nuisance and an inconvenience to every one she meets;--the Girl of the +Period has done away with such moral muffishness as consideration for +others, or regard for counsel and rebuke. It was all very well in +old-fashioned times, when fathers and mothers had some authority and +were treated with respect, to be tutored and made to obey, but she is +far too fast and flourishing to be stopped in mid-career by these slow +old morals; and as she lives to please herself, she does not care if +she displeases every one else. + +Nothing is too extraordinary and nothing too exaggerated for her +vitiated taste; and things which in themselves would be useful reforms +if let alone become monstrosities worse than those which they have +displaced so soon as she begins to manipulate and improve. If a +sensible fashion lifts the gown out of the mud, she raises hers midway +to her knee. If the absurd structure of wire and buckram, once called +a bonnet, is modified to something that shall protect the wearer's +face without putting out the eyes of her companion, she cuts hers down +to four straws and a rosebud, or a tag of lace and a bunch of glass +beads. If there is a reaction against an excess of Rowland's Macassar, +and hair shiny and sticky with grease is thought less nice than +if left clean and healthily crisp, she dries and frizzes and sticks +hers out on end like certain savages in Africa, or lets it wander down +her back like Madge Wildfire's, and thinks herself all the more +beautiful the nearer she approaches in look to a negress or a maniac. + +With purity of taste she has lost also that far more precious purity +and delicacy of perception which sometimes mean more than appears on +the surface. What the _demi-monde_ does in its frantic efforts to +excite attention, she also does in imitation. If some fashionable +_dévergondée en évidence_ is reported to have come out with her dress +below her shoulder-blades, and a gold strap for all the sleeve thought +necessary, the Girl of the Period follows suit next day; and then she +wonders that men sometimes mistake her for her prototype, or that +mothers of girls not quite so far gone as herself refuse her as a +companion for their daughters. She has blunted the fine edges of +feeling so much that she cannot understand why she should be condemned +for an imitation of form which does not include imitation of fact. She +cannot be made to see that modesty of appearance and virtue in deed +ought to be inseparable; and that no good girl can afford to appear +bad, under pain of receiving the contempt awarded to the bad. + +This imitation of the _demi-monde_ in dress leads to something in +manner and feeling, not quite so pronounced perhaps, but far too like +to be honourable to herself or satisfactory to her friends. It +leads to slang, bold talk and general fastness; to the love of +pleasure and indifference to duty; to the desire of money before +either love or happiness; to uselessness at home, dissatisfaction with +the monotony of ordinary life, horror of all useful work; in a word, +to the worst forms of luxury and selfishness--to the most fatal +effects arising from want of high principle and absence of tender +feeling. + +The Girl of the Period envies the queens of the _demi-monde_ far more +than she abhors them. She sees them gorgeously attired and sumptuously +appointed, and she knows them to be flattered, fêted, and courted with +a certain disdainful admiration of which she catches only the +admiration while she ignores the disdain. They have all that for which +her soul is hungering; and she never stops to reflect at what a price +they have bought their gains, and what fearful moral penalties they +pay for their sensuous pleasures. She sees only the coarse gilding on +the base token, and shuts her eyes to the hideous figure in the midst +and the foul legend written round the edge. It is this envy of the +pleasures, and indifference to the sins, of these women of the +_demi-monde_ which is doing such infinite mischief to the modern girl. +They brush too closely by each other, if not in actual deeds, yet in +aims and feelings; for the luxury which is bought by vice with the one +is that thing of all in life most passionately desired by the other, +though she is not yet prepared to pay quite the same price. +Unfortunately, she has already paid too much--all that once gave her +distinctive national character. + +No one can say of the modern English girl that she is tender, loving, +retiring or domestic. The old fault so often found by keen-sighted +Frenchwomen, that she was so fatally _romanesque_, so prone to +sacrifice appearances and social advantages for love, will never be +set against the Girl of the Period. Love indeed is the last thing she +thinks of, and the least of the dangers besetting her. Love in a +cottage--that seductive dream which used to vex the heart and disturb +the calculations of the prudent mother--is now a myth of past ages. +The legal barter of herself for so much money, representing so much +dash, so much luxury and pleasure--that is her idea of marriage; the +only idea worth entertaining. For all seriousness of thought +respecting the duties or the consequences of marriage, she has not a +trace. If children come, they find but a stepmother's cold welcome +from her; and if her husband thinks that he has married anything that +is to belong to him--a _tacens et placens uxor_ pledged to make him +happy--the sooner he wakes from his hallucination and understands that +he has simply married some one who will condescend to spend his money +on herself, and who will shelter her indiscretions behind the shield +of his name, the less severe will be his disappointment. She has +married his house, his carriage, his balance at the banker's, his +title; and he himself is just the inevitable condition clogging +the wheel of her fortune; at best an adjunct, to be tolerated with +more or less patience as may chance. For it is only the old-fashioned +sort, not Girls of the Period _pur sang_, who marry for love, or put +the husband before the banker. But the Girl of the Period does not +marry easily. Men are afraid of her; and with reason. They may amuse +themselves with her for an evening, but they do not readily take her +for life. Besides, after all her efforts, she is only a poor copy of +the real thing; and the real thing is far more amusing than the copy, +because it is real. Men can get that whenever they like; and when they +go into their mothers' drawing-rooms, with their sisters and their +sisters' friends, they want something of quite a different flavour. +_Toujours perdrix_ is bad providing all the world over; but a +continual weak imitation of _toujours perdrix_ is worse. + +If we must have only one kind of thing, let us have it genuine, and +the queens of St. John's Wood in their unblushing honesty rather than +their imitators and make-believes in Bayswater and Belgravia. For, at +whatever cost of shocked self-love or pained modesty it may be, it +cannot be too plainly told to the modern English girl that the net +result of her present manner of life is to assimilate her as nearly as +possible to a class of women whom we must not call by their proper--or +improper--name. And we are willing to believe that she has still some +modesty of soul left hidden under all this effrontery of fashion, +and that, if she could be made to see herself as she appears to the +eyes of men, she would mend her ways before too late. + +It is terribly significant of the present state of things when men are +free to write as they do of the women of their own nation. Every word +of censure flung against them is two-edged, and wounds those who +condemn as much as those who are condemned; for surely it need hardly +be said that men hold nothing so dear as the honour of their women, +and that no one living would willingly lower the repute of his mother +or his sisters. It is only when these have placed themselves beyond +the pale of masculine respect that such things could be written as are +written now. When women become again what they were once they will +gather round them the love and homage and chivalrous devotion which +were then an Englishwoman's natural inheritance. + +The marvel in the present fashion of life among women is, how it holds +its ground in spite of the disapprobation of men. It used to be an +old-time notion that the sexes were made for each other, and that it +was only natural for them to please each other, and to set themselves +out for that end. But the Girl of the Period does not please men. She +pleases them as little as she elevates them; and how little she does +that, the class of women she has taken as her models of itself +testifies. All men whose opinion is worth having prefer the simple and +genuine girl of the past, with her tender little ways and pretty +bashful modesties, to this loud and rampant modernization, with her +false red hair and painted skin, talking slang as glibly as a man, and +by preference leading the conversation to doubtful subjects. She +thinks she is piquante and exciting when she thus makes herself the +bad copy of a worse original; and she will not see that though men +laugh with her they do not respect her, though they flirt with her +they do not marry her; she will not believe that she is not the kind +of thing they want, and that she is acting against nature and her own +interests when she disregards their advice and offends their taste. We +do not understand how she makes out her account, viewing her life from +any side; but all we can do is to wait patiently until the national +madness has passed, and our women have come back again to the old +English ideal, once the most beautiful, the most modest, the most +essentially womanly in the world. + + + + +_MODERN MOTHERS._ + +I. + + +No human affection has been so passionately praised as maternal love, +and none is supposed to be so holy or so strong. Even the poetic +aspect of that instinct which inspires the young with their dearest +dreams does not rank so high as this; and neither lover's love nor +conjugal love, neither filial affection nor fraternal, comes near the +sanctity or grandeur of the maternal instinct. But all women are not +equally rich in this great gift; and, to judge by appearances, English +women are at this moment wonderfully poor. It may seem a harsh thing +to say, but it is none the less true:--society has put maternity out +of fashion, and the nursery is nine times out of ten a place of +punishment, not of pleasure, to the modern mother. + +Two points connected with this subject are of growing importance at +this present time--the one is the increasing disinclination of married +women to be mothers at all; the other, the large number of those who, +being mothers, will not, or cannot, nurse their own children. In the +mad race after pleasure and excitement now going on through +English society the tender duties of motherhood have become simply +disagreeable restraints, and the old feeling of the blessing attending +the quiver full is exchanged for one the very reverse. With some of +the more intellectual and less instinctive sort, maternity is looked +on as a kind of degradation; and women of this stamp, sensible enough +in everything else, talk impatiently among themselves of the base +necessities laid on them by men and nature, and how hateful to them is +everything connected with their characteristic duties. + +This wild revolt against nature, and specially this abhorrence of +maternity, is carried to a still greater extent by American women; +with grave national consequences resulting; but though we have not yet +reached the Transatlantic limit, the state of feminine feeling and +physical condition among ourselves will disastrously affect the future +unless something can be done to bring our women back to a healthier +tone of mind and body. No one can object to women declining marriage +altogether in favour of a voluntary self-devotion to some project or +idea; but, when married, it is a monstrous doctrine to hold that they +are in any way degraded by the consequences, and that natural +functions are less honourable than social excitements. The world can +get on without balls and morning calls; it can get on too without +amateur art and incorrect music; but not without wives and mothers; +and those times in a nation's history when women have been social +ornaments rather than family home-stays have ever been times of +national decadence and of moral failure. + +Part of this growing disinclination is due to the enormous expense +incurred now by having children. As women have ceased to take any +active share in their own housekeeping, whether in the kitchen or the +nursery, the consequence is an additional cost for service, which is a +serious item in the yearly accounts. Women who, if they lived a +rational life, could and would nurse their children, now require a +wet-nurse, or the services of an experienced woman who can 'bring up +by hand,' as the phrase is; women who once would have had one +nursemaid now have two; and women who, had they lived a generation +ago, would have had none at all, must in their turn have a wretched +young creature without thought or knowledge, into whose questionable +care they deliver what should be the most sacred obligation and the +most jealously-guarded charge they possess. + +It is rare if, in any section of society where hired service can be +had, mothers give more than a superficial personal superintendence to +nursery or schoolroom--a superintendence about as thorough as their +housekeeping, and as efficient. The one set of duties is quite as +unfashionable as the other; and money is held to relieve from the +service of love as entirely as it relieves from the need of labour. +And yet, side by side with this personal relinquishment of natural +duties, has grown up, perhaps as an instinctive compensation, an +amount of expensive management specially remarkable. There never was a +time when children were made of so much individual importance in the +family, yet were in so little direct relation with the mother--never a +time when maternity did so little and social organization so much. +Juvenile parties; the kind of moral obligation apparently felt by all +parents to provide heated and unhealthy amusements for their boys and +girls during the holidays; extravagance in dress, following the same +extravagance among the mothers; the increasing cost of education; the +fuss and turmoil generally made over them--all render children real +burdens in a house where money is not too plentiful, and where every +child that comes is not only an additional mouth to feed and an +additional body to clothe, but a subtractor by just so much from the +family fund of pleasure. Even where there is no lack of money, the +unavoidable restraints of the condition, for at least some months, +more than counterbalance any sentimental delight to be found in +maternity. For, before all other things in life, maternity demands +unselfishness in women; and this is just the one virtue of which women +have least at this present time--just the one reason why motherhood is +at a discount, and children are regarded as inflictions instead of +blessings. + +Few middle-class women are content to bring up their children with the +old-fashioned simplicity of former times, and to let them share +and share alike in the family, with only so much difference in their +treatment as is required by their difference of state; fewer still are +willing to take on themselves the labour and care which must come with +children in the easiest-going household, and so to save in the +expenses by their own work. The shabbiest little wife, with her two +financial ends always gaping and never meeting, must have her still +shabbier little drudge to wheel her perambulator, so as to give her an +air of fine-ladyhood and being too good for such work; and the most +indolent housekeeper, whose superintendence of domestic matters takes +her just half an hour, cannot find time to go into the gardens or the +square with nurse and the children, so that she may watch over them +herself and see that they are properly cared for. + +In France, where it is the fashion for mother and _bonne_ to be +together both out of doors and at home, at least the children are not +neglected nor ill-treated, as is too often the case with us; and if +they are improperly managed, according to our ideas, the fault is in +the system, not in the want of maternal supervision. Here it is a very +rare case indeed when the mother accompanies the nurse and children; +and those days when she does are nursery gala-days to be talked of and +remembered for weeks after. As the little ones grow older, she may +occasionally take them with her when she visits her more intimate +friends; but this is for her own pleasure, not their good; and +going with them to see that they are properly cared for has nothing to +do with the matter. + +It is to be supposed that each mother has a profound belief in her own +nurse, and that when she condemns the neglect and harshness shown to +other children by the servants in charge, she makes a mental +reservation in favour of her own, and is very sure that nothing +improper nor cruel takes place in _her_ nursery. Her children do not +complain; and she always tells them to come to her when anything is +amiss. On which negative evidence she satisfies her soul, and makes +sure that all is right because she is too neglectful to see if +anything is wrong. She does not remember that her children do not +complain because they dare not. Dear and beautiful as all mammas are +to the small fry in the nursery, they are always in a certain sense +Junos sitting on the top of Mount Olympus, making occasional gracious +and benign descents, but practically too far removed for useful +interference; while nurse is an ever-present power, capable of sly +pinches and secret raids, as well as of more open oppression--a power, +therefore, to be propitiated, if only with the grim subservience of a +Yezidi too much afraid of the Evil One to oppose him. Wherefore nurse +is propitiated, failing the protection of the glorified creature just +gone to her grand dinner in a cloud of lace and a blaze of jewels; and +the first lesson taught the youthful Christian in short frocks or +knickerbockers is not to carry tales down stairs, and by no means +to let mamma know what nurse desires should be kept secret. + +A great deal of other evil, beside these sly beginnings of deceit, is +taught in the nursery; a great deal of vulgar thought, of +superstitious fear, of class coarseness. As, indeed, how must it not +be when we think of the early habits and education of the women taken +into the nursery to give the first strong indelible impressions to the +young souls under their care? Many a man with a ruined constitution, +and many a woman with shattered nerves, can trace back the beginning +of their sorrow to those neglected childish days when nurse had it all +her own way because mamma never looked below the surface, and was +satisfied with what was said instead of seeing for herself what was +done. It is an odd state of society which tolerates this transfer of a +mother's holiest and most important duty into the hands of a mere +stranger, hired by the month, and never thoroughly known. + +Where the organization of the family is of the patriarchal kind--old +retainers marrying and multiplying about the central home, and +carrying on a warm personal attachment from generation to +generation--this transfer of maternal care has not such bad effects; +but in our present way of life, without love or real relationship +between masters and servants, and where service is rendered for just +so much money down and for nothing more noble, it is a hideous system, +and one that makes the modern mother utterly inexplicable. We +wonder where her mere instincts can be, not to speak of her reason, +her love, her conscience, her pride. Pleasure and self-indulgence have +indeed gained tremendous power, in these later days, when they can +thus break down the force of the strongest law of nature--a law +stronger even than that of self-preservation. + +Folly is the true capillary attraction of the moral world, and +penetrates every stratum of society; and the folly of extravagant +attire in the drawing-room is reproduced in the nursery. Not content +with bewildering men's minds and emptying their husbands' purses for +the enhancement of their own charms, women do the same by their +children; and the mother who leaves the health and mind and temper and +purity of her offspring in the keeping of a hired nurse takes especial +care of the colour and cut of the frocks and petticoats. And there is +always the same strain after show, and the same endeavour to make a +little look a mickle. The children of five hundred a year must look +like those of a thousand; and those of a thousand must rival the +_tenue_ of little lords and ladies born in the purple; while the +amount of money spent on clothes in the tradesman class is a matter of +real amazement to those let into the secret. Simplicity of diet, too, +is going out with simplicity of dress, with simplicity of habits +generally; and stimulants and concentrated food are now the rule in +the nursery, where they mar as many constitutions as they make. More +than one child of whom we have had personal knowledge has yielded +to disease induced by too stimulating and too heating a diet; but +artificial habits demand corresponding artificiality of food, and so +the candle burns at both ends instead of one. + +Again, as for the increasing inability of educated women to nurse +their children, even if desirous of doing so, that also is a bodily +condition brought about by an unwholesome and unnatural state of life. +Late hours, high living, heated blood, and constantly breathing a +vitiated atmosphere are the causes of this alarming physical defect. +But it would be too much to expect that women should forego their +pleasurable indulgences, or do anything disagreeable to their senses, +for the sake of their offspring. They are not famous for looking far +ahead on any matter; but to expect them to look beyond themselves, and +their own present generation, is to expect the great miracle that +never comes. + + + + +_MODERN MOTHERS._ + +II. + + +There was once a superstition among us that mothers were of use in the +world; that they had their functions and duties, without which society +would not prosper nor hold together; and that much of the well-being +of humanity, present and future, depended on them. Mothers in those +bygone days were by no means effete personages or a worn-out +institution, but living powers exercising a real and pervading +influence; and they were credited with an authority which they did not +scruple to use when required. + +One of the functions recognized as specially belonging to them was +that of guarding their young people from the consequences of their own +ignorance--keeping them from dangers both physical and moral until +wise enough to take care of themselves, and supplementing by their own +experience the want of it in their children. Another was that of +preserving the tone of society on a high level, and supplying the +antiseptic element by which the rest was kept pure; as, for example, +insisting that the language used and the subjects discussed +before them were such as should not offend the modesty of virtuous +women; that the people with whom they were required to associate +should be moderately honest and well conducted; and, in short, as +mothers, discountenancing everything in other men and women which they +would not like to see imitated by their own sons and daughters. + +This was one of the fond superstitions of an elder time. For +ourselves, we boast of our freedom from superstition in these later +days; of our proud renunciation of restraints and habits which were +deemed beneficial by our forefathers; of our indifference to forms and +hatred of humbug; and of all that tends to fetter what is called +individualism. Hence we have found that we can go on without +safeguards for our young; that society does not want its matrons as +the preservative ingredient for keeping it pure; and that the world is +all the merrier for the loosening of bonds which once it was the duty +of women to draw closer. In fact, mothers have gone out, surviving +only in the form of chaperons. + +More or less on the search for her own pleasure--if by any possibility +of artifice she can be taken for less than sixty, still ready for odd +snatches of flirting as she can find occasion--or, with her faculties +concentrated on the chance of winning the rubber by indifferent +play--the chaperon's charge is not a very onerous one; and her +daughters know as well as she does that her presence is a blind rather +than a protection. They are with mamma as a form of speech; but +they are left to themselves as a matter of fact. Anyone who is in the +confidence of young people of either sex knows a little of what goes +on in the dark corners and on the steps of the stairs--a favourite +anchorage for the loosely chaperoned in private houses where two +hundred are invited and only a hundred can find room. But then the +girls are 'with mamma,' and the young men are contented souls who take +what they can get without making wry faces. Mamma, occupied in her own +well-seasoned coquetries, or absorbed in the chances of her deep +'finesse' and the winning trick, lets the girls take care of +themselves, and would think it an intolerable impertinence should a +friend hint to her that her place of chaperon included vigilant +personal guardianship, and that she would do better to keep her +daughters in her own charge than leave them to themselves. + +It is all very well for the advocates of youthful innocence to affect +to resent the slur supposed to be cast on girlhood by the advocacy of +this closer guardianship; or for those who do not know the world to +make their ignorance the measure of another's knowledge, and to deny +what they have not proved for themselves. Those who do know the world +know what they say when they deprecate the excessive freedom which is +too often granted to unmarried girls; and their warning is fully +justified by experience when they call mothers back to their duty +of stricter watchfulness. If indeed the young are capable of +self-protection, then we grant with them that mothers are a +mistake:--Let them abdicate without more ado. If license is more +desirable than modesty, and liberty better than reticence, the girls +may as well be left, as practically they are already, free from the +mother's guardianship; but if we have a doubt that way, we may as well +give it the benefit of consideration, and think a little on the +subject before going further on the present line. + +From the first the mother, in the well-to-do classes, acts too much +the part of the hen ostrich with her eggs. She trusts to the kindly +influences of external circumstances rather than to her own care to +make the hatching successful. Nurses, governesses, schools, in turn +relieve her of the irksome duties of maternity. She sees her little +ones at their stated hour, and for the other twenty-three leaves them +to receive their first indelible impress from a class which she is +never tired of disparaging. + +As the children grow older the women by whom they are moulded become +higher in the social and intellectual scale, but they are no more than +before subordinated to the mother's personal supervision. She, for her +part, cares only that her girls shall be taught the correct shibboleth +of their station; and for the rest, if she thinks at all, she cradles +herself in a generous trust in the goodness of human nature, or the +incorruptibility of her brood beyond that of any other woman's brood. +When they come under her own immediate hand, 'finished' and ready +to be introduced, she knows about as much of them as she knows of her +neighbours' girls in the next square; and in nine cases out of ten the +sole duties towards them which are undertaken by her are shirked when +possible, as a _corvée_ which she is too wise to bear unnecessarily. +When she can, she shuffles them off on some kind neighbourly hands, +and lets her daughters 'go about' with the first person who offers, +glad to have a little breathing time on her own side, and with always +that generous trust in providence and vicarious protection which has +marked her maternal career throughout. + +In the lower half of the middle class the liberty allowed to young +girls grows yearly more and more unchecked. They walk alone, travel +alone, visit alone; and the gravest evils have been known to arise +from the habit which modern mothers have of sending their daughters of +sixteen and upwards unaccompanied in London to colleges and classes. +Mamma has grown stout and lazy, and has always some important matter +on hand that keeps her at home, half asleep in the easy-chair, while +the girls go to and fro, and take the exercise befitting their +youthful energies. Of course no harm can befall them. They are _her_ +daughters, and the warnings given by the keener-eyed, who have had +experience, are mere inventions of the enemy and slanders against the +young. So they parade the streets, dressed in the most startling and +meretricious costumes of the period; and that fatal doctrine of +self-protection counts its victims by the score as the consequence. + +The world is fond of throwing the blame of any misfortune that may +arise, now on the girl, now on the man concerned; but in honest fact +that blame really belongs to the mothers who let their daughters run +about the world without guide or guard. A work was given to them by +nature and love to do which they have neglected, a duty which they +have discarded. Whoever chooses may chaperon, accompany, mould their +daughters, so long as they are freed from the trouble; and their +dependence on the natural virtue of humanity and the beneficence of +circumstance runs exactly parallel with their own indolence and +neglect. + +In preserving the tone of society pure the modern mother is as far +removed from the former ideal as she is in the duty of taking care of +her girls. Too often she is found making herself prominent in support +of the most objectionable movements; or, when doubtful questions are +discussed in mixed society, she forgets that regard for the purity of +her daughters should keep her silent, even if her own self-respect +were too weak to restrain her. When the conscienceless world, living +without a higher aim than that of success and what is known by getting +on, condones all kinds of moral obliquity for the sake of financial +prosperity and social position, do we find that, as a rule, mothers +and matrons protest against opening their houses to this gilded +rascality? If they did--if they made demerit and not poverty the +cause of exclusion, virtue and not success the title to +reception--there would be some check to the corruption which is so +insolently rampant now. + +Women have this power in their own hands, more especially those women +who are mothers. If they would only set themselves to check the +inclination for loose talk and doubtful discussions which is +characteristic of the present moment, they could put an end to it +without delay. So also they might stop in less than a year the torrent +of slang with which Young England floods its daily speech; and by +setting themselves against the paint and dye and meretricious make-up +generally of the modern girl, they might bring next quarter's fashions +back to modesty and simplicity. + +Women are apt to murmur at their lot as one without influence, +variety, stirring purpose, space for action. But it is, on the +contrary, a lot full of dignity and importance if properly regarded +and fitly undertaken. If they do not lead armies, they make the +characters of the men who lead and are led. If they are not State +Ministers nor Parliamentary orators, they raise by their nobleness or +degrade by their want of delicacy and refinement the souls and minds +of the men who are. If they are not in the throng and press of active +life, they can cheer others on to high aims, or basely reward the +baser methods of existence. As mothers they are the artificers who +give the initial touch that lasts for life; and as women they +complete what the mother began. Society is moulded mainly by them, +and they bring up their daughters on their own pattern. + +It is surely weak and silly then to blame society for its ignoble +tone, or the young for their disorders. All men want the corrective +influence of social opinion, and it is chiefly women who create that +opinion. Youth, too, will ever be disorderly if it gets the chance, +and the race has not yet been born that carries old heads on young +shoulders. It is for the mothers to supplement by their own wisdom the +gaps left by the inexperience and ignorance of youth; it is for the +mothers to guide aright the steps that are apt, without that guidance, +to run astray, and to guard against passions, emotions, desires, +which, if left to themselves, bring only evil and disaster, but which, +guarded and directed, may be turned to the best ends. For ourselves, +we deeply regret to see the rapid extinction of motherhood in its best +sense, and decline to accept this modern loose-handed chaperon age as +its worthy substitute. We repudiate the plea of the insubordination of +the young so often put forward in defence of the new state of things, +for it is simply nonsense. The young are what the mothers make them, +just as society is what the matrons allow it to be; and if these +mothers and matrons did their duty, we should hear no more of the +wilfulness of the one or the shameless vagaries of the other. The +remedy for each lies in their own hands only. + + + + +_PAYING ONE'S SHOT._ + + +It would save much useless striving and needless disappointment if the +necessity of paying one's shot were honestly accepted as absolute--if +it were understood, once for all, that society, like other +manifestations of humanity, is managed on the principle of exchange +and barter, and equivalents demanded for value received. The +benevolence which gives out of its own impulse, with no hope of reward +save in the well-being of the recipient, has no place in the +drawing-room code of morals. We may keep a useless creature from +starving at the cost of so much of our substance _per diem_, for the +sole remuneration of thanks and the consciousness of an equivocal act +of charity; but who among us opens his doors, or gives a seat at his +table, to drawing-room paupers unable to pay their shot? who cares to +cultivate the acquaintance of men or women who are unable to make him +any return? It is not necessary that this return should be in kind--a +dinner for a dinner, a champagne supper for a champagne supper, and +balls with waxed floors for balls with stretched linen; but shot +must be paid in some form, whether in kind or not, and the social +pauper who cannot pay his quota is Lazarus excluded from the feast. +This is a hard saying, but it is a true one. We often hear worthy +people who do not understand this law complain that they are +neglected--left out of wedding breakfasts--passed over in dinner +invitations--and that they find it difficult to keep acquaintances +when made. But the fact is, these poor creatures who know so much +about the cold-shoulder of society are simply those who cannot pay +their shot, according to the currency of the class to which they +aspire; and so by degrees they get winnowed through the meshes, and +fall to a level where their funds will suffice to meet all demands, +triumphantly. For the rejected of one level are not necessarily the +rejected of all, and the base metal of one currency is sound coinage +in another. People who would find it impossible to enter a +drawing-room in Grosvenor Square may have all Bloomsbury at their +command; and what was caviare to My Lord will be ambrosia to his +valet--all depending on the amount of the shot to be paid and the +relative value of coinage wherewith to pay it. + +The most simple form of payment is of course by the elemental process +of reciprocity in kind; a dinner for a dinner and a supper for a +supper:--a form as purely instinctive as an eye for an eye and a tooth +for a tooth--the _lex talionis_ of early jurisprudence administered +among wine-cups instead of in the shambles. But there are other +modes of payment as efficient if less evident, and as imperative if +more subtle. For instance, women pay their shot--when they pay it +individually, and not through the vicarious merits of their masculine +relations--by dressing well and looking nice; some by being pretty; +some by being fashionable; a few by brilliant talk; while all ought to +add to their private speciality the generic virtue of pleasant +manners. If they are not pretty, pleasant, well-dressed nor +well-connected, and if they have no masculine pegs of power by which +they can be hooked on to the higher lines, they are let to drop +through the social meshes without an effort made to retain them, as +little fishes swim away unopposed through the loops which hold the +bigger ones. These things are their social duties--the final cause of +their drawing-room existence; and if they fail in them they fail in +the purpose for which they were created socially, and may die out as +soon as convenient. They have other duties, of course, and doubtless +of far higher moment and greater worth; but the question now is only +of their drawing-room duties--of the qualities which secure their +recognition in society--of the special coinage in which they must pay +their shot if they would assist at the great banquet of social life. A +dowdy, humdrum, well-principled woman, whose toilette looks as if it +had been made with the traditionary pitchfork, and whose powers of +conversation do not go beyond the strength of _Cobwebs to Catch +Flies_, or _Mangnall's Questions_, may be an admirable wife, +the painstaking mother of future honest citizens, invaluable by a +sick-bed, beyond price in the nursery, a pattern of all household +economies, a woman absolutely faultless in her sphere--and that sphere +a very sweet and lovely one. But her virtues are not those by which +she can pay her shot in society; and the motherly goodness, of so much +account in a dressing-jacket and list-slippers, is put out of court +when the fee to be paid is liveliness of manner or elegance of +appearance. Certainly, worthy women who dress ill and look ungraceful, +and whose conversation is about up to the mark of their children's +easy-spelling-books, are plentiful in society--unfortunately for those +bracketed with them for two hours' penance; but in most cases they +have their shot paid for them by the wealth, the importance, the +repute, or the desirableness of their relations. They may pay it +themselves by their own wealth and consequent liberal tariff of +reciprocity; but this is rare; the possession of personal superiority +of any kind for the most part acting as a moral stimulus with women +whom the superiority of their male belongings does not touch. And, by +the way, it is rather hard lines that so many celebrated men have such +dowdy wives. Artists, poets, self-made men of all kinds often fail in +this special article; and, while they themselves have caught the tone +of the circle to which they have risen, and pay their shot by manner +as well as by repute, their wives lag behind among the ashes of the +past, like Cinderellas before the advent of the fairy godmother. +How many of them are carried through society as clogs or excrescences +which a polite world is bound to tolerate with more or less +equanimity, according to the amount of sensitiveness bestowed by +nature and cultivated by art! Sometimes, however, self-made men and +their wives are wise in their generation and understand the terms on +which society receives its members; in which case the marital +Reputation goes to the front alone, and the conjugal Cinderella rests +tranquilly in the rear. + +Notoriety of all kinds, short of murder or forgery, is one way of +paying one's shot, specially into the coffers of the Leo Hunters, of +whom there are many. It is shot paid to the general fund when one has +seen an accident--better still, if one has been in it. Many a man has +owed a rise in his scale of dinners to a railway smash; and to have +been nearly burnt to death, to have escaped by a miracle from +drowning, to have been set on by footpads or to have been visited by +burglars, is worth a round of At Homes, because of the ready cash of a +real adventure. To be connected more or less remotely with the +fashionable tragedy of the hour is paying one's shot handsomely. To +have been on speaking terms with the latest respectable scoundrel +unmasked, or to have had dealings, sufficiently remote to have +been cleanly, with the newest villainy, will be accepted as shot +while the public interest in the matter lasts. A chance visit to +ultra-grandees--grandees in ratio to the ordinary sphere--is shot +paid with an air. A bad illness, or the attendance on one, with the +apparently unconscious heroism of the details, comes in as part of the +social fine; especially if the person relating his or her experience +has the knack of epigram or exaggeration, while still keeping local +colour and verisimilitude intact. Interesting people who have been +abroad and seen things have good counters for a dinner-party; paying +their shot for themselves and their hosts too, who put them forward as +their contribution to the funds of the commonwealth, with certainty of +acceptance. Some pay their shot by their power of procuring orders and +free admissions. They know the manager of this theatre or the leading +actor of that; they are acquainted with the principal members of the +hanging committees, and are therefore great in private views; they are +always good for a gratuitous treat to folks who can afford to pay +twice the sum demanded for their day's pleasure. Such people may be +stupid, ungainly, not specially polished, in grain unpleasant; but +they circulate in society because they pay their shot and give back +equivalents for value received. A country-house, where there is a good +tennis-ground and a blushing bed of strawberries, is coinage that will +carry the possessor very far ahead through London society; and by the +same law you will find healthy, well-conditioned country folk tolerate +undeniable little snobs of low calibre because of that sixteen-roomed +house in Tyburnia, a visit to which represents so many concerts, so +many theatres, a given number of exhibitions, and a certain +quantity of operas and parties. Had those undeniable little snobs no +funds wherewith to pay their shot, they would have had no place kept +for them among the rose-trees and the strawberry-beds; but, bringing +their quota as they do, they take their seat with the rest and are +helped in their turn. + +In fact, humiliating to our self-love as it may be, the truth is, we +are all valued socially, not for ourselves integrally, not for the +mere worth of the naked soul, but for the kind of shot that we +pay--for the advantage or amusement to others that we can bring--for +something in ourselves which renders us desirable as companions--or +for something belonging to our condition which makes us remunerative +as guests. If we have no special qualification, if we neither look +nice nor talk well, neither bring glory nor confer pleasure, we must +expect to be shunted to the side in favour of others who are up to the +right mark and who give as much as they receive. If this truth were +once fully established as a matter of social science, a great advance +would be made; for nothing helps people so much as to clear a subject +of what fog may lie about it. And as the tendency of the age is to +discover the fixed laws which regulate the mutable affairs of man, it +would be just as well to extend the inquiry from the jury-box to the +dinner-table, and from the blue-book to the visiting-list. Why is it +that some people struggle all their lives to get a footing in society, +yet die as they have lived--social Sisyphuses, never accomplishing +their perpetually-recurring task? There must be a reason for it, +seeing that nothing is ruled by blind chance, though much seems +to lie outside the independent will of the individual. Enlighten +these worthy people's minds on the unwritten laws of invitation, and +show them that--thoroughly honest souls and to be trusted with untold +gold or with their neighbour's pretty wife, which is perhaps a harder +test, as they may be--they are by no means to be trusted with the +amusement of a couple of companions at a dinner-table. Show them that, +how rich soever they may be in the rough gold of domestic morality, +they are bankrupts in the small-change which alone passes current in +society--and, if invited where they aspire to be, they would be taken +on as pauper cousins unable to pay their footing and good for neither +meat nor garnish. Let them learn how to pay their shot, and their +difficulties would vanish. They would leave off repeating the fable of +Sisyphus, and attain completion of endeavour. No one need say this is +a hard or a selfish doctrine, for we all follow it in practice. Among +the people we invite to our houses are some whom we do not specially +like, but whom we must ask because of shot paid in kind. There are +people who may be personally disagreeable, ill-educated, +uninteresting, ungainly, but whom we cannot cut because of the +relations in which we stand towards them, and who take their place by +right, because they pay their shot with punctuality. There are +others whom we ask because of liking or desirability, and shot paid in +some specific form of pleasantness, as in beauty, fashion, good +manner, notoriety; but there are none absolutely barren of all gifts +of pleasantness to the guests, of reflected honour to ourselves, and +of social small-change according to the currency. We do not go into +the byways and hedges to pick up drawing-room tatterdemalions who +bring nothing with them and are simply so much deadweight on the rest, +occupying so much valuable space and consuming so much vital energy. +The law of reciprocity may be hard on the strivers who are ignorant of +its inexorable provisions; but it is a wholesome law, like other rules +and enactments against remediable pauperism. And were we once +thoroughly to understand that, if we would sit securely at the table +we must put something of value into the pool--that we must possess +advantageous circumstances, or personal desirabilities, as the shot to +be paid for our place--the art of society would be better cultivated +than it is now, and the classification of guests would be carried out +with greater judgment. Surely, if the need of being gracious in +manner, sprightly in talk, and of pleasant appearance generally--all +cultivable qualities, and to be learned if not born in us by +nature--were accepted as an absolute necessity, without which we must +expect to be overlooked and excluded, drawing-rooms would be far +brighter and dinner-tables far pleasanter than they are at present; to +the advantage of all concerned! And, after all, society is a +great thing in human life. If not equal in importance to the family, +or to political virtue, it has its own special value; and whatever +adds to its better organization is a gain in every sense. + + + + +_WHAT IS WOMAN'S WORK?_ + + +This is a question which one half the world is at this moment asking +the other half; with very wild answers as the result. Woman's work +seems to be in these days everything that it was not in times past, +and nothing that it was. Professions are undertaken and careers +invaded which were formerly held sacred to men; while things are left +undone which, for all the generations that the world has lasted, have +been naturally and instinctively assigned to women to do. From the +savage squaw gathering fuel or drawing water for the wigwam, to the +lady giving up the keys to her housekeeper, housekeeping has been +considered one of the primary functions of women. The man to +provide--the woman to dispense; the man to do the rough initial work +of bread-winning, whether as a half-naked barbarian hunting live meat +or as a City clerk painfully scoring lines of rugged figures--the +woman to cook the meat when got, and to lay out to the best advantage +for the family the quarter's salary gained by casting up ledgers and +writing advices and bills of lading. Take human society in any +phase we like, we must come down to these radical conditions; and any +system which ignores this division of labour, and confounds these +separate functions, is of necessity imperfect and wrong. We have +nothing whatever to say against the professional self-support of women +who have no men to work for them, and who must therefore work for +themselves in order to live. In what direction soever they can best +make their way, let them take it. Brains and intellectual gifts are of +no sex and no condition, and it is far more important that good work +should be done than that it should be done by this or that particular +set of workers. But we are speaking of the home duties of married +women, and of those girls who have no need to earn their daily bread, +and who are not so specially gifted as to be driven afield by the +irrepressible power of genius. We are speaking of women who cannot +help in the family income, but who might both save and improve in the +home; women whose lives are one long day of idleness, _ennui_ and +vagrant imagination, because they despise the activities into which +they were born, while seeking outlets for their energies impossible to +them both by functional and social restrictions. + +It is strange to see into what unreasonable disrepute active +housekeeping--first social duty--has fallen in England. Take a family +with four or five hundred a year--and we know how small a sum that is +for 'genteel humanity' in these days--the wife who is an active +housekeeper, even with such an income, is an exception to the +rule; and the daughters who are anything more than drawing-room dolls +waiting for husbands to transfer them to a home of their own, where +they may be as useless as they are now, are rarer still. For things +are getting worse, not better, and our young women are less useful +even than were their mothers; while these last do not, as a rule, come +near the housekeeping ladies of olden times, who knew every secret of +domestic economy and made a wise and pleasant 'distribution of bread' +their grand point of honour. The usual method of London housekeeping, +even in the second ranks of the middle-classes, is for the mistress to +give her orders in the kitchen in the morning, leaving the cook to +pass them on to the tradespeople when they call. If she be not very +indolent, and if she have a due regard for neatness and cleanliness, +she may supplement her kitchen commands by going up stairs through +some of the bedrooms; but after a kind word of advice to the housemaid +if she be sweet-tempered, or a harsh note of censure if she be of the +cross-grained type, her work in that department will be done, and her +duties for the day are at an end. There is none of the clever +marketing by which fifty per cent. is saved in the outlay, if a woman +knows what she is about and how to buy; none of that personal +superintendence, so encouraging to servants when genially performed, +which renders slighted work impossible; none of that 'seeing to +things' herself, or doing the finer parts of the work with her +own hands, which used to form part of a woman's unquestioned duty. She +gives her orders, weighs out her supplies, then leaves the maids to do +the best they know or the worst they will, according to the degree in +which they are supplied with faculty or conscience. Many women boast +that their housekeeping takes them perhaps an hour, perhaps half an +hour, in the morning, and no more; and they think themselves clever +and commendable in proportion to the small amount of time given to +their largest family duty. This is all very well where the income is +such as to secure first-class servants--professors of certain +specialities of knowledge and far in advance of the mistress; but how +about the comfort of the house under this hasty generalship, when the +maids are mere scrubs who ought to go through years of training if +they are ever to be worth their salt? It may be very well too in large +households governed by general system, and not by individual ruling; +but where the service is scant and poor, it is a stupid, +uncomfortable, as well as wasteful way of housekeeping. It is +analogous to English cookery--a revolting poverty of result with +flaring prodigality of means; all the pompous paraphernalia of +tradespeople and their carts and their red-books for orders, with +nothing worth the trouble of booking; and everything of less quantity +and lower quality than would be if personal pains were taken--which is +always the best economy. + +What is there in practical housekeeping less honourable than the +ordinary work of middle-class gentlewomen? and why should women shrink +from doing for utility, and for the general comfort of the family, +what they would do at any time for vanity or idleness? No one need go +into extremes, and wish our middle-class gentlewomen to become +exaggerated Marthas occupied only with much serving, Nausicaas washing +linen, or 'wise Penelopes' spending their lives in needlework alone. +But, without undertaking anything unpleasant to her senses or +degrading to her condition, a lady might do hundreds of things which +are now left undone in a house, or are given up to the coarse handling +of servants; and domestic life would gain in consequence. What +degradation, for instance, is there in cookery? and how much more home +happiness would there not be if wives would take in hand that great +cold-mutton question? But women are both selfish and small on this +point. Born for the most part with feebly-developed gustativeness, +they affect to despise the stronger instinct in men, and think it low +and sensual if they are expected to give special attention to the +meals of the man who provides the meat. This contempt for good cooking +is one cause of the ignorance there is among them of how to secure +good living. Those horrible traditions of 'plain roast and boiled' +cling about them as articles of culinary faith; and because they have +reached no higher knowledge for themselves, they decide that no one +else shall go beyond them. For one middle-class gentlewoman who +understands anything about cookery, or who really cares for it as +a scientific art or domestic necessity, there are ten thousand who do +not; yet our mothers and grandmothers were not ashamed to be known as +deft professors, and homes were happier in proportion to the respect +paid to the stewpan and the stockpot. And cookery is more interesting +now than it was then, because more advanced, more scientific, and with +improved appliances; and, at the same time, it is of confessedly more +importance. + +It may seem humiliating, to those who go in for spirit pure and +simple, to speak of the condition of the soul as in any way determined +by beef and cabbage; but it is so, nevertheless; the connexion between +food and virtue, food and thought, being a very close one. And the +sooner wives recognize this connexion the better for them and for +their husbands. The clumsy savagery of a plain cook, or the vile +messes of a fourth-rate confectioner, are absolute sins in a house +where a woman has all her senses, and can, if she will, attend +personally to the cooking. Many things pass for crimes which are +really not so bad as this. But how seldom do we find a house where the +lady does look after the food of the family; where clean hands and +educated brains are put to active service for the good of others! The +trouble would be too great in our fine-lady days, even if there were +the requisite ability; but there is as little ability as there is +energy, and the plain cook with her savagery and the fourth-rate +confectioner with his rancid pastry, have it all their own way, +according as the election is for economy or ostentation. If by chance +we stumble on a household where the woman does not disdain housewifely +work, and specially does not disdain the practical superintendence of +the kitchen, there we are sure to find cheerfulness and content. + +There seems to be something in the life of a practical housekeeper +that answers to the needs of a woman's best nature, and that makes her +pleasant and good-humoured. Perhaps it is the consciousness that she +is doing her duty--of itself a wonderful sweetener of the temper; +perhaps the greater amount of bodily exercise keeps her liver in good +case; whatever the cause, sure it is that the homes of the active +housekeepers are more harmonious than those of the feckless and +do-nothing sort. Yet the snobbish half of the middle-classes holds +housewifely work as degrading, save in the trumpery pretentiousness of +'giving orders.' A woman may sit in a dirty drawing room which the +slipshod maid has not had time to clean, but she must not take a +duster in her hands and polish the legs of the chairs:--there is no +disgrace in the dirt, only in the duster. She may do fancy-work of no +earthly use, but she must not be caught making a gown. Indeed very few +women could make one, and as few will do plain needlework. They will +braid and embroider, 'cut holes, and sew them up again,' and spend any +amount of time and money on beads and wools for messy draperies which +no one wants. The end, being finery, sanctions the toil and +refines it. But they will not do things of practical use; or, if they +are compelled by the exigencies of circumstances, they think +themselves martyrs and badly used by the Fates. + +The whole scheme of woman's life at this present time is untenable and +unfair. She wants to have all the pleasures and none of the +disagreeables. Her husband goes to the City and does monotonous and +unpleasant work there; but his wife thinks herself very hardly dealt +with if asked to do monotonous housework at home. Yet she does nothing +more elevating nor more advantageous. Novel-reading, fancy-work, +visiting and letter-writing, sum up her ordinary occupations; and she +considers these more to the point than practical housekeeping. In fact +it becomes a serious question what women think themselves sent into +the world for--what they hold themselves designed by God to be or to +do. They grumble at having children and at the toil and anxiety which +a family entails; they think themselves degraded to the level of +servants if they have to do any practical housework whatever; they +assert their equality with man, and express their envy of his life, +yet show themselves incapable of learning the first lesson set to +men--that of doing what they do not like to do. What, then, do they +want? What do they hold themselves made for? Certainly some of the +more benevolent sort carry their energies out of doors, and leave such +prosaic matters as savoury dinners and fast shirt-buttons for +committees and charities, where they get excitement and _kudos_ +together. Others give themselves to what they call keeping up society, +which means being more at home in every person's house than their own; +and some do a little weak art, and others a little feeble literature; +but there are very few indeed who honestly buckle to the natural +duties of their position, and who bear with the tedium of home-work as +men bear with the tedium of office-work. + +The little royalty of home is the last place where a woman cares to +shine, and the most uninteresting of all the domains she seeks to +govern. Fancy a high-souled creature, capable of æsthetics, giving her +mind to soup or the right proportion of chutnee for the curry! Fancy, +too, a brilliant creature fore-going an evening's conversational glory +abroad for the sake of a prosaic husband's more prosaic dinner! He +comes home tired from work, and desperately in need of a good dinner +as a restorative; but the plain cook gives him cold meat and pickles, +or an abomination which she calls hash, and the brilliant creature, +full of mind, thinks the desire for anything else rank sensuality. It +seems a little hard, certainly, on the unhappy fellow who works at the +mill for such a return; but women believe that men are made only to +work at the mill that they may receive the grist accruing, and be kept +in idleness and uselessness all their lives. They have no idea of +lightening the labour of that mill-round by doing their own +natural work cheerfully and diligently. They will do everything but +what they ought to do. They will make themselves doctors, +committee-women, printers, what not; but they will not learn cooking, +and they will not keep their own houses. There never was a time when +women were less the helpmates of men than they are at present; when +there was such a wide division between the interests and the +sympathies of the sexes coincident with the endeavour, on the one +side, to approximate their pursuits. + +A great demand is being made now for more work for woman and wider +fields for her labour. We confess we should feel a deeper interest in +the question if we saw more energy and conscience put into the work +lying to her hand at home; and we hold that she ought to perfectly +perform the duties which we may call instinctive to her sex before +claiming those hitherto held remote from her natural condition. Much +of this demand springs from restlessness and dissatisfaction; little, +if any, from higher aspirations or nobler energies unused. Indeed, the +nobler the woman the more thoroughly she will do her own proper work, +in the spirit of old George Herbert's well-worn line; and the less she +will feel herself above that work. It is only the weak who cannot +raise their circumstances to the level of their thoughts; only the +poor in spirit who cannot enrich their deeds by their motives. + +That very much of this demand for more power of work comes from +necessity and the absolute need of bread, we know; and that the demand +will grow louder as marriage becomes scarcer, and there are more women +adrift in the world without the protection and help of men, we also +know. But this belongs to another part of the subject. What we want to +insist on now is the pitiable ignorance and shiftless indolence of +most middle-class housekeepers; and what we would urge on woman is the +value of a better system of life at home before laying claim to the +discharge of extra-domestic duties abroad. + + + + +_LITTLE WOMEN._ + + +The conventional idea of a brave, energetic, or a supremely criminal, +woman has always been that of a tall, dark-haired, large-armed virago +who might pass as the younger brother of her husband, and about whom +nature seemed to have hesitated before determining whether to make her +a man or a woman:--a kind of debateable land, in fact, between the two +sexes, and almost as much the one as the other. Helen Macgregor, Lady +Macbeth, Catharine de Medici, Mrs. Manning, and the old-fashioned +murderesses in novels, were all of the muscular, black-brigand type, +with more or less of regal grace super-added according to +circumstances; and it would have been thought nothing but a puerile +fancy to have supposed the contrary of those whose personal +description was not already known. Crime, indeed, in art and fiction, +was generally painted in very nice proportion to the number of cubic +inches embodied and the depth of colour employed; though we are bound +to add that the public favour ran towards muscular heroines almost as +much as towards muscular murderesses, which to a certain extent +redressed the overweighted balance. Our later novelists, however, have +altered the whole setting of the palette. Instead of five foot ten of +black and brown, they have gone in for four foot nothing of pink and +yellow. Instead of tumbled masses of raven hair, they have shining +coils of purest gold. Instead of hollow caverns whence flash +unfathomable eyes eloquent of every damnable passion, they have limpid +lakes of heavenly blue; and their worst sinners are in all respects +fashioned as much after the outward semblance of the ideal saint as +they have skill to design. + +The original notion was a very good one, and the revolution did not +come before it was wanted; but it has been a little overdone of late, +and we are threatened with as great a surfeit of small-limbed +yellow-headed criminals as we have had of the black-haired virago. One +gets weary of the most perfect model in time, if too constantly +repeated; as now, when we have all begun to feel that the resources of +the angel's face and demon's soul have been more heavily drawn on than +is quite fair, and that, given 'heavy braids of golden hair,' +'bewildering blue eyes,' 'a small lithe frame,' and special delicacy +of feet and hands, we are booked for the companionship, through three +volumes, of a young person to whom Messalina or Lucrezia Borgia was a +mere novice. + +And yet there is a physiological truth in this association of energy +with smallness--perhaps, also, with a certain tint of yellow hair, +which, with a dash of red through it, is decidedly suggestive of +nervous force. Suggestiveness, indeed, does not go very far in an +argument; but the frequent connexion of energy and smallness in women +is a thing which all may verify in their own circles. In daily life, +who is the really formidable woman to encounter?--the black-browed, +broad-shouldered giantess, with arms almost as big in the girth as a +man's? or the pert, smart, trim little female, with no more biceps +than a ladybird, and of just about equal strength with a sparrow? Nine +times out of ten, the giantess with the heavy shoulders and broad +black eyebrows is a timid, feeble-minded, good-tempered person, +incapable of anything harsher than a mild remonstrance with her maid, +or a gentle chastisement of her children. Nine times out of ten her +husband has her in hand in the most perfect working order, so that she +would swear the moon shone at midday if it were his pleasure that she +should make a fool of herself by her submissiveness. One of the most +obedient and indolent of earth's daughters, she gives no trouble to +any one, save the trouble of rousing, exciting and setting going; +while, as for the conception or execution of any naughty piece of +self-assertion, she is as utterly incapable of either as if she were a +child unborn, and demands nothing better than to feel the pressure of +the leading-strings, and to know exactly by their strain where she is +desired to go and what to do. + +But the little woman is irrepressible. Too fragile to come into +the fighting section of humanity--a puny creature whom one blow from a +man's huge fist could annihilate--absolutely fearless, and insolent +with the insolence which only those dare show who know that +retribution cannot follow--what can be done with her? She is afraid of +nothing and to be controlled by no one. Sheltered behind her weakness +as behind a triple shield of brass, the angriest man dare not touch +her, while she provokes him to a combat in which his hands are tied. +She gets her own way in everything and everywhere. At home and abroad +she is equally dominant and irrepressible, equally free from obedience +and from fear. Who breaks all the public order in sights and shows, +and, in spite of King, Kaiser, or Policeman X, goes where it is +expressly forbidden that she shall go? Not the large-boned, muscular +woman, whatever her temperament; unless, indeed, of the exceptionally +haughty type in distinctly inferior surroundings--and then she can +queen it royally enough and set everything at most lordly defiance. + +But in general the large-boned woman obeys the orders given, because, +while near enough to man to be somewhat on a par with him, she is +still undeniably his inferior. She is too strong to shelter herself +behind her weakness, yet too weak to assert her strength and defy her +master on equal grounds. She is like a flying fish--not one thing +wholly; and while capable of the inconveniences of two lives is +incapable of the privileges of either. It is not she, for all her +well-developed frame and formidable looks, but the little woman, who +breaks the whole code of laws and defies all their defenders--the +pert, smart, pretty little woman, who laughs in your face and goes +straight ahead if you try to turn her to the right hand or to the +left, receiving your remonstrances with the most sublime indifference, +as if you were talking a foreign language she could not understand. +She carries everything before her, wherever she is. You may see her +stepping over barriers, slipping under ropes, penetrating to the green +benches with a red ticket, taking the best places on the platform over +the heads of their rightful owners, settling herself among the +reserved seats without an inch of pasteboard to float her. You cannot +turn her out by main force. British chivalry objects to the public +laying on of hands in the case of a woman, even when most recalcitrant +and disobedient; more particularly if she be a small and +fragile-looking woman. So that, if it be only a usurpation of places +specially masculine, she is allowed to retain what she has got, amid +the grave looks of the elders--not really displeased at the flutter of +her ribbons among them--and the titters and nudges of the young +fellows. + +If the battle is between her and another woman, they are left to fight +it out as they best can, with the odds laid heavily on the little one. +All this time there is nothing of the tumult of contest about her. +Fiery and combative as she generally is, when breaking the law in +public places she is the very soul of serene daring. She shows no +heat, no passion, no turbulence; she leaves these as extra weapons of +defence to women who are assailable. For herself she requires no such +aids. She knows her capabilities and the line of attack that best +suits her, and she knows, too, that the fewer points of contest she +exposes the more likely she is to slip into victory; the more she +assumes and the less she argues, the slighter the hold she gives her +opponents. She is either perfectly good-humoured or blankly innocent; +she either smiles you into indulgence or wearies you into compliance +by the sheer hopelessness of making any impression on her. She may, +indeed, if of the very vociferous and shrill-tongued kind, burst out +into such a noisy demonstration as makes you glad to escape from her, +no matter what spoils you leave in her hands; just as a mastiff will +slink away from a bantam hen all heckled feathers and screeching +cackle and tremendous assumption of doing something terrible if he +does not look out. Any way the little woman is unconquerable; and a +tiny fragment of humanity at a public show, setting all rules and +regulations at defiance, is only carrying out in the matter of benches +the manner of life to which nature has dedicated her from the +beginning. + +As a rule, the little woman is brave. When the lymphatic giantess +falls into a faint or goes off into hysterics, she storms, or bustles +about, or holds on like a game terrier, according to the work on hand. +She will fly at any man who annoys her, and she bears herself as +equal to the biggest and strongest fellow of her acquaintance. In +general she does it all by sheer pluck, and is not notorious for +subtlety or craft. Had Delilah been a little woman she would never +have taken the trouble to shear Samson's locks. She would have stood +up against him with all his strength untouched on his head, and she +would have overcome him too. Judith and Jael were both probably large +women. The work they went about demanded a certain strength of muscle +and toughness of sinew; but who can say that Jezebel was not a small, +freckled, auburn-haired Lady Audley of her time, full of the +concentrated fire, the electric force, the passionate recklessness of +her type? Regan and Goneril might have been beautiful demons of the +same pattern; we have the example of the Marchioness de Brinvilliers +as to what amount of spiritual devilry can exist with the face and +manner of an angel direct from heaven; and perhaps Cordelia was a tall +dark-haired girl, with a pair of brown eyes, and a long nose sloping +downwards. + +Look at modern Jewesses, with their flashing Oriental orbs, their +night-black tresses and the dusky shadows of their olive-coloured +complexions. As catalogued properties according to the ideal, they +would be placed in the list of the natural criminals and law-breakers, +while in reality they are about as meek and docile a set of women as +are to be found within the four seas. Pit a fiery little Welsh woman +or a petulant Parisienne against the most regal and Junonic +amongst them, and let them try conclusions in courage, in energy, in +audacity; the Israelitish Juno will go down before either of the small +Philistines, and the fallacy of weight and colour in the generation of +power will be shown without the possibility of denial. + +Even in those old days of long ago, when human characteristics were +embodied and deified, we do not find that the white-armed large-limbed +Hera, though queen by right of marriage, lorded it over her sister +goddesses by any superior energy or force of nature. On the contrary, +she was rather a heavy-going person, and, unless moved to anger by her +husband's numerous infidelities, took her Olympian life placidly +enough, and once or twice got cheated in a way that did no great +credit to her sagacity. A little Frenchwoman would have sailed round +her easily; and as it was, shrewish though she was in her speech when +provoked, her husband not only deceived but chastised her, and reduced +her to penitence and obedience as no little woman would have suffered +herself to be reduced. + +There is one celebrated race of women who were probably the +powerfully-built, large-limbed creatures they are assumed to have +been, and as brave and energetic as they were strong and big--the +Norse women of the sagas, who, for good or evil, seem to have been a +very influential element in the old Northern life. Prophetesses; +physicians; dreamers of dreams and accredited interpreters as well; +endowed with magic powers; admitted to a share in the councils of +men; brave in war; active in peace; these fair-haired Scandinavian +women were the fit comrades of their men, the fit wives and mothers of +the Berserkers and the Vikings. They had no tame nor easy life of it, +if all we hear of them be true. To defend the farm and the homestead +during their husbands' absence, and to keep these and themselves +intact against all bold rovers to whom the Tenth Commandment was an +unknown law; to dazzle and bewilder by magic arts when they could not +conquer by open strength; to unite craft and courage, deception and +daring, loyalty and independence, demanded no small amount of opposing +qualities. But the Steingerdas and Gudrunas were generally equal to +any emergency of fate or fortune, and slashed their way through the +history of their time more after the manner of men than of women; +supplementing their downright blows by side thrusts of craftier +cleverness when they had to meet power with skill and were fain to +overthrow brutality by fraud. The Norse women were certainly as +largely framed as they were mentally energetic, and as crafty as +either; but we know of no other women who unite the same +characteristics and are at once cunning, strong, brave and true. + +On the whole, then, the little women have the best of it. More petted +than their bigger sisters, and infinitely more powerful, they have +their own way in part because it really does not seem worth while +to contest a point with such little creatures. There is nothing that +wounds a man's self-respect in any victory they may get or claim. +Where there is absolute inequality of strength, there can be no +humiliation in the self-imposed defeat of the stronger; and as it is +always more pleasant to have peace than war, and as big men for the +most part rather like than not to put their necks under the tread of +tiny feet, the little woman goes on her way triumphant to the end; +breaking all the laws she does not like and throwing down all the +barriers which impede her progress; irresistible and irrepressible in +all circumstances and under any conditions. + + + + +_IDEAL WOMEN._ + + +It is often objected against fault-finders, writers or others, that +they destroy but do not build up; that while industriously blaming +errors they take good care not to praise the counteracting virtues; +that in their zeal against the vermin of which they are seeking to +sweep the house clean they forget the nobler creatures which do the +good work of keeping things sweet and wholesome. But it is impossible +to be continually introducing the saving clause, 'all are not so bad +as these.' The seven thousand righteous who have not bowed the knee to +Baal are understood to exist in all communities; and, vicious as any +special section may be, there must always be the hidden salt and +savour of the virtuous to keep the whole from falling into utter +corruption. + +This is specially true of modern women. Certainly some of them are as +unsatisfactory as any of their kind who have ever appeared on earth +before; but it would be very queer logic to infer therefore that all +are bad alike, and that our modern womanhood is as ill off as the +Cities of the Plain, which could not be saved for want of the ten just +men to save them. Happily, we have noble women among us yet; +women who believe in something besides pleasure, and who do their work +faithfully, wherever it may lie; women who can and do sacrifice +themselves for love and duty, and who do not think they were sent into +the world simply to run one mad life-long race for wealth, for +dissipation, for distinction. But the life of such women is +essentially in retirement; and though the lesson they teach is +beautiful, yet its influence is necessarily confined, because of the +narrow sphere of the teacher. When public occasions for devotedness +occur, we in some sort measure the extent to which the self-sacrifice +of women can be carried; but in general their noblest virtues come out +only in the quiet sacredness of home, and the most heroic lives of +patience and well-doing go on in seclusion, uncheered by sympathy and +unrewarded by applause. + +Still, it is impossible to write of one absolute womanly ideal--one +single type that shall satisfy every man's fancy; for, naturally, what +would be perfection to one is imperfection to another, according to +the special bent of the individual mind. Thus one man's ideal of +womanly perfection is in beauty, mere physical outside beauty; and not +all the virtues under heaven could warm him into love with red hair or +a snub nose. He is entirely happy if his wife be undeniably the +handsomest woman of his acquaintance, and holds himself blessed when +all men admire and all women envy. But he is blessed for his own +sake rather than for hers. Pleasant as her loveliness is to look on, +it is pleasanter to know that he is the possessor of it. The +'handsomest woman in the room' comes into the same category as the +finest picture or the most thoroughbred horse within his sphere; and +if the degree of pride in his possession be different, the kind is the +same. And so in minor proportions--from the most beautiful woman of +all, to simply beauty as a _sine quâ non_, whatever else may be +wanting. One other thing only is as absolute as this beauty, and that +is its undivided possession. + +Another man's ideal is a good housekeeper and a careful mother; and he +does not care a rush whether his wife, if she is these, be pretty or +ugly. Provided she is active and industrious, minds the house well, +brings up the children as they ought to be brought up, has good +principles, is trustworthy and even-tempered, he is not particular as +to colour or form, and can even be brought to tolerate a limp or a +squint. Given the broad foundations of an honourable home, and he will +forego the lath and plaster of personal appearance which will not bear +the wear and tear of years and their troubles. The solid virtues +stand. His balance at the banker's is a fact; his good name and credit +with the tradespeople are facts; so is the comfort of his home; so are +the health, the morals, the education of his children. All these are +the true realities of life to him; but the beauty which changes to +deformity by small-pox, which fades under dyspepsia, grows stale +by habit, and is worn threadbare by the end of twenty years, is only a +skin-deep grace which he does not value. Perhaps he is right. +Certainly, some of the happiest marriages amongst one's acquaintances +are those where the wife has not one perceptible physical charm, and +where the whole force of her magnetic value lies in what she is, not +in how she looks. + +Another man wants a tender, adoring, fair-haired seraph, who will +worship him as a demigod and accept him as her best revelation of +strength and wisdom. The more dependent she is, the better he will +love her; the less of conscious thought, of active will, of +originative power she has, the greater will be his regard and +tenderness. To be the one sole teacher and protector of such a gentle +little creature seems to him the most delicious joy and the best +condition of married life; and he holds Milton's famous lines to be +expressive of the only fitting relations between men and women. The +adoring seraph is his ideal; Griselda, Desdemona, Lucy Ashton, are his +highest culminations of womanly grace; and the qualities which appeal +the most powerfully to his generosity are the patience which will not +complain, the gentleness that cannot resent, and the love which +nothing can chill. + +Another man wants a cultivated intelligence in his ideal. As an +author, an artist, a student, a statesman, he would like his wife to +be able to help him by the contact of bright wit and ready intellect. +He believes in the sex of minds, and holds no work complete which +has not been created by the one and perfected by the other. He sees +how women have helped on the leaders in troublous times; he knows that +almost all great men have owed something of their greatness to the +influence of a mother or a wife; he remembers how thoughts which had +lain dumb and dormant in men's brains for more than half their +lifetime have suddenly wakened up into speech and activity by the +influence of a woman great enough to call them forth. The adoring +seraph would be an encumbrance and nothing better than a child on his +hands; and the soul which had to be awakened and directed by him would +run great chance of remaining torpid and inactive all its days. He has +his own life to lead and round off; and, so far from wishing to +influence another's, he wants to be helped for himself. + +Another man cares only for the birth and social position of the woman +to whom he gives his name and affection. To another yellow gold stands +higher than blue blood, and 'my wife's father' may have been a +rag-picker, so long as rag-picking had been distilled in a +sufficiently rich alembic leaving a residuum admitting no kind of +doubt. Venus herself without a dowry would be only a pretty seaside +girl with a Newtown pippin in her hand; but Miss Kilmansegg would be +something worth thinking of, if but little worth looking at. + +One man delights in a smart, vivacious little woman of the +irrepressible kind. It makes no difference to him how petulant +she is, how full of fire and fury; the most passionate bursts of +temper simply amuse him, like the anger of a canary-bird, and he holds +it fine fun to watch the small virago in her tantrums, and to set her +going again when he thinks she has been a long enough time in +subsidence. His ideal of woman is an amusing little plaything, with a +great facility for being put up, and a dash of viciousness to give it +piquancy. Another wants a sweet and holy saint whose patient humility +springs from principle rather than from fear; another likes a +blithe-tempered, healthy girl with no nonsense about her, full of fun +and ready for everything, and he is not particular as to the strict +order or economy of the housekeeping, provided only his wife is at all +times willing to be his pleasant playmate and companion. Another +delights in something very quiet, very silent, very home-staying. One +must have first-rate music in his ideal woman; another, unimpeachable +taste; a third, strict order; a fourth, liberal breadth of nature; and +each has his own ideal, not only of nature but of person--to the exact +shade of the hair, the colour of the eyes and the oval of the face. +But all agree in the great fundamental requirements of truth and +modesty and love and unselfishness; for though it is impossible to +write of one womanly ideal as an absolute, it is very possible to +detail the virtues which ought to belong to all alike. + +If this diversity of ideals be true of individuals, it is especially +true of nations, each of which has its own ideal woman varying +according to what is called the genius of the country. To the +Frenchman, if we are to believe Michelet and the novelists, it is a +feverish little creature, full of nervous energy but without muscular +force; of frail health and feeble organization; a prey to morbid +fancies which she has no strength to control nor yet to resist; now +weeping away her life in the pain of finding that her husband--a man +gross and material because husband--does not understand her, now +sighing over her delicious sins in the arms of the lover who does; +without reasoning faculties but with divine intuitions which are as +good as revelations; without cool judgment but with the light of +burning passions which guide her just as well; thinking by her heart +and carrying the most refined metaphysics into her love; subtle; +incomprehensible by the coarser brains of men and women who are only +honest; a creature born to bewilder and to be misled, to love and to +be adored, to madden men and to be destroyed by them. + +It does not much signify that the reality is a shrewd, calculating, +unromantic woman, with a hard face and keen eyes, who for the most +part makes a good practical wife to her common-sense middle-aged +husband, who thinks more of her social position than of her feelings, +more of her children than of her lovers, more of her purse than of her +heart, and whose great object of life is a daily struggle for +centimes. It pleases the French to idealize their eminently practical +and worldly-wise women into this queer compound of hysterics and +adultery; and if it pleases them it need not displease us. To the +German his ideal is of two kinds--one, his Martha, the domestic +broad-faced _Hausmutter_, who cooks good dinners at small cost, and +mends the family linen as religiously as if this were the Eleventh +Commandment specially appointed for feminine fingers to keep, the +poetic culmination of whom is Charlotte cutting bread and butter; the +other, his Mary, his Bettina, full of mind and æsthetics and +heart-uplifting love, yearning after the infinite with holes in her +stockings and her shoes down at heel. For what are coarse material +mendings to the æsthetic soul yearning after the Infinite and +worshipping at the feet of the prophet? + +In Italy the ideal woman of late times was the ardent patriot, full of +active energy, of physical force, of dauntless courage. In Poland it +is the patriot too, but of a more refined and etherealized type, +passively resenting Tartar tyranny by the subtlest feminine scorn, and +living in perpetual music and mourning. In Spain it is a woman +beautiful and impassioned, with the slight drawback of needing a world +of looking after, of which the men are undeniably capable. In +Mohammedan countries generally it is a comely smooth-skinned Dudù, +patient and submissive, always in good humour with her master, +economical in house-living to please the meanness, and gorgeous in +occasional attire to gratify the ostentation, of the genuine Oriental; +but by no means Dudù ever asleep and unoccupied. For, if not +allowed to take part in active outside life, the Eastern's wife or +wives have their home duties and their maternal cares like all other +women, and find to their cost that, if they unduly neglect them, they +will have a bad time of it with Ali Ben Hassan when the question comes +of piastres and sequins, and the dogs of Jews who demand payment, and +the pigs of Christians who follow suit. + +The American ideal is of two kinds, like the German--the one, the +clever manager, the woman with good executive faculty in the matters +of buckwheat cakes and oyster gumbo, as is needed in a country so +poorly provided with 'helps;' the other, the aspiring soul who puts +her aspirations into deeds, and goes out into the world to do battle +with the sins of society as editress, preacher, stump-orator and the +like. It must be rather embarrassing to some men that this special +manifestation of the ideal woman at times advocates miscegenation and +free love; but perhaps we of the narrow old conventional type are not +up to the right mark yet, and have to wait until our own women are +thoroughly emancipated before we can rightly appreciate these +questions. At all events, if this kind of thing pleases the Americans, +it is no more our business to interfere with them than with the French +compound; and if miscegenation and free love seem to them the right +manner of life, let them follow it. + +In all countries, then, the ideal woman changes, chameleon-like, to +suit the taste of men; and the great doctrine that her happiness +does somewhat depend on his liking is part of the very foundation of +her existence. According to his will she is bond or free, educated or +ignorant, lax or strict, housekeeping or roving; and though we +advocate neither the bondage nor the ignorance, yet we do hold to the +principle that, by the laws which regulate all human communities +everywhere, she is bound to study the wishes of man and to mould her +life in harmony with his liking. No society can get on in which there +is total independence of sections and members, for society is built up +on the mutual dependence of all its sections and all its members. +Hence the defiant attitude which women have lately assumed, and their +indifference to the wishes and remonstrances of men, cannot lead to +any good results whatever. It is not the revolt of slaves against +their tyrants which they have begun--in that we could sympathize--but +it is a revolt against their duties. + +And this it is which makes the present state of things so deplorable. +It is the vague restlessness, the fierce extravagance, the neglect of +home, the indolent fine-ladyism, the passionate love of pleasure which +characterises the modern woman, that saddens men and destroys in them +that respect which their very pride prompts them to feel. And it is +the painful conviction that the ideal woman of truth and modesty and +simple love and homely living has somehow faded away under the paint +and tinsel of this modern reality which makes us speak out as we +have done, in the hope--perhaps a forlorn one--that if she could be +made to thoroughly understand what men think of her, she would, by the +very force of natural instinct and social necessity, order herself in +some accordance with the lost ideal, and become again what we once +loved and what we all regret. + + + + +_PINCHBECK._ + + +Not many years ago no really refined gentlewoman would have worn +pinchbeck. False jewelry and imitation lace were touchstones with the +sex, and the woman who would condescend to either was assumed, perhaps +not quite without reason, to have lost something more than the mere +niceness of technical taste. This feeling ran through the whole of +society, and pinchbeck was considered as at once despicable and +disreputable. The successful speculator, sprung from nothing, who had +made his fortune during the war, might buy land, build himself a +mansion and set up a magnificent establishment, but he was never +looked on by the aboriginal gentry of the place as more than a lucky +adventurer; and the blue blood, perhaps nourishing itself on thin +beer, turned up its nose disdainfully at the claret and Madeira which +had been personally earned and not lineally inherited. This +exclusiveness was narrow in spirit and hard in individual working; and +yet there was a wholesome sentiment underlying its pride which made it +valuable in social ethics, if immoral on the score of natural equality +and human charity. It was the rejection of pretentiousness, however +gilded and glittering, in favour of reality, however poor and +barren; it was the condemnation of make-believe--the repudiation of +pinchbeck. It is not a generation since this was the normal attitude +of society towards its _nouveaux riches_ and Brummagem jewelry; but +time moves fast in these later days, and national sentiments change as +quickly as national fashions. + +We are in the humour to rehabilitate all things, and pinchbeck has now +its turn with the rest. The lady of slender means who would refuse to +wear imitation lace and false jewelry is as rare as the country +society which would exclude the _nouveau riche_ because of his +newness, and not adopt him because of his riches. The whole anxiety +now is, not what a thing is, but how it looks--not its quality, but +its appearance. Every part of social and domestic life is dedicated to +the apotheosis of pinchbeck. It meets us at the hall-door, where +miserable stuccoed pillars are supposed to confer a quasi-palatial +dignity on a wretched jerry-built little villa run up without regard +to one essential of home comfort or of architectural truth. It goes +with us into the cold, conventional drawing-room, where all is for +show and nothing for use, in which no one lives, and which is just the +mere pretence of a dwelling-room, set out to deceive the world into +the belief that its cheap finery is the expression of the every-day +life and circumstances of the family. It sits with us at the table, +which a confectioner out of a back street has furnished and where +everything, down to the very flowers, is hired for the occasion. +It glitters in the brooches and bracelets of the women, in the studs +and signet-rings of the men. It is in the hired broughams, the hired +waiters, the pigmy page-boys, the faded paper flowers, the cheap +champagne, and the affectation of social consideration that meet us at +every turn. The whole of the lower section of the middle-classes is +penetrated through and through with the worship of pinchbeck; and for +one family that holds itself in the honour and simplicity of truth, +ten thousand lie, to the world and to themselves, in frippery and +pretence. + +The greatest sinners in this are women. Men are often ostentatious, +often extravagant, and not unfrequently dishonest in that broad way of +dishonesty which is called living beyond their means--sometimes making +up the deficit by practices which end in the dock of the Old Bailey; +but, as a rule, they go in for the real thing in details, and their +pinchbeck is at the core rather than on the surface. Women, on the +contrary, give themselves up to a more general pretentiousness, and, +provided they can make a show, care very little about the means; +provided they can ring their metal on the counter, they ignore the +want of the hall-stamp underneath. Locality, dress, their +visiting-list and domestic appearances are the four things which they +demand shall be in accord with their neighbours'; and for these four +surfaces they will sacrifice the whole internal fabric. They will have +a showy-looking house, encrusted with base ornamentation and false +grandeur, though it lets in wind, rain and noise almost as if it +were made of mud or canvas, rather than a plain and substantial +dwelling-place, with comfort instead of stucco, and moderately thick +walls instead of porches and pilasters. Most of their time is +necessarily passed at home, but they will undergo all manner of house +discomfort resulting from this preference of cheap finery over solid +structure, rather than forego their 'genteel locality' and stereotyped +ornamentation. A family of daughters on the one side, diligent over +the 'Battle of Prague;' a nursery full of crying babies on the other; +more Battles of Prague opposite, diversified by a future Lind +practising her scales unweariedly; water-pipes bursting in the frost; +walls streaming in the thaw; the lower offices reeking and green with +damp; the upper rooms too insecure for unrestricted movement--all +these, and more miseries of the same kind, a woman given over to the +worship of pinchbeck willingly encounters rather than shift into a +locality relatively unfashionable to her sphere, but where she could +have substantiality and comfort for the same rent that she pays now +for flash and show. + +In dress it is the same thing. She must look like her neighbours, no +matter whether they can spend pounds to her shillings, so runs up a +milliner's bill beyond what she ought to afford for the whole family +expenses. If others can buy gold, she can manage pinchbeck. Glass that +looks like jet, like filagree work, like anything else she fancies, is +every bit to her as good as the real thing; and if she cannot +compass Valenciennes and Mechlin, she can go to Nottingham and buy +machine-made imitations that will make quite as fine a show. How poor +soever she may be, she must hang herself about with ornaments made of +painted wood, of glass, of vulcanite; she must break out into spangles +and beads and chains and _benoîtons_, which are cheap luxuries and, as +she thinks, effective decorations. Flimsy silks make as rich a rustle +to her ear as the stateliest brocade; and cotton velvet delights the +soul that cannot aspire to Genoa. The love of pinchbeck is so deeply +ingrained in her that even if, in a momentary fit of aberration into +good taste, she condescends to a simple material about which there can +be neither disguise nor pretence, she must load it with that +detestable cheap finery of hers till she makes herself as vulgar in a +muslin as she was in a cotton velvet. The _simplex munditiis_, which +used to be held as a canon of feminine good taste, is now abandoned +altogether, and the more she can bedizen herself according to the +pattern of a Sandwich islander the more beautiful she thinks +herself--the more certain the fascination of the men and the greater +the jealousy of the women. This is the cause of all the tags and +streamers, the bits of ribbon here and flying ends of laces there, the +puffed-out chignons, and the trailing curls cut off some dead girl's +head, wherewith the modern Englishwoman delights to make herself +hideous. It is pinchbeck throughout. + +But we fear woman is past praying for in the matter of fashion; and +that she is too far given over to the abomination of pretence to be +called back to truth for any ethical reason whatsoever, or indeed by +anything short of high examples. And then, if simplicity became the +fashion, we should have our pinchbeck votaries translating that into +extremes as they do now with ornamentation; if my lady took to +plainness, they would go to nakedness. + +Another bit of pinchbeck is the visiting-list--the cards of invitation +stuck against the drawing-room glass--with the grandest names and +largest fortunes put forward, irrespective of dates or tenses. The +chance contact with the people represented may be quite out of the +ordinary circumstances of life, but their names are paraded as if an +accident, which has happened once and may never occur again, were in +the daily order of events. They are brought to the front to make +others believe that the whole social substance is of the same quality; +that generals and admirals and lords and ladies are the common +elements of the special circle in which the family habitually moves; +that pinchbeck is good gold, and that 'composition' means marble. +Women are exceedingly tenacious of these pasteboard appearances. In a +house with its couple of female servants, where formal visitors are +very rare and invitations, save by friendly word of mouth, rarer +still, you may see a cracked china bowl or cheap mock _patera_ on the +hall table, to receive the cards which are assumed to come in the +thick showers usual with high people who have hall-porters and a +thousand names or more on their books. The pile gets horribly dusty to +be sure, and the upper layer turns by degrees from cream-colour to +brown; but antiquity is not held to weaken the force of grandeur. The +titled card left on a chance occasion more than a year ago still keeps +the uppermost place, still represents a perpetual renewal of +aristocratic visits and an unbroken succession of social triumphs. +Yellowed and soiled, it is none the less the trump-card of the list; +and while the outside world laughs and ridicules, the lady at home +thinks that no one sees through this puerile pretence, and that the +visiting-list is accepted according to the status of the fugleman at +the head. She is very happy if she can say that the pattern of her +dress, her cap, her bonnet, was taken from that of Lady So and So's; +and we may be quite sure that all personal contact with grand folks so +expresses itself and perpetuates the memory of the event, by such +imitation--at a distance. It is too good an occasion for the airing of +pinchbeck to be disregarded; consequently, for the most part it is +turned to this practical account. Whether the fashion be suited to the +material or to the other parts of the dress, is quite a secondary +consideration; it being of the essence of pinchbeck to despise both +fitness and harmony. + +There is a large amount of pinchbeck in the appearance of social +influence, much cultivated by women of a certain activity of mind and +with more definite aims than all women have. This belongs to a +grade higher than the small pretences of which we have been +speaking--to women who have money, and so far have one reality, but +who have not, by their own birth or their husbands', the original +standing which would give them this social influence as of right. Some +make themselves notorious for their drawing-room patronage of artists, +which however does not include buying their pictures; others gather +round them scores of obscure authors, whose books they talk of but do +not read; a few, a short time since, were centres of spiritualistic +circles and got a queer kind of social influence thereby, so far as +Philistine desire to witness the 'manifestations' went; and one or two +are names of weight in the emancipated ranks, and take chiefly to what +they call 'working women.' These are they who attend Ladies' +Committees, where they talk bosh and pound away at utterly +uninteresting subjects as diligently as if what they said had any +point in it, and what they did any ultimate issue in probability or +common sense. But beyond the fact of having a large house, where their +several sets may assemble at stated periods, these would-be lady +patronesses are utterly impotent to help or to hinder; and their +patronage is just so much pinchbeck, not worth the trouble of +weighing. + +In all this gaudy attempt at show, this restless dissatisfaction with +what they are and ceaseless endeavour to appear something they are +not, our middle-class ladies are doing themselves and society +infinite mischief. They set the tone to the world below them; and the +small tradespeople and the servants, when they copy the vices of their +superiors, do not imitate her grace the duchess, but the doctor's wife +over the way, and the lawyer's lady next door, and the young ladies +everywhere, who all try to appear like women of rank and fortune, and +who are ashamed of nothing so much as of industry, truth and +simplicity. Hence the rage for cheap finery in the kitchen, just a +trifle more ugly and debased than that worn in the drawing-room; hence +the miserable pretentiousness and pinchbeck fine-ladyism filtering +like poison through every pore of our society, to result God only +knows in what grave moral cataclysm, unless women of mind and +education will come to the front and endeavour to stay the plague +already begun. Chains and brooches may seem but small material causes +for important moral effects, but they are symbols; and, as symbols, +they are of deep national value. + +No good will be done till we get back some of our fine old horror of +pinchbeck, and once more insist on Truth as the foundation of our +national life. Education and refinement will be of no avail if they do +not land us here; and the progress of the arts and sciences must not +be brought to mean chiefly the travesty of civilized ladies into the +semblance of savages, by the cheap imitation of costly substances. +Women are always rushing about the world eager after everything but +their home business. Here is something for them to do--the +regeneration of society by means of their own energies; the bringing +people back to the dignity of truth and the beauty of simplicity; the +substitution of that self-respect which is content to appear what it +is, for the feeble pride which revels in pinchbeck because it cannot +get gold, which endeavours so hard to hide its real estate and to pass +for what it is not and never can be. + + + + +_AFFRONTED WOMANHOOD._ + + +Amongst other queer anomalies in human nature is the difference that +lies between sectarian sins and personal immoralities, between the +intellectual untruth of a man's creed and the spiritual evil of his +own nature. Rigid Calvinism, for instance, which narrows the issues of +divine grace and shuts up the avenues of salvation from all but a +select few, is a sour and illiberal faith; and yet a rigid Calvinist, +simply continuing to believe in predestination and election as he was +taught from the beginning, may be a generous, genial, large-hearted +man. An inventor scheming out the deadliest projectile that has yet +been devised is not necessarily indifferent to human life on his own +account; nor is every American who talks tall talk about the glorious +destinies of his country and the infinite superiority of his +countrymen, as conceited personally as he is vainglorious nationally. +In fact, he may be a very modest fellow by his own fireside; and +though in his quality of American he is of course able to whip +universal creation, in his mere quality of man he is quite ready to +take the lower seat at the table and to give honour where honour is +due. + +This kind of distinction between the faults of the sect and the +person, the nature and the cause, is very noticeable in women; and +especially in all things relating to themselves. Individually, many +among them are meek and long-suffering enough, and would be as little +capable of resenting a wrong as of revenging it. Being used from the +cradle to a good deal of snubbing, they take to it kindly as part of +the inevitable order of things, and kiss the chastening rod with +edifying humility; but, collectively, they are the most impatient of +rebuke, the most arrogant in moral attitude, and the most restive of +all created things sought to be led or driven. The woman who will bear +to hear of her personal faults without offering a word in +self-defence, and who will even say peccavi quite humbly if hard +pressed, fires up into illimitable indignation when told that her +foibles are characteristic of her sex, and that she is no worse than +nature meant her to be. Personally she is willing to confess that she +is only a poor worm grovelling in the dust--perhaps an exceptionally +poor worm, if of the kind given to spiritual asceticism--but by her +class she claims to be considered next door to an angel, and arrogates +to her sex virtues which she would blush to claim on her own behalf. + +Men, as men, are all sorts of bad things, as every one knows. They are +selfish, cruel, tyrannical, sensual, unjust, bloodthirsty--where does +the list end? and human nature in the abstract is a bad thing +too, given over to lies and various deadly lusts; but women, as women, +are exempt from any special share in the general iniquity, and only +come under the ban with universal nature--with lambs and doves and +other pretty creatures--not quite perfection, because of the Fall +which spoilt everything, and yet very near it. As children of the rash +parents who corrupted the race they certainly suffer from the general +infection of sin that followed, but, as daughters contrasted with the +sons, they are so far superior to those evil-minded brethren of theirs +that their comparative virtues by sex override their positive vices by +race. As individuals, they are worms; as human beings, they are poor +sinful souls; but by their womanhood they are above rebuke. + +Women have been so long wrapped in this pleasant little delusion about +the sacredness of their sex, and the perfections belonging thereto by +nature, that any attempt to show them the truth and convince them that +they too are guilty of the mean faults and petty ways common to a +fallen humanity--whereof certain manifestations are special to +themselves--is met with the profound scorn or shrill cries of +affronted womanhood. A man who speaks of their faults as they appear +to him, and as he suffers by them, is illiberal and unmanly, and the +rage of the more hysterically indignant would not be very far below +that of the Thracian Mænads, could they lay hands on the offending +Orpheus of the moment; but a woman who speaks from knowledge, and +touches the weak places and the sore spots known best to the +initiated, is a traitress even baser than the rude man who perhaps +knows no better. + +The whole life and being of womanhood must be held sacred from +censure, exalted as it is by a kind of sentimental apotheosis that +will not bear reasoning about, to something very near divinity. Even +the follies of fashion must be exempt from both ridicule and rebuke, +on the ground of man's utter ignorance of the merits of the question; +for how should a poor male body know anything about trains or +crinolines, or the pleasure that a woman feels in making herself +ridiculous or indecent in appearance and a nuisance to her neighbours? +while, for anything graver than the follies of fashion, it is in a +manner high treason against the supremacy of the sex to assume that +they deserve either ridicule or rebuke. Besides, it is indelicate. +Women are made to be worshipped, not criticized; to be reverenced as +something mystically holy and incomprehensible by the grosser +masculine faculties; and it is indiscreet, to say the least of it, +when vile man takes it on himself to test the idol by the hard +mechanical tests of truth and common-sense, and to show the world how +much alloy is mingled with the gold. + +This is in ethics what the Oriental's reserve about his harem is in +domestic life. The sacredness of a Mohammedan's womankind must be so +complete that they are even nameless to the coarser sex; and not, +'How is your wife?' 'How are your daughters?' but, 'How is your +house?' is the only accepted form of words by which Ali may ask Hassan +about the health of his Fatimas and Zuliekas. In much the same way our +women must be kept behind the close gilded gratings of affected +perfectness, and, above all things, never publicly discussed--much +less publicly condemned. + +It is by no means a proof of wisdom, or of the power of logically +reasoning out a position and its consequences, that women should thus +demand to be treated as things superior to the faults and follies of +humanity at large. They are clamouring loudly, and with some justice, +for an equal share in the world's work and wages, and it is +wonderfully stupid in them to stand on their womanly dignity and their +quasi-sacredness, when told of their faults and measured according to +their shortcomings, not their pretensions. If they come down into the +arena to fight, they must fight subject to the conditions of the +arena. They must not ask for special rules to be made in their +behalf--for blunted weapons on the one side and impregnable defences +on the other. If they demand either mystic reverence or chivalric +homage they must be content with their own narrow but safe enclosure, +where they have nothing to do but to look at the turmoil below, and +accept with gratitude such portions of the good things fought for as +the men to whom they belong see fit to bring them. They cannot at one +and the same time have the good of both positions--the courtesy +claimed by weakness and the honour paid to prowess. If they mingle in +the _mêlée_ they must expect as hard knocks as the rest, and must +submit to be bullied when they hit foul and to be struck home when +they hit wide. If they do not like these conditions, let them keep out +of the fray altogether; but if they choose to mingle in it, no +hysterics of affronted womanhood, however loud the shrieks, will keep +them safe from hard knocks and rough treatment. + +Time out of mind women have been credited with all the graces and +virtues possible in a world which 'the trail of the serpent' has +defiled. To be sure they have been cursed as well, as the causes of +most of the miseries of society from Eve's time to Helen's, and later +still. _Teterrima causa._ But the praise alone sticks, so far as their +own self-belief is concerned, and men, who create the curses, may +arrange them to their own liking. The poet says they are 'ministering +angels;' the very name of mother is to some men almost as holy as that +of God, and the most solemn oath a Frenchman can take in a private way +is not by his own honour, but by the name or the head or the life of +his mother. + +As wives--well, save in the old nursery doggrel which sets forth that +they are made of 'all that's good if well understood'--as wives +certainly they get not a few ungentle rubs. But then only a husband +knows where the shoe pinches, and if he blasphemes during the wearing +of it, on his own head be the guilt as is already the punishment. +As maidens they are confessedly the most sacred manifestation of +humanity, and to be approached with the reverence rightfully due to +the holiest thing we know; while in the new spiritualistic world we +are told to look for the time when the moral supremacy of woman shall +be the recognized law of human life and the reign of violence and +tears and all iniquity shall therefore be at an end. Thus the moral +loveliness of collective womanhood is a dogma which men are taught from +their boyhood as an article of faith if not a matter of experience, +and women naturally keep them up to the mark--theoretically, at all +events. Yet for all this lip-homage, of which so much account is +made, women are often ill-used and brutalized, and in spite of +their superior pretensions as often fall below men in every quality +but that of patience. And patience is eminently the virtue of +weakness, and therefore woman's cardinal grace; speaking broadly and +allowing for exceptions. But what women do not see is that all this +poetic flattery comes originally from the idealizing passion of men, +and that, left to themselves, with only each other for critics and +analyzers, they would soon find themselves stripped of their superfluous +moral finery and reduced to the bare core of uncompromising truth. +And this would be the best thing for them in the end. If they could +but rise superior to the weakness of flattery, they would rise +beyond the power of much that now degrades them. If they would but +honestly consider the question of their own shortcomings when told +where they fail, and what they cannot do, and what they will be sure +to make a mess of if they attempt, they would prove their title to +man's respect far more than they prove it now by the shrill cries and +indignant remonstrances of affronted womanhood. + +This is the day of trial for many things--among others, for the +capacity of women for an enlarged sphere of action and more public +exercise of power. Do women think they show their fitness for nobler +duties than those already assigned them, by their impatience under +censure, which is, after all, but one mode of teaching? Are they +qualifying themselves to act in concert with men, by assuming an +absolute moral supremacy which it is a kind of sacrilege to deny? If +they think they are on the right road as at present followed, let them +go on in heaven's name. When they have wandered sufficiently far +perhaps they will have sense enough to turn back, and see for +themselves what mistakes they have made and might have avoided, had +they had the wisdom of self-knowledge in only a small degree. +Certainly, so long as womanhood is held to confer, _per se_, a special +and unassailable divinity, so long will women be rendered +comparatively incapable of the best work through vanity, through +ignorance, and through impatience of the teaching that comes by +rebuke. Nothing is so damaging in the long run as exaggerated +pretensions; for by-and-by, after a certain period of uncritical +homage, the world is sure to believe that the silver veil which it has +so long respected hides deformity, not divinity, and that what is too +sacred for public use is too poor for public honour. If the faults of +women are not to be discussed, nor their follies condemned, because +womanhood is a sacred thing and a man naturally respects his mother +and sisters, then women must be content to live in a moral harem, +where they will be safe from both the gaze and the censure of the +outside world; they must not come down into the battle-fields and the +workshops, where they forfeit all claim to protection and have to +accept the man's law of 'no favour.' It must be one thing or the +other. Either their merits must be weighed and their capacity assayed +in reference to the place they want to take--and in doing this their +faults must be boldly and distinctly discussed--or they must be +content with their present condition; and, with the mystic sanctity of +their womanhood, they must accept also its moral seclusion--belonging, +by their very nature, to things too sacred for criticism and too +perfect for censure. It rests with themselves to decide which it is to +be. + + + + +_FEMININE AFFECTATIONS._ + + +The old form of feminine affectation used to be that of a die-away +fine lady afflicted with a mysterious malady known by the name of the +vapours, or one, no less obscure, called the spleen. Sometimes it was +an etherealized being who had no capacity for homely things, but who +passed her life in an atmosphere of poetry and music, for the most +part expressing her vague ideas in halting rhymes which gave more +satisfaction to herself than to her friends. She was probably an +Italian scholar and could quote Petrarch and Tasso, and did quote them +pretty often; she might even be a Della Cruscan by honourable +election, with her own peculiar wreath of laurel and her own silver +lyre; any way she was 'a sister of the Muses,' and had something to do +with Apollo or Minerva, whom she was sure to call Phoebus or Pallas +Athene, as being the more poetical name of the two. Probably she had +dealings with Diana too--for this kind of woman does not in any age +affect the 'seaborn,' save in a hazy sentimental way that bears no +fruits--a neatly-turned sonnet or a clever bit of counterpoint being +to her worth all the manly love or fireside home delights that +the world can give. What is the touch of babies' dimpled fingers or +the rosy kisses of babies' lips compared to the pleasures of being a +sister of the Muses and one of the beloved of Apollo! The Della +Cruscan of former days, or her modern avatar, will tell you that music +and poetry are godlike and bear the soul away to heaven, but that the +nursery is a prison and babies are no dearer gaolers than any other; +and that household duties disgrace the aspiring soul mounting to the +empyrean. This was the Ethereal Being of last generation--the +Blue-stocking, as a poetess in white satin, with her eyes turned up to +heaven and her hair in dishevelled cascades about her neck. She +dropped her mantle as she finally departed; and we still have the +Della Cruscan essence, if not in the precise form of earlier times. We +still have ethereal beings who, as the practical outcome of their +etherealization, rave about music and poetry and æsthetics and +culture, and horribly neglect their babies and the weekly bills. + +A favourite form of feminine affectation among certain opposers of the +prevalent fast type is in an intense womanliness--an aggravating +intensity of womanliness--that makes one long for a little roughness, +just to take off the cloying excess of sweetness. This kind is +generally found with large eyes, dark in the lids and hollow in the +orbit, by which a certain spiritual expression is given to the face--a +certain look of being consumed by the hidden fire of lofty +thought, that is very effective. It does not destroy the effectiveness +that the real cause of the darkened lids and cavernous orbits is most +probably internal disease, when not antimony. Eyes of this sort stand +for spirituality and loftiness of thought and intense womanliness of +nature; and, as all men are neither chemists nor doctors, the +simulation does quite as well as truth. + +The main characteristic of these women is self-consciousness. They +live before a moral mirror, and pass their time in attitudinizing to +what they think the best advantage. They can do nothing simply, +nothing spontaneously and without the fullest consciousness as to how +they do it, and how they look while they are doing it. In every action +of their lives they see themselves as pictures, as characters in a +novel, as impersonations of poetic images or thoughts. If they give +you a glass of water, or take your cup from you, they are Youth and +Beauty ministering to Strength or Age, as the case may be; if they +bring you a photographic album, they are Titian's Daughter carrying +her casket, a trifle modernized; if they hold a child in their arms, +they are Madonnas, and look unutterable maternal love though they +never saw the little creature before, and care for it no more than for +the puppy in the mews; if they do any small personal office, or +attempt to do it--making believe to tie a shoestring, comb out a curl, +fasten a button--they are Charities in graceful attitudes, and expect +you to think them both charitable and graceful. Nine times out of +ten they can neither tie the string nor fasten the button with +ordinary deftness--for they have a trick of using only the ends of +their fingers when they do anything with their hands, as being more +graceful and fitting in better, than would a firmer grasp, with the +delicate womanliness of the character; and the less sweet and more +commonplace woman who does not attitudinize morally and never parades +her womanliness, beats them out of the field for real helpfulness, and +is the Charity which the other only plays at being. + +This kind too affects, in theory, wonderful submissiveness to man. It +upholds Griselda as the type of feminine perfection, and--still in +theory--between independence and being tyrannized over, goes in for +the tyranny. 'I would rather my husband beat me than let me do too +much as I liked,' said one before she married, who, after she was +married, managed to get entire possession of the domestic reins and +took good care that her nominal lord should be her practical slave. +For, notwithstanding the sweet submissiveness of her theory, the +intensely womanly woman has the most astonishing knack of getting her +own way and imposing her own will on others. The real tyrant among +women is not the one who flounces and splutters and declares that +nothing shall make her obey, but this soft-mannered, large-eyed, +intensely womanly person who says that Griselda is her ideal and that +the whole duty of woman lies in unquestioning obedience to man. + +In contrast with this special affectation is the mannish woman--the +woman who wears a double-breasted coat with big buttons, of which she +flings back the lappels with an air, understanding the suggestiveness +of a wide chest and the need of unchecked breathing; who wears +unmistakeable shirt-fronts, linen collars, vests and plain ties, like +a man; who folds her arms or sets them akimbo, like a man; who even +nurses her feet and cradles her knees, in spite of her petticoats, and +makes believe that the attitude is comfortable because it is manlike. +If the excessively womanly woman is affected in her sickly sweetness, +the mannish woman is affected in her breadth and roughness. She adores +dogs and horses, which she places far above children of all ages. She +boasts of how good a marksman she is--she does not call herself +markswoman--and how she can hit right and left and bring down both +birds flying. When she drinks wine she holds the stem of the glass +between her first two fingers, hollows her underlip, and, throwing her +head well back, tosses off the whole at a draught--she would disdain +the lady-like sip or the closer gesture of ordinary women. She is +great in cheese and bitter-beer, in claret-cup and still champagne, +but she despises the puerilities of sweets or of effervescing wines. +She rounds her elbows and turns her wrist outward, as men round their +elbows and turn their wrists outward. She is fond of carpentry, +she says, and boasts of her powers with the plane and saw. For charms +to her watch-chain she wears a cork-screw, a gimlet, a big knife and a +small foot-rule; and in contrast with the intensely womanly woman, who +uses the tips of her fingers only, the mannish woman when she does +anything uses the whole hand, and if she had to thread a needle would +thread it as much by her palm as by her fingers. All of which is +affectation--from first to last affectation; a mere assumption of +virile fashions utterly inharmonious to the whole being, physical and +mental, of a woman. + +Then there is the affectation of the woman who has taken propriety and +orthodoxy under her special protection, and who regards it as a +personal insult when her friends and acquaintances go beyond the exact +limits of her mental sphere. This is the woman who assumes to be the +antiseptic element in society; who makes believe that without her the +world and human nature would go to the dogs and plunge headlong into +the abyss of sin and destruction forthwith; and that not all the grand +heroism of man, not all his thought and energy and high endeavour and +patient seeking after truth would serve his turn or the world's if she +did not spread her own petty preserving nets, and mark out the +boundary lines within which she would confine the range of thought and +speculation. She knows that this assumption of spiritual beadledom is +mere affectation, and that other minds have as much right to +their own boundary lines as that which she claims for herself: but it +seems to her pretty to assume that woman generally is the consecrated +beadle of thought and morality, and that she, of all women, is most +specially consecrated. As an offshoot of this kind stands the +affectation of simplicity--the woman whose mental attitude is +self-depreciation, and who poses herself as a mere nobody when the +world is ringing with her praises. 'Is it possible that your Grace has +ever heard of _me_?' said one of this class with prettily affected +_naïveté_ at a time when all England was astir about her, and when +colours and fashions went by her name to make them take with the +public at large. No one knew better than the fair _ingénue_ in +question how far and wide her fame had spread; but she thought it +looked modest and simple to assume ignorance of her own value, and to +declare that she was but a creeping worm when all the world knew that +she was a soaring butterfly. + +There is a certain like kind of affectation very common among pretty +women; and this is the affectation of not knowing that they are +pretty, and not recognizing the effect of their beauty on men. Take a +woman with bewildering eyes, say, of a maddening size and shape and +fringed with long lashes which distract you to look at; the creature +knows that her eyes are bewildering, as well as she knows that fire +burns and that ice melts; she knows the effect of that trick she has +with them--the sudden uplifting of the heavy lid and the swift, full +gaze that she gives right into a man's eyes. She has practised it +often in the glass, and knows to a mathematical nicety the exact +height to which the lid must be raised and the exact fixity of the +gaze. She knows the whole meaning of the look and the stirring of +men's blood that it creates; but if you speak to her of the effect of +her trick, she puts on an air of extremest innocence, and protests her +entire ignorance as to anything her eyes may say or mean; and if you +press her hard she will look at you in the same way for your own +benefit, and deny at the very moment of offence. Various other tricks +has she with those bewildering eyes of hers--each more perilous than +the other to men's peace; and all unsparingly employed, no matter what +the result. For this is the woman who flirts to the extreme limits, +then suddenly draws up and says she meant nothing. Step by step she +has led you on, with looks and smiles and pretty doubtful phrases +always susceptible of two meanings--the one for the ear by mere word, +the other for the heart by the accompaniments of look and manner, +which are intangible; step by step she has drawn you deeper and deeper +into the maze where she has gone before as your decoy; then, when she +has you safe, she raises her eyes for the last time, complains that +you have mistaken her cruelly and that she has meant nothing more than +any one else might mean; and what can she do to repair her mistake? +Love you? marry you? No; she is engaged to your rival, who counts his +thousands to your hundreds; and what a pity that you had not seen +this all along and that you should have so misunderstood her! Besides, +what is there about her that you or any one should love? + +Of all the many affectations of women, this affectation of their own +harmlessness when beautiful, and of their innocence of design when +they practise their arts for the discomfiture of men, is the most +dangerous and the most disastrous. But what can one say to them? The +very fact that they are dangerous disarms a man's anger and blinds his +perception until too late. That men love though they suffer is the +woman's triumph, guilt and condonation; and so long as the trick +succeeds it will be practised. + +Another affectation of the same family is the extreme friendliness and +familiarity which some women adopt in their manners towards men. Young +girls affect an almost maternal tone to boys of their own age, or a +year or so older; and they, too, when their wiser elders remonstrate, +declare they mean nothing, and how hard it is that they may not be +natural! This form of affectation, once begun, continues through life; +being too convenient to be lightly discarded; and youthful matrons not +long out of their teens assume a tone and ways that would befit middle +age counselling giddy youth, and that might by chance be dangerous +even then if the 'Indian summer' were specially bright and warm. + +Then there is that affectation pure and simple which is the mere +affectation of manner, such as is shown in the drawling voice, the +mincing gait, the extreme gracefulness of attitude which by +consciousness ceases to be grace, and the thousand little +_minauderies_ and coquetries of the sex known to us all. And there is +the affectation which people of a higher social sphere show when they +condescend to those of low estate, and talk and look as if they are +not quite certain of their company, and scarcely know if they are +Christian or heathen, savage or civilized. And there is the +affectation of the maternal passion with women who are never by any +chance seen with their children, but who speak of them as if they were +never out of their sight; the affectation of wifely adoration with +women who are to be met about the world with every man of their +acquaintance rather than with their lawful husbands; the affectation +of asceticism in women who lead a self-enjoying life from end to end; +and the affectation of political fervour in those who would not give +up a ball or a new dress to save Europe from universal revolution. + +Go where we will, the affectation of being something she is not meets +us in woman, like a ghost we cannot lay, a mist we cannot sweep away. +In the holiest and the most trivial things we find it penetrating +everywhere--even in church and at her prayers, when the pretty +penitent, rising from her lengthy orisons, lifts her eyes and +furtively looks about to see who has noticed her self-abasement and to +whom her picturesque piety has commended itself. All sorts and +patterns of good girls and pleasant women are very dear and +delightful; but the pearl of great price is the thoroughly natural and +unaffected woman--that is, the woman who is truthful to her heart's +core, and who would as little condescend to act a pretence as she +would dare to tell a lie. + + + + +_INTERFERENCE._ + + +About the strongest propensity in human nature, apart from the purely +personal instincts, is the propensity to interfere. We do not mean +tyranny; that is another matter--tyranny being active while +interference is negative--the one standing as the masculine, the other +as the feminine, form of the same principle. Besides, tyranny has +generally some personal gain in view when it takes it in hand to force +people to do what they dislike to do; while interference seeks no good +for itself at all, but simply prevents the exercise of free-will for +the mere pleasure to be had out of such prevention. + +Again, the idea of tyranny is political rather than domestic; but the +curse of interference is seen most distinctly within the four walls of +home, where also it is most felt. Very many people spend their lives +in interfering with others--perpetually putting spokes into wheels +with the turning of which they have nothing to do, and thrusting their +fingers into pies about the baking of which they are in no way +concerned; and of these people we are bound to confess that women make +up the larger number and are the greater sinners. To be sure +there are some men--small, fussy, finnicking fellows, with whom nature +has made the irreparable blunder of sex--who are as troublesome in +their endless interference as the narrowest-minded and most meddling +women of their acquaintance; but the feminine characteristics of men +are so exceptional that we need not take them into serious +calculation. For the most part, when men do interfere in any manly +sense at all, it is with such things as they think they have a right +to control--say, with the wife's low dresses or the daughter's too +patent flirtations. They interfere and prevent because they are +jealous of the repute, perhaps of the beauty, of their womankind; and, +knowing what other men say of such displays, or fearing their effect, +they stand between folly and slander to the best of their ability. But +this kind of interference, noble or ignoble as the cause may be, comes +into another class of motives altogether and does not belong to that +kind of interference of which we are speaking. + +Women, then, are the great interferers at home, both with each other +and with men. They do not tell us what we are to do, beyond going to +church and subscribing to their favourite mission, so much as they +tell us what we are not to do. They do not command so much as they +forbid. And, of all women, wives and daughters are the most given to +handling these check-strings and putting on these drag-chains. +Sisters, while young, are obliged to be less interfering, under pain +of a perpetual round of bickering; for brothers are not apt to +submit to the counsel of creatures for the most part so loftily +snubbed as sisters; while mothers nine times out of ten are laid aside +for all but sentimental purposes, so soon as the son has ceased to be +a boy and has learned to become a man. The queenhood, therefore, of +personal and domestic interference lies with wives, and they know how +to use the prerogative they assume. Take an unlucky man who smokes +under protest--his wife not liking to forbid the pleasure entirely, +but always grudging it and interfering with its exercise. Each cigar +represents a battle, deepening in intensity according to the number. +The first may have been had with only a light skirmish--perhaps a mere +threatening of an attack that passed away without coming to actual +onslaught; the second brings up the artillery; while the third or +fourth lets all the forces loose, and sets the big guns thundering. +She could understand a man smoking one cigar in the day, she says, +with a gracious condescension to masculine weakness; but when it comes +to more she feels that she is called on to interfere, and to do her +best towards checking such a reprehensible excess. It does not weaken +her position that she knows nothing of what she is talking about. She +never smoked a cigar herself, therefore does not understand the uses +nor the abuses of tobacco; but she holds herself pledged to interfere +so soon as she gets the chance; and she redeems that pledge with +energy. + +The man too, who has the stomach of an ostrich and an appetite to +correspond, but about whom the home superstition is that he has a +feeble digestion and must take care of his diet, has also to run the +gauntlet of his wife's interfering forces. He never dines nor sups +jollily with his friends without being plucked at and reminded that +salmon always disagrees with him; that champagne is sure to give him a +headache to-morrow; and, 'My dear! when you know how bad salad is for +you!' or, 'How can you eat that horrid pastry? You will be so ill in +the night!' 'What! more wine? another glass of whisky? how foolish you +are! how wrong!' The wife has a nervous organization which cannot bear +stimulants; the husband is a strong, large-framed man who can drink +deep without feeling it; but to the excitable woman her feeble limit +is her husband's measure, and when he has gone beyond the range of her +own short tether, she trots after him remonstrating, and thinks +herself justified in interfering with his further progress. For women +cannot be brought to understand the capacities of a man's life; they +cannot be made to understand that what is bad for themselves may not +be bad for others, and that their weakness ought not to be the gauge +of a man's strength. + +A pale, chilly woman, afflicted with chronic bronchitis, who wears +furs and velvets in May and fears the east wind as much as an East +Indian fears a tiger, does her best to coddle her husband, father, +sons, in about the same ratio as she coddles herself. They must +not go out without an overcoat; they must take an umbrella if the day +is at all cloudy; they must not walk too far nor ride too hard; and +they must be sure to be at home by a given hour. + +When such women as these have to do with men just on the boundary-line +between the last days of vigour and the first of old age, they put +forward the time of old age by many years. We see their men rapidly +sink into the softness and incapacity of senility, when a more bracing +life would have kept them good for half-a-dozen years longer. But +women do not care for this. They like men to be their own companions +and dread rather than desire the masculine comradeship which would +keep them up to the mark of virile independence; for most women--but +not all--would rather have their husbands manly in a womanly way than +in a manly one, as being more within the compass of their own +sympathies and understanding. + +The same kind of interference is very common where the husband is a +man of broad humour--one who calls a spade a spade, with no +circumlocution about an agricultural implement. According to the odd +law of compensation which regulates so much of human action, the wife +of such a man is generally one of the ultra-refined kind, who thinks +herself consecrated the enduring censor of her husband's speech. As +this is an example most frequently to be found in middle life and +where there are children belonging to the establishment, the word of +warning is generally 'papa!'--said with reproach or resentment, +according to circumstances--which has, of course, the effect of +drawing the attention of the young people to the paternal breadth of +speech, and of fixing that special breach of decorum on their memory. +Sometimes the wife has sufficient self-restraint not to give the word +of warning in public, but can nurse her displeasure for a more +convenient season; but so soon as they are alone the miserable man has +to pass under the harrow, as only husbands with wives of a chastising +spirit can pass under it, and his life is made a burden to him because +of that unlucky anecdote told with such verve a few hours ago, and +received with such shouts of pleasant laughter. Perhaps the anecdote +was just a trifle doubtful; granted; but what does the wife take by +her remonstrance? Most probably a quarrel; possibly a good-natured +_peccavi_ for the sake of being let off the continuance of the sermon; +perhaps a yawn; most certainly not reform. If the man be a man of free +speech and broad humour by nature and liking, he will remain so to the +end; and what the censorship of society leaves untouched, the +interference of a wife will not control. + +Children come in for an enormous share of interference, which is not +direction nor discipline, but simple interference for its own sake. +There are mothers who meddle with every expression of individuality in +their young people, quite irrespective of moral tendency, or whether +the occasion is trivial or important. In the fancies, the pleasures, +the minor details of dress in their children, there is always +that intruding maternal finger upsetting the arrangements of the poor +little pie as vigorously as if thrones and altars depended on the +result. Not a game of any kind can be begun, nor a blue ribbon worn +instead of a pink, without maternal interference; so that the bloom is +rubbed off every enjoyment, and life becomes reduced to a kind of +goose-step, with mamma for the drill-sergeant prescribing the inches +to be marked. Sisters, too, do a great deal of this kind of thing +among each other; as all those who are intimate in houses where there +are large families of unmarried girls must have seen. The nudges, the +warning looks, the deprecating 'Amy's!' and 'Oh, Lucy's!' and 'Hush, +Rose's!' by which some seek to act as household police over the +others, are patent to all who use their senses. In some houses the +younger sisters seem to have been born chiefly as training grounds for +the elders, whereon they may exercise their powers of interference; +and a hard time they have of it. If Emma goes to her embroidery, Ellen +tells her she ought to practise her singing; if Jane is reading, Mary +recommends sewing as a more profitable use of precious time; if Amy is +at her easel, Ada wants to turn her round to the piano. It is quite +the exception where four or five sisters leave each other free to do +as each likes, and do not take to drilling and interference as part of +the daily programme. + +Something of the reluctance to domestic service, so painfully apparent +among the better class of working women, is due to this spirit of +interference with women. The lady who wrote about the caps and gowns +of servant-girls, and drew out a plan of dress, down to the very +material of their gloves, was an instance of this spirit. For, when we +come to analyze it, what does it really signify to us how our servants +dress, so long as they are clean and decent and do not let their +garments damage our goods? Fashion is almost always ridiculous, and +women, as a rule, care more for dress than they care for anything +else; and if the kitchen apes the parlour, and Phyllis gives as much +thought to her new linsey as my lady gives to her new velvet, we +cannot wonder at it, nor need we hold up our hands in horror at the +depravity of the smaller person. Does one flight of stairs transpose +morality? If it does not, there is no real ethical reason why my lady +should interfere with poor Phyllis's enjoyment in her ugly little +vanities, when she herself will not be interfered with--though press +and pulpit both try to turn her out of her present path into the way +which all ages have thought the best for her and the one naturally +appointed. It is a thing that will not bear reasoning on, being simply +a form of the old 'who will guard the guardian?' Who will direct the +directress? and to whose interference will the interferer submit? + +There are two causes for this excessive love of interference among +women. The one is the narrowness of their lives and objects, by which +insignificant things gain a disproportionate value in their eyes; +the other, their belief that they are the only saviours of society, +and that without them man would become hopelessly corrupt. And to a +certain extent this belief is true; but surely with restrictions! +Because the clearer moral sense and greater physical weakness of women +restrain men's fiercer passions and force them to be gentle and +considerate, women are not, therefore, the sole arbiters of masculine +life into whose hands is given the paying out of just so much rope as +they think fit for the occasion. They would do better to look to their +own tackle before settling so exactly the run of others; and if ever +their desired time of equality is to come, it must come through mutual +independence, not through womanly interference, and as much liberality +and breadth given as demanded:--which, so far as humanity has gone +hitherto, has not been the feminine manner of squaring accounts. + +Grant that women are the salt of the earth and the great antiseptic +element in society, still that does not reduce everything else to the +verge of corruption which they alone prevent. Yet they evidently think +that it is so, and that they are each and all the keepers of keys +which give them a special entrance to the temple of morality, and by +which they are able to exclude or admit the grosser body of men. Hence +they interfere and restrict and pay out just so much rope, and measure +off just so much gambolling ground, as they think fit; then think vile +man a horribly wicked invention when he takes things into his own +hand and goes beyond their boundary-lines. It is all done in good if +in a very narrow faith--that we admit willingly; but we would call +their attention to the difference there is between influence and +interference; which is just the difference between their ideal duty +and their daily practice--between being the salt of the earth and the +blister of the home. + +We think it only justice to put in a word for those poor henpecked +fellows of husbands at a time when the whole cry is for Woman's +Rights, which seems to mean chiefly her right of making man knuckle +under on all occasions and of making one will serve for two lives--and +that will hers. We assure her that she would get her own way in large +matters much more easily if she would leave men more liberty in small +ones, and not teaze them by interfering in things which do not concern +her and have only reference to themselves. + + + + +_THE FASHIONABLE WOMAN._ + + +Among the many odd products of a mature civilization, the fashionable +woman is one of the oddest. From first to last she is an amazing +spectacle; and if we take human life in any earnestness at all, +whether individually, as the passage to an eternal existence the +condition of which depends on what we are here, or collectively, as +the highest thing we know, we can only look in blank astonishment at +the fashionable woman and her career. She is the one sole capable +member of the human family without duties and without useful +occupation; the one sole being who might be swept out of existence +altogether, without deranging the nice arrangement of things, or +upsetting the balance of inter-dependent forces. We know of no other +organic creation of which this could be said; but the fashionable +woman is not as other creatures, being, fortunately, _sui generis_, +and of a type not existing elsewhere. If we take the mere ordering of +her days and the employment of her time as the sign of her mental +state, we may perhaps measure to a certain extent, but not fully, the +depth of inanity into which she has fallen and the immensity of her +folly. Considering her as a being with the potentiality of +reason, of usefulness, of thought, the actual result is surely the +saddest and the strangest thing under heaven! + +She goes to bed at dawn and does not attempt to rise till noon. For +the most part she breakfasts in bed, and then amuses herself with a +cursory glance at the morning paper, if she have sufficient energy for +so great a mental exertion; if she have not, she lies for another hour +or two in that half-slumberous state which is so destructive to mind +and body, weakening as it does both fibre and resolution, both muscle +and good principle. At last she languidly rises, to be dressed in time +for luncheon and her favoured intimates--the men who have the _entrée_ +at sacred hours when the world in general is forbidden. Some time +later she dresses again for her drive--for the first part of the day's +serious business; for paying visits and leaving cards; for buying +jewelry and dresses, and ordering all sorts of unnecessary things at +her milliner's; for this grand lady's ordinary 'day,' and that grand +lady's extraordinary At Home; for her final slow parade in the Park, +where she sees her friends as in an open air drawing-room, makes +private appointments, carries on flirtations, and hears and retails +gossip and scandal of a full flavour. Then she goes home to dress for +tea in a 'lovely gown' of suggestive piquancy; to be followed by +dinner, the opera or a concert, a _soirée_, or perhaps a ball or two; +whence she returns towards morning, flushed with excitement or +worn out with fatigue, feverish or nervous, as she has had pleasure +and success or disappointment and annoyance. + +This is her outside life; and this is no fancy picture and no +exaggeration. After a certain time of such an existence, can we wonder +if her complexion fades and her eyes grow dim? if that inexpressible +air of haggard weariness creeps over her, which ages even a young girl +and makes a mature woman substantially an old one? It is then that she +has recourse to those foul and fatal expedients of which we have heard +more than enough in these latter days. She will not try simplicity of +living, natural hours, wholesome occupation, unselfish endeavour, but +rushes off for help to paints and cosmetics, to stimulants and drugs, +and attempts to restore the tarnished freshness of her beauty by the +very means which further corrode it. Every now and then, for very +weariness when not for idleness, she feigns herself sick and has her +favourite physician to attend her. In fact the funniest thing about +her is the ease with which she takes to her bed on the slightest +provocation, and the strange pleasure she seems to find in what is a +penance to most women. + +You meet her in a heated, crowded, noisy room, looking just as she +always looks, whatever her normal state of health may be; and in +answer to your inquiries she tells you she has only two hours ago left +her bed to come here, having been confined to her room for a week, +with Dr. Blank in close attendance. If you are an intimate female +friend she will whisper you the name of her malady, which is sure to +be something terrific, and which, if true, would have kept her a real +invalid for months instead of days; but if you are only a man she will +make herself out to have been very ill indeed in a more mysterious +way, and leave you to wonder at the extraordinary physique of +fashionable women, which enables them to live on the most friendly +touch-and-go terms with death, and to overcome mortal maladies by an +effort of the will and the delights of a ducal ball. The favourite +physician has a hard time of it with these ladies; and the more +popular he is the harder his work. It is well for his generation when +he is a man of honour and integrity, and knows how to add self-respect +and moral power to the qualities which have made him the general +favourite. For his influence over women is almost unlimited--like +nothing so much as that of the handsome Abbé of the Regency or the +fascinating Monsignore of Rome; and if he chooses to abuse it and turn +it to evil issues, he can. And, however great the merit in him that he +does not, it does not lessen the demerit of the woman that he could. + +Sometimes the fashionable woman takes up with the clergyman instead of +the physician, and coquets with religious exercises rather than with +drugs; but neither clergyman nor physician can change her mode of life +nor give her truth nor common-sense. Sometimes there is a fluttering +show of art-patronage, and the fashionable woman has a handsome +painter or well-bred musician in her train, whom she pets publicly and +patronizes graciously. Sometimes it is a young poet or a rising +novelist, considerably honoured by the association, who dedicates his +next novel to her, or writes verses in her praise, with such fervency +of gratitude as sets the base Philistines on the scent of the +secret--perhaps guessing not far amiss. For the fashionable woman has +always some love-affair on hand, more or less platonic according to +her own temperament or the boldness of the man--a love-affair in which +the smallest ingredient is love; a love-affair which is vanity, +idleness, a dissolute imagination and contempt of such prosaic things +as morals; a love-affair not even to be excused by the tragic frenzy +of earnest passion, and which may be guilty and yet not true. + +The physical effects of such a life as this are as bad as the mental, +and both are as bad as the worst can make them. A feverish, +overstrained condition of health either prevents the fashionable woman +from being a mother at all, or makes her the mother of nervous, sickly +children. Many a woman of high rank is at this moment paying bitterly +for the disappointment of which she herself, in her illimitable folly, +has been the sole and only cause. And, whether women like to hear it +or not, it is none the less a truth that part of the reason for their +being born at all is that they may in their turn bear children. The +unnatural feeling against maternity existing among fashionable +women is one of the worst mental signs of their state, as their +frequent inability to be mothers is one of the worst physical results. +This is a condition of things which no false modesty nor timid reserve +should keep in the background, for it is a question of national +importance, and will soon become one of national disaster unless +checked by a healthier current and more natural circumstances. + +Dress, dissipation and flirting make up the questionable lines which +enclose the life of the fashionable woman, and which enclose nothing +useful, nothing good, nothing deep nor true nor holy. Her piety is a +pastime; her art the poorest pretence; her pleasure consists only in +hurry and excitement alternating with debasing sloth, in heartless +coquetry or in lawless indulgence, as nature made her more vain or +more sensual. As a wife she fulfils no wifely duty in any grand or +loving sense, for the most part regarding her husband only as a banker +or an adjunct, according to the terms of her marriage settlement; as a +mother she is a stranger to her children, to whom nurse and governess +supply her place and give such poor makeshift for maternal love as +they are enabled or inclined. In no domestic relation is she of the +smallest value, and of none in any social circumstance beside the +adorning of a room--if she be pretty--and the help she gives to trade +through her expenditure. She lives only in the gaslight, and her +nature at last becomes as artificial as her habits. + +As years go on, and she changes from the acknowledged belle to +_la femme passée_, she goes through a period of frantic endeavour to +retain her youth; and even when time has clutched her with too firm a +hand to be shaken off, and she begins to feel the infirmities which +she still puts out all her strength to conceal, even then she grasps +at the departing shadow and fresh daubs the crumbling ruin, in the +belief that the world's eyes are dim and that stucco may pass for +marble for another year or two longer. Or she becomes a Belgravian +mother, with daughters to sell to the highest bidder; and then the aim +of her life is to secure the purchaser. Her daughters are never +objects of real love with the fashionable woman. They are essentially +her rivals, and the idea of carrying on her life in theirs, of +forgetting herself in them, occurs to her only as a forecast of death. +She shrinks even from her sons, as living evidences of the lapse of +time which she cannot deny, and awkward _memoria technica_ for fixing +dates; and there is not a home presided over by a fashionable woman +where the family is more than a mere name, a mere social convention +loosely held together by circumstances, not by love. + +Closing such a life as this comes the unhonoured end, when the +miserable made-up old creature totters down into the grave where paint +and padding, and glossy plaits cut from some fresh young head, are of +no more avail; and where death, which makes all things real, reduces +her life of lies to the nothingness it has been from the beginning. +What does she leave behind her? A memory by which her children +may order their own lives in proud assurance that so they will order +them best for virtue and for honour? Or a memory which speaks to them +of time misused, of duties unfulfilled, of love discarded for +pleasure, and of a life-long sacrifice of all things good and pure for +selfishness? + +We all know examples of the worldly old woman clinging batlike to the +last to the old roofs and rafters; and we all know how heartily we +despise her, and how we ridicule her in our hearts, if not by our +words. If the reigning queens of fashion, at present young and +beautiful, would but remember that they are only that worldly old +woman in embryo, and that in a very few years they will be her exact +likeness, unhappily repeated for the scorn of the world once more to +follow! The traditional skeleton at the feast had a wonderfully wise +meaning, crude and gross as it was in form. For though its _memento +mori_, too constantly before us, would either sadden or brutalize, as +we were thoughtful or licentious, yet it is good to see the end of +ourselves, and to study the meaning and lesson of our lives in those +of our prototypes and elder likenesses. + +The pleasures of the world are, as we all know, very potent and very +alluring, but nothing can be more unsatisfying if taken as the main +purpose of life. While we are young, the mere stirring of the blood +stands instead of anything more real; but as we go on, and the pulse +flags and pleasurable occasions get rare and more rare, we find +that we have been like the Prodigal Son, and that our food and his +have been out of much the same trough, and come in the main to much +the same thing. + +This is an age of extraordinary wealth and of corresponding +extraordinary luxury; of unparalleled restlessness, which is not the +same thing as activity or energy, but which is the kind of +restlessness that disdains all quiet and repose, as unendurable +stagnation. Hence the fashionable woman of the day is one of extremes +in her own line also; and the idleness, the heartlessness, the +self-indulgence, the want of high morality, and the insolent luxury at +all times characteristic of her were never displayed with more cynical +effrontery than at present, and never called for more severe +condemnation. + +The fashionable women of Greece and Rome, of Italy and France, have +left behind them names which the world has made typical of the vices +naturally engendered by idleness and luxury. But do we wish that our +women should become subjects for an English Juvenal? that fashion +should create a race of Laïses and Messalinas, of Lucrezia Borgias and +Madame du Barrys, out of the stock which once gave us Lucy Hutchinson +and Elizabeth Fry? Once the name of Englishwoman carried with it a +grave and noble echo as the name of women known for their gentle +bearing and their blameless honour--of women who loved their husbands, +and brought up about their own knees the children they were not +reluctant to bear and not ashamed to love. Now, it too often means a +girl of the period, a frisky matron, a fashionable woman--a thing of +paints and pads, consorting with dealers of no doubtful calling for +the purchase of what she grimly calls 'beauty,' making pleasure her +only good and the world her highest god. It too often means a woman +who is not ashamed to supplement her husband with a lover, but who is +unwilling to become the honest mother of that husband's children. It +too often means a hybrid creature, perverted out of the natural way +altogether, affecting the license but ignorant of the strength of a +man; as girl or woman alike valueless so far as her highest natural +duties are concerned; and talking largely of liberty while showing at +every turn how much she fails in that co-essential of liberty--knowledge +how to use it. + + + + +_SLEEPING DOGS._ + + +There is a capital old proverb, often quoted but not so often acted +on, called 'Let sleeping dogs lie;' a proverb which, if we were to +abide by its injunction, would keep us out of many a mess that we get +into now, because we cannot let well alone. Certainly we fall into +trouble sometimes, or rather we drift into it--we allow it to gather +round us--for want of a frank explanation to clear off small +misunderstandings. At least novelists say so, and then make a great +point of the anguish endured by Henry and Angelina for three mortal +volumes, because they were too stupid to ask the reason why the one +looked cold the other evening at the duchess's ball, and the other +looked shy the next morning in the park. But then novelists, poor +souls, are driven to such extravagant expedients for motives and +matter, that we can scarcely take them as rational exponents of real +life in any way; though the very meaning and final cause of their +profession is to depict human nature as it is, and to show the reflex +action of character and circumstances somewhat according to the +pattern set out in the actual world. But, leaving novelists +alone, on the whole we find in real life that if speech is silvern, +silence is essentially golden, and that more harm is done by saying +too much than by saying too little; above all, that infinite mischief +arises by not letting sleeping dogs lie. + +People are so wonderfully anxious to stir up the dregs of everything, +they can never let things rest. Take a man or woman who has done +something queer that gets noised abroad, and who is coldly looked on +in consequence by those who believe the worst reports which arise as +interpretations. Now the wisest thing undoubtedly is to bear this +coldness as the righteous punishment of that folly, and to trust for +rehabilitation to the mysterious process called 'living it down.' If +there has been absolutely no sinfulness to speak of, nothing but a +little imprudence and a big glossary of scandalous explanation, a +little precipitancy and a great deal of ill-nature, by all means wake +up the sleeping dog and set him howling through the streets. He may do +good, seeing that truth would be your friend. But if there be a core +of ugly fact, even if it be not quite so ugly as the envelope which +rumour has wrapped round it, then fall back on the dignity of 'living +it down,' and let the dog lie sleeping and muzzled. + +There is another, but an unsavoury saying, which advises against the +stirring up of evil odours; but this is just what imprudent, +high-spirited people will not understand. They will take their own way +in spite of society and all its laws; they will kick over the +traces when it suits them; they will do this and that of which the +world says authoritatively, 'No, you shall not do it;' and then, when +the day of wrath arrives, and down comes the whip on the offending +back, they shriek piteously and wake up all the dogs in the town in +the 'investigation of their case.' And a queer kennel enough they turn +out sometimes! They would have done better to put up with their social +thrashing than to have set the bloodhounds of 'investigation' on their +heels. + +Actions for libel often do this kind of thing, as every one may read +for himself. Many a man who gets his farthing damages had better have +borne the surly growl of the only half-roused dog, than have +retaliated, and so waked him up. The farthing damages, representing +say a cuff on the head or a kick in the ribs, or a milder 'Lie down, +sir!' may be very pleasant to the feelings of the yelped-at, as so +much revenge exacted--Shylock's pound of flesh, without the blood. But +what about the consequences? what about the disclosure of your secret +follies and the uncovering of the foundations on which the libel +rested? The foundations remain immoveable to the end of time if the +superstructure be disroofed, and the sleeping dog is awakened, never +to be set at rest again while he has a tooth in his head that can +bite. + +One of the arts of peaceful living at home is contained in the power +of letting sleeping dogs lie. Papa is surly--it is a way papas +have--or mamma is snappish, as even the best of mammas are at +times when the girls are tiresome and will flirt with ineligible +younger brothers, or when the boys, who must marry money, are paying +attention to dowerless beauty instead. Well, the family horizon is +overcast, and the black dog keeps the gate of the family mansion. +Better let it lie there asleep, if it will but remain so. It is not +pleasant to have it there certainly, but it would be worse to rouse it +into activity and to have a general yelping through the house. + +Sometimes, indeed, in a family given to tears and caresses and easily +excited feelings, a frank challenge as to reasons why is answered by a +temporary storm, followed by a scene of effusion and _attendrissement_, +and the black dog is not awakened, but banished, by the rousing he has +got. This is a method that can be tried when you have perfect knowledge +and command of your material; else it is a dangerous, and nine times +out of ten would be an unsuccessful, experiment. It is nearly always +unsuccessful with husbands and wives, who often sulk, but rarely +for causes needing explanation. Angelina knows quite well that she +danced too often the other night with that fascinating young Lovelace +for whom her Henry has a special, and not quite groundless, aversion. +She may put on as many airs of injured innocence as she likes, and +affect to consider herself an ill-used wife suffering grievous things +because of her husband's displeasure and the black dog of sulks +accompanying; but she knows as well as her Henry himself where her sin +lies, and to kick at the black dog would only be to set him +loose upon her, and be well barked at if not worried for her pains. +The wiser course would be to muzzle him by ignoring his presence; +and so in almost all cases of domestic dog, however black. + +A sleeping dog of another kind, which it would be well if women would +always leave at rest, is the potential passion of a man who is a +cherished friend but an impossible lover. Certain slow-going men are +able to maintain for life a strong but strictly platonic attachment +for certain women. If any warmer impulse or more powerful feeling give +threatening notice of arising, it is kept in due subjection and a +wholesome state of coolness, perhaps by its very hopelessness even if +returned, perhaps by the fear or the knowledge that it would be +ill-received, and that the only passport to the pleasant friendship so +delighted in is in this calm and sober platonism. This is all very +well so long as the woman minds what she is about; for the passionless +attachment of a man depends mainly on her desire to keep things in +their present place, and on her power of holding to the line to be +observed. If she oversteps this line, if she wakens up that sleeping +dog of passion, it is all over with her and platonism. What was once a +pleasant truth would now be a burning satire; for friendship routed by +love can never take service under its old banners again. + +And yet this is what women are continually doing. They are always +complaining that men are not their friends, and that they are only +selfish and self-seeking in their relations with them; yet no sooner +do they possess a man friend who is nothing else than they try their +utmost to convert him into a lover, and are not too well pleased if +they do not succeed--which might by chance sometimes happen like any +other rare occurrence, but not often. And yet success ruins +everything. It takes away the friend and does not give an available +lover; it destroys the existing good and substitutes nothing better. +If the woman be of the fishpond type, whose heart Thackeray wanted to +'drag,' she simply turns round upon the unhappy victim with one of the +'looks that kill;' if she be more weak than vain and less designing +than impulsive, she regrets the momentary infatuation which has lost +her her friend; but in any case she has lost him--by her own folly, +not by inevitable misfortune. + +Just as easy is it to rouse the sleeping dogs of hatred, of jealousy, +of envy. You have a tepid well-controlled dislike to some one; and you +know that he knows it. For feelings are eloquent, even when dumb, and +express themselves in a thousand ways independent of words. You do not +care much about your dislike--you do not nurse it nor feed it in any +way, and are rather content than not to let it lie dormant, and so far +harmless. But your unloved friend cannot let well alone. He will be +always treading on your corns and touching you on the raw. That +unlucky speculation you made; your play that was damned; the election +you lost; the decision that was given against you, with +costs--whenever you see him he is sure to introduce some topic that +rubs you the wrong way, till at last the sleeping dog gets fairly +roused, and what was merely a well-ordered dislike bursts out into a +frantic and ungovernable hatred. It has been his own doing. Just as in +the case of the platonic friend transformed into the passionate lover +by the woman's wiles, so the dislike that gave you no trouble--become +now the hatred which is a real curse to your existence--results from +your friend's incessant rousing up of sleeping passions. + +Young people are much given to this kind of thing. There is an impish +tendency in most girls, and in all boys, that makes teazing a matter +of exquisite delight to them. If they know of any sleeping dog which +an elder carries about under his cloak, they are never so happy as +when they are rousing it to activity, though their own backs may get +bitten in the fray. Let a youngster into the secret of a weakness, a +sore, and if he can resist the temptation of torturing you as the +result of his knowledge he may lay claim to a virtue almost unknown in +boyish morals. But he sometimes pays dearly for his fun. More than one +life-long dislike, culminating in a disastrous codicil or total +omission from the body of the will, has been the return-blow for a +course of boyish teazings which a testy old uncle or huffish maiden +aunt has had to undergo. The punishment may be severe and unjust; +but the provocation was great; and revenge is a human, if +indefensible, instinct common to all classes. + +Fathers and mothers themselves are not always sacred ground, nor are +their special dogs suffered to lie sleeping undisturbed; and perhaps +the favouritism and comparative coldness patent in almost every family +may be traced back to the propensity for soothing or for rousing those +parental beasts. For even fathers and mothers have personal feelings +in excess of their instincts, and they, no more than any one else, +like to be put through their paces by the impish vivacity of youth, +and made to dance according to the piping of an irreverent lad or +saucy girl. If they have dogs, they do not want their children to pry +into their kennels and whistle them out at their pleasure; and those +who do so most will naturally get worst off in the great division of +family love. 'Let sleeping dogs lie,' certainly, as a rule for private +life. + +Historically, the saying does not hold good. For if the great leaders +of thought and reform had not roused up the sleeping dogs of their +day, and made them give tongue for all after ages to hear, we should +be but poorly off at this present time. Many of our liberties have +been got only by diligently prodding up that very sleepy dog, the +public, till he has been forced to show his teeth; and history is full +of instances of how much has been done, all the world over and in +every age, by the like means. Sometimes the prodded dog flies at the +wrong throat on the other side, as we have had a few notable +instances of late; and then it would have been wiser to leave him +quietly sleeping in the shade, whether at Mentana or elsewhere; to +rouse for rending being a poor amusement at the best, and an eminently +unprofitable use of leather. + + + + +_BEAUTY AND BRAINS._ + + +That lovely woman fulfils only half her mission when she is +unpersonable instead of beautiful, all young men, and all pretty girls +secure in the consciousness of their own perfections, will agree. +Indeed, it is cruel to hear the way in which ingenuous youths despise +ugly girls, however clever, whose charm lies in their cleverness only, +with a counteraction in their plainness. To hear them, one would think +that hardness of feature was, like poverty, a crime voluntarily +perpetrated, and that contempt was a righteous retribution for the +offence. Yet their preference, though so cruelly expressed, is to a +certain extent the right thing. When we are young, the beauty of women +has a supreme attraction beyond all other possessions or qualities; +and there are self-evident reasons why it should be so. It is only as +we grow older that we know the value of brains, and, while still +admiring beauty--as indeed who does not?--admire it as one passing by +on the other side--as a grace to look at, but not to hold, unless +accompanied by something more lasting. + +This is in the middle term of a man's life. Old age, perhaps with +the unconscious yearning of regret, goes back to the love of youth and +beauty for their own sake; extremes meeting here as in almost all +other circumstances. The danger is when a young man, obeying the +natural impulse of his age and state, marries beauty only, with +nothing more durable beneath. The mind sees what it brings, and we +love the ideal we create rather than the reality that exists. A pretty +face, the unworn nerves of youth, the freshness of hope that has not +yet been soured by disappointment nor chilled by experience, a neat +stroke at croquet and a merry laugh easily excited, make a girl a +goddess to a boy who is what he himself calls in love and his friends +'spoony.' She may be narrow, selfish, spoilt, unfit to bear the +burdens of life and unable to meet her trials patiently; she may be +utterly unpractical and silly--one of those who never mature but only +grow old--without judgment, forethought, common-sense or courage; but +he sees nothing of all this. To him she is perfect; the 'jolliest girl +in the world,' if he be slangy, or the 'dearest,' if he be +affectionate; and he neither sees nor heeds her potential faults. + +It is only when she has stepped down from her pedestal to the level of +the home-threshold that he finds out she is but a woman after all, and +perhaps an exceptionally weak and peevish one. Then he knows that he +would have done better for himself had he married that plain +brave-hearted girl who would have had him to a dead certainty if he +had asked her, but whom he so unmercifully laughed at when he was +making love to his fascinating charmer. As years go on and reduce the +Hebe and Hecate of eighteen to much the same kind of woman at +forty--with perhaps the advantage on Hecate's side if of the sort that +ripens well and improves by keeping--the man feels that he has been a +fool after the manner of Bunyan's Passion; that he has eaten up his +present in the past, and had all his good things at once. If he had +but looked at the future and been able to wait! But in those days he +wanted beauty that does not last, and cared nothing for brains which +do; and so, having made his election he must abide by it, and eat +bitter bread from the yeast of his own brewing. + +Many a man has cursed, his whole life long, the youthful infatuation +that made him marry a pretty fool. Take the case of a rising +politician whose fair-faced wife is either too stupid to care about +his position, or who imperils it by her folly. If amiable and +affectionate, and in her own silly little way ambitious, she does him +incalculable mischief by exaggeration, and by saying and doing exactly +the things which are most damaging to him; if stupid, she is just so +much deadweight that he has to carry with him while swimming up the +stream. She is very lovely certainly, and people crowd her +drawing-room to look at her; but a plain-featured, sensible, shrewd +woman, with no beauty to speak of but with tact and cleverness, would +have helped him in his career far better than does his brainless +Venus. He finds this out when it is too late to change M. for N. +in the marriage service. + +The successful men of small beginnings are greatly liable to this +curse of wifely hindrance. A barrister once briefless and now in +silk--an artist once obscure and now famous--who in the days of +impecuniosity and Bohemianism married the landlady's pretty daughter +and towards the meridian of life find themselves in the front ranks of +_la haute volée_ with a wife who drops her h's and multiplies her s's, +know the full bitterness of the bread baked from that hasty brewing. +Each woman may have been beautiful in her youth, and each man may have +loved his own very passionately; but if she have nothing to supplement +her beauty--if she have no brains to fall back on, by which she can be +educated up to her husband's present social position as the wife of +his successful maturity--she is a mistake. Dickens was quite right to +kill off pretty childish Dora in 'David Copperfield.' If she had lived +she would have been like Flora in 'Bleak House,' who indeed was Dora +grown old but not matured; with all the grace and beauty of her youth +gone, and nothing else to take their place. + +Men do not care for brains in excess in women. They like a sympathetic +intellect which can follow and seize their thoughts as quickly as they +are uttered; but they do not much care for any clear or specific +knowledge of facts. Even the most philosophic among them would rather +not be set right in a classical quotation, an astronomical +calculation, or the exact bearing of a political question by a +lovely being in tarlatane whom he was graciously unbending to +instruct. Neither do they want anything very strong-minded. To most +men, indeed, the feminine strong-mindedness that can discuss immoral +problems without blushing is a quality as unwomanly as a +well-developed biceps or a 'shoulder-of-mutton' fist. It is sympathy, +not antagonism--it is companionship, not rivalry, still less +supremacy, that they like in women; and some women with brains as well +as learning--for the two are not the same thing--understand this, and +keep their blue stockings well covered by their petticoats. Others, +enthusiasts for freedom of thought and intellectual rights, show +theirs defiantly; and meet with their reward. Men shrink from them. +Even clever men, able to meet them on their own ground, do not feel +drawn to them; while all but high-class minds are humiliated by their +learning and dwarfed by their moral courage. And no man likes to feel +humiliated or dwarfed in the presence of a woman, and because of her +superiority. + +But the brains most useful to women, and most befitting their work in +life, are those which show themselves in common-sense, in good +judgment, and that kind of patient courage which enables them to bear +small crosses and great trials alike with dignity and good temper. +Mere intellectual culture, however valuable it may be in itself, does +not equal the worth of this kind of moral power; for as the true +domain of woman is the home, and her way of ordering her domestic +life the best test of her faculties, mere intellectual culture does +not help in this; and, in fact, is often a hindrance rather than a +help. What good is there in one's wife being an accomplished +mathematician, a sound scholar, a first-rate musician, a deeply-read +theologian, if she cannot keep the accounts square, knows nothing of +the management of children, lets herself be cheated by the servants +and the tradespeople, has not her eyes opened to dirt and disorder, +and gives way to a fretful temper on the smallest provocation? + +The pretty fool who spends half her time in trying on new dresses and +studying the effect of colours, and who knows nothing beyond the last +new novel and the latest plate of fashions, is not a more disastrous +wife than the woman of profound learning whose education has taught +her nothing practical. They stand at the opposite ends of the same +scale, and neither end gives the true position of women. Indeed, if +one must have a fool in one's house, the pretty one would be the best, +as, at the least, pleasant to look at; which is something gained. + +The intellectual fool, with her head always in books and 'questions,' +and her children dropping off like sheep for the want of womanly care, +is something more than flesh and blood can tolerate. The pretty fool +cannot help herself. If nature proved herself but a stepmother to her, +and left out the best part of her wits while taking such especial care +of her face, it is no fault of hers; but the intellectual fool is a +case of maladministration of powers, for which she alone is +responsible; and in this particular alternative between beauty and +brains, without a shadow of doubt we would go in for beauty. + +Ball-rooms and dinner-tables are the two places where certain women +most shine. In the ball-room Hebe is the queen, and has it all her own +way without fear of rivals. A very few men who care for dancing for +its own sake will certainly dance with Hecate if she is light on hand, +keeps accurate time, and manages her feet with scientific precision; +but to the ruck of youths, Hebe, who jerks herself into step every +second round, but whose lovely face and perfect figure make up for +everything, is the partner they all besiege. Only to those exceptional +few who regard dancing as a serious art would she be a bore with her +three jumps and a hop; while Hecate, waltzing like an angel, would be +divine, in spite of her high cheek-bones and light green eyes _à fleur +de tête_. But at a dinner-table, where a man likes to talk between the +dishes, a sympathetic listener with pleasant manners, to whom he can +air his stalest stories and recount his personal experiences, is +preferable to the prettiest girl if a simpleton, only able to show her +small white teeth in a silly smile, and say 'yes' and 'indeed' in the +wrong places. The ball-room may be taken to represent youth; the +dinner-table maturity. The one is the apotheosis of mere beauty, in +clouds of millinery glory and a heaven of flirting; the other is solid +enjoyment, with brains to talk to by the side and beauty to look +at opposite, in just the disposition that makes life perfect. A +well-ordered dinner-table is a social microcosm; and, being so, this +is the blue riband of the arrangement. + +Every woman is bound to make the best of herself. The strong-minded +women who hold themselves superior to the obligations of dress and +manner and all the pleasant little artificial graces belonging to an +artificial civilization, and who think any sacrifice made to +appearance just so much waste of power, are awful creatures, ignorant +of the real meaning of their sex--social Graiæ wanting in every charm +of womanhood, and to be diligently shunned by the wary. + +This making the best of themselves is a very different thing from +making dress and personal vanity the first considerations in life. +Where women in general fail is in the exaggerations into which they +fall on this and on almost every other question. They are apt to be +either demireps or devotees; frights or flirts; fashionable to an +extent that lands them in illimitable folly and drags their husbands' +names through the mire, or they are so dowdy that they disgrace a +well-ordered drawing-room, and among nicely-dressed women stand out as +living sermons on slovenliness. If they are clever, they are too +commonly blue-stockings, and let the whole household go by the board +for the sake of their fruitless studies; and if they are domestic and +good managers they sink into mere servants, never opening a book save +their daily ledger, and having no thought beyond the cheesemonger's +bill and the butcher's prices. They want that fine balance, that +accurate self-measurement and knowledge of results, which goes by +the name of common-sense and is the best manifestation of brains +they can give, and the thing which men most prize. It is the most +valuable working form of intellectual power, and has most endurance +and vitality; and it is the form which helps a man on in life, when +he has found it in his wife, quite as much as money or a good connexion. + +So that, on the whole, brains are before beauty in the solid things of +life. For admiration and personal love and youthful enjoyment, beauty +of course is supreme; but as we cannot be always young nor always apt +for pleasure, it is as well to provide for the days when the daughters +of music shall be brought low and the years draw nigh which have no +pleasure in them. + + + + +_NYMPHS._ + + +Between the time of the raw school-girl and that of the finished young +lady is the short season of the nymph, when the physical enjoyment of +life is perhaps at its keenest, and a girl is not afraid to use her +limbs as nature meant her to use them, nor ashamed to take pleasure in +her youth and strength. This is the time when a sharp run down a steep +hill, with the chance of a tumble midway, is an exercise by no means +objected to; when clambering over gates, stiles, and even crabbed +stone-walls is not refused because of the undignified display of ankle +which the adventure involves; when leaping a ditch comes in as one of +the ordinary accidents of a marshland walk; and when the fun of riding +is infinitely enhanced if the horse be only half broken or barebacked. + +The nymph--an out-of-door, breezy, healthy girl, more after the +pattern of the Greek Oread than the Amazon--is found only in the +country; and for the most part only in the remoter districts of the +country. In the town she degenerates into fastness, according to the +law which makes evil merely the misdirection of force, as dirt is +only matter in the wrong place. But among the mountains, in the +secluded midland villages, or out on the thinly-populated moorland +tracts, the nymph may be found in the full perfection of her nature. +And a very beautiful kind of nature it is; though it is to be feared +that certain ladies of the stricter sort would call her 'tomboy', and +that those of a still narrower way of thought, unable to distinguish +between unconventionality and vulgarity, would hold her to be +decidedly vulgar--which she is not--and would wonder at her mother for +'letting her go on so.' + +You fall upon the nymph at all hours and in all seasons. Indeed, she +boasts that no weather ever keeps her indoors, and prefers a little +roughness of the elements to anything too luscious or sentimental. A +fresh wind, a sharp frost, a blinding fall of snow, or a pelting +shower of rain are all high jinks to the nymph, to whom it is rare fun +to come in like a water-dog, dripping from every hair, or shaking the +snow in masses from her hat and cloak. She prefers this kind of thing +to the suggestive beauty of the moonlight or the fervid heats of +summer; and thinks a long walk in the crisp sharp frost, with the +leaves crackling under her feet, worth all the nightingales in the +wood. And yet she loves the spring and summer too, for the sake of the +flowers and the birds and the beasts and the insects they bring forth; +for the nymph is almost always a naturalist of the perceptive and +self-taught kind, and has a marvellous faculty for finding out +nests and rare habitats, and for tracking unusual trails to the hidden +home. + +There is no prettier sight among girls than the nymph when thoroughly +at her ease, and enjoying herself in her own peculiar way. That +wonderful grace of unconsciousness which belongs to savages and +animals belongs to her also, and she moves with a supple freedom which +affectation or shyness would equally destroy. To see her running down +a green field, with the sunlight falling on her; her light dress blown +into coloured clouds by the wind; her step a little too long for the +correct town-walk--but so firmly planted and yet so light, so swift, +so even!--her cheeks freshly flushed by exercise; her eyes bright and +fearless; her white teeth shown below her upper lip as she comes +forward with a ringing laugh, carrying a young bird which she has just +caught, or a sheaf of wild flowers for which she has been perilling +her neck, is to see a beautiful and gracious picture which you +remember with pleasure all your life after. Or you meet her quite +alone on a wide bleak moor, with her hat in her hand and her hair +blowing across her face, looking for plovers' eggs, or ferns and +orchids down in the damp hollows. She is by no means dressed according +to the canons of _Le Follet_, and yet she always manages to have +something picturesque about her--something that would delight an +artist's taste, and that is in perfect harmony with herself and her +surroundings--which she wears with profound ignorance as to how well +it suits her--or at most with only an instinctive knowledge that +it is the right thing for her. She may be shy as she meets you; if she +is passing out of the nymph state into that of conscious womanhood, +she will be shy; but if still a nymph with no disturbing influences at +work, she will probably look at you with a fixed, perplexing, +half-provoking look of frank curiosity which you can neither notice +nor take advantage of; the trammels of conventional life fettering one +side heavily, if not the other. + +Shocking as it is to say, the nymph may sometimes be met on the top of +a haycart, and certainly in the hayfield, where she is engaged in +scattering the 'cocks,' if not in raising them; and where even the +haymakers themselves--and they are not a notably romantic race--do not +grumble at the extra trouble she gives them, because of her evident +delight in her misdeeds. Besides, she has a bright word for them as +she passes; for the nymph has democratic tendencies, and is frank and +'affable' to all classes alike. She needs to be a little looked after +in this direction, not for mischief but for manners; for, if not +judiciously checked, she may become in time coarse. There are seamy +sides to everything, and the nymph does not escape the general law. + +If the nymph condescends to any game at all, it is croquet, at which +she is inexorably severe. She knows nothing of the little weakness +which makes her elder sisters overlook the patent spooning of the +favourite curate, even though he is opposed to them--nothing of +the tender favouritism which pushes on an awkward partner by deeds of +helping outside the law. The nymph, who has no weakness nor tenderness +of that kind, knows only the game; and the game has not elastic +boundaries. Therefore she is inflexible in her justice to one side and +the other. Is it not the game? she says when reproached with being +disagreeable and unamiable. + +But even croquet is slow to the nymph, who has been known to handle a +bat not discreditably, and who is an adept at firing at a mark with +real powder and ball. If she lives near a lake, a river, or the sea, +she is first-rate at boating, can feather her oar and back water with +the skill of a veteran oarsman, and can reef a sail or steer close +without the slightest hesitation or nervousness. She is also a famous +swimmer, and takes the water like a duck; and at an ordinary summer +seaside resort, if by chance she ever profanes herself by showing off +there, she attracts a crowd of beach-loungers to watch her feats far +outside the safe barrier of the bathing-machines. She is a great +walker, wherever she lives. If a mountaineer, she is a clever +cragswoman, making it a point of honour to go to the top of the most +difficult and dangerous mountains in her neighbourhood, and coaxing +her brothers to let her join them and their friends in expeditions +which require both nerve and strength. + +Her greatest sphere of social glory is a picnic, where she always +heads the exploring party, clambering up the rocks of the +waterfall, or diving down into the close-smelling caves, or scaling +the crumbling walls of the ruin before any one else can come up to +her. She is specially happy at old ruins, where she flits in and out +among the broken columns and under the mouldering arches, like a +spirit of the place unduly disturbed. Sometimes she climbs up by +unseen means, till she reaches a point where it makes one dizzy to see +her; and sometimes she startles her company by the sudden bleating of +a sheep, or the wild hoot of an owl. For she can imitate the sounds of +animals for the most part with wonderful accuracy; though she can also +sing simple ballads without music, with sweetness and correctness. She +is fond of all animals and fears none. She will pass through a field +thronged with wild-looking cattle without the least hesitation; and +makes friends even with the yelping farm-dogs which come snapping and +snarling at her heels. In winter she feeds the wood-birds by flocks, +and always takes care that the horses have a handful of corn or a +carrot when she goes to see them, and that the cows are the better for +her visit by a bunch of lucerne or a fat fresh cabbage-leaf. The +home-beasts show their pleasure when they hear her fleet footstep on +the paved yard; and her favourite pony whinnies to her in a peculiar +voice as she passes his stable door. These are her friends, and their +love for her is her reward. + +In her early days the nymph was notorious for her dilapidated +attire, perplexing mother and nurse to mend, or to understand why or +how it had come about. But as her favourite hiding-place was in a +forked branch midway up an old tree in the shrubbery, or a natural +arbour which she had cut out for herself in the very heart of the +underwood, it was scarcely to be wondered at if cloth and cotton +testified to the severity of her retreats. She has still mysterious +rents in her skirts, got no one knows how; and her mother still +laments over her aptitude for rags, and wishes she could be brought to +see the beauty of unstained apparel. She is given to early rising--to +fits indeed of rising at some wild hour in the morning, for walks +before breakfast and the like innocent insanities. Sometimes she takes +it in hand to educate herself in certain stoicisms, and goes without +butter at breakfast or without breakfast altogether, if she thinks +that thereby she will grow stronger or less inclined to +self-indulgence. For drink she will never touch wine nor beer; but she +likes new milk, and is great in her capacity for water. + +The nymph is almost always of the middle-classes. It is next to +impossible indeed that she should be found in the higher ranks, where +girls are not left to themselves, and where no one lives in far-away +country places out of the reach of public opinion and beyond the range +of public overlooking. Some years ago, before the railroads and +monster hotels had made the mountain districts like Hampstead or +Richmond on a Sunday afternoon, the nymph was to be found in +great abundance down in Cumberland and Westmoreland. By the more +remote lakes, like Buttermere and Hawes Water, and in the secluded +valleys running up from the larger lakes, you would come upon square +stuccoed houses, generally abominably ugly, where the nymph was +mistress of the situation. She might be met riding about alone in a +flapping straw hat, long before hats were fashionable headgear for +women, and in a blue baize skirt for all the riding-habit thought +necessary; or she might be encountered on the wild fell sides, or on +the mountain heights, or in her boat sculling among the lonely lake +islets, or gathering water-lilies in the bays. In the desolate stretch +of moorland country to the north of Skiddaw the whole female +population a few years ago was of the nymph kind; but railroads and +the penny-post, cheap trains, fashion and fine-ladyism have penetrated +even into the heart of the wild mountains, and now the nymph there is +only a transitional development--not, as formerly, a fixed type. + +The nymph is the very reverse of a flirt. She has no inclination that +way, and looks shy and awkward at the men who pay her compliments or +attempt anything like sentimentality. But she is not superior to boys, +who are her chosen companions and favourites. A bold, brave boy, who +just overtops her in skill and daring, is her delight; but anything +over twenty is 'awfully old,' while forty and sixty are so remote that +the lines blur and blend together and have no distinction. By-and-by +the nymph becomes a staid young woman, and marries. If she goes +into a close town and has children, very often her vigorous health +gives way, and we see her in a few years nervous, emaciated, +consumptive, and with a pitiful yearning for 'home' more pathetic than +all the rest. But if she remains where she is, in the fresh pure air +of her native place, she retains her youth and strength long after the +age when ordinary women lose theirs, and her children are celebrated +as magnificent specimens of the future generation. + +We often see in country places matrons of over forty who are still +like young women, both in looks and bearing, both in mental innocence +and physical power. They have the shy and innocent look of girls; they +blush like girls; they know less evil than almost any town-bred girl +of eighteen, mothers of stalwart youths though they may be; they can +walk and laugh and take pleasure in their lives like girls; and their +daughters find them as much sisters as mothers. It is not quite the +same thing if they do not marry; for among the saddest sights of +social life is that terrible fading and withering away of comely, +healthy, vigorous young country girls, who slowly pass from nymphs, +full of grace and beauty, of happiness and power, to antiquated +virgins, soured, useless, debilitated and out of nature. Of these, +too, there are plenty in country places; but perhaps some scheme will +be some day set afoot which shall redress the overweighted balance and +bring to the service of the future some of the healthiest and +best of our women. Meanwhile the fresh, innocent, breezy nymph is a +charming study; and may the time be far distant which shall see her +tamed and civilized out of existence altogether! + + + + +_MÉSALLIANCES._ + + +The French system of parents arranging the marriage of their children +without the consent of the girl being even asked, but assumed as +granted, is not so wholly monstrous as many people in England believe. +It seems to be founded on the idea that, given a young girl who has +been kept shut up from all possibility of forming the most shadowy +attachment for any man whatsoever, and present to her as her husband a +sufficiently well-endowed and nice-looking man, with whom come +liberty, pretty dresses, balls, admiration and social standing, and +the chances are she will love him and live with him in tolerable +harmony to the end of the chapter. And this idea is by no means wholly +beside the truth, as we find it in practice. The parents, who are +better judges of character and circumstance than the daughter can +possibly be, are supposed to take care that their future son-in-law is +up to their standard, whatever that may be, and that the connexion is +not of a kind to bring discredit on their house; and on this and the +joint income, as the solid bases, they build the not very unreasonable +hypothesis that one man is as good as another for the satisfaction +of a quite untouched and virginal fancy, and that suitable external +conditions go further and last longer than passion. They trust to the +force of instinct to make all square with the affections, while they +themselves arrange for the smooth running of the social circumstances; +and they are not far out in their calculations. + +The young people of the two lonely lighthouse islands, who made love +to each other through telescopes, are good examples of the way in +which instinct simulates the impulse which calls itself love when +there are two or three instead of one to look at. For we may be quite +sure that had the lighthouse island youth been John instead of James, +fair instead of dark, garrulous instead of reticent, short and fat +instead of tall and slender, the lighthouse island girl would have +loved him all the same, and would have quite believed that this man +was the only man she ever could have loved, and that her instinctive +gravitation was her free choice. + +The French system of marriage, then, based on this accommodating +instinct, works well for women who are not strongly individual, not +inconstant by temperament, and not given to sentimentality. But, +seeing that all women are not merely negative, and that passions and +affections do sometimes assert themselves inconveniently, the system +has had the effect of making society lenient to the little follies of +married women, unless too strongly pronounced--partly because the +human heart insists on a certain amount of free-will, which fact +must be recognized--but partly, we must remember, because of the want +of the young-lady element in society. In England, where our girls are +let loose early, we have free-trade in flirting; consequently, we +think that all that sort of thing ought to be done before marriage, +and that, when once a woman has made her choice and put her neck under +the yoke, she ought to stick to her bargain and loyally fulfil her +self-imposed engagement. + +One consequence of this free-trade in flirting and this large amount +of personal liberty is that love-marriages are more frequent with us +than with the French, with whom indeed, in the higher classes, they +are next to impossible; and, unfortunately, the corollary to this is +that love-marriages are too often _mésalliances_. There is of course +no question, ethically, between virtuous vulgarity and refined vice. A +groom who smells of the stable and speaks broad Somersetshire or +racier Cumberland, but who is brave, faithful, honest, incapable of a +lie or of meanness in any form, is a better man than the best-bred +gentleman whose life is as vicious as his bearing is unexceptionable. +The most undeniable taste in dress, and the most correct +pronunciation, would scarcely reconcile us to cruelty, falsehood, or +cowardice; and yet we do not know a father who would prefer to give +his girl to the groom, rather than the gentleman, and who would think +horny-handed virtue, dressed in fustian and smelling of the stable, +the fitter husband of the two. + +If we take the same case out of our own time and circumstances, we +have no doubt as to the choice to be made. It seems to us a very +little matter that honest Charicles should tell his love to Aglaë in +the broad Doric tongue instead of in the polished Athenian accents to +which she was accustomed; that he should wear his chiton a hand's +breadth too long or a span too short; that his chlamys should be flung +across his brawny chest in a way which the young bloods of the time +thought ungraceful; or that, as he assisted at a symposium, he should +not hold the rhyton at quite the proper angle, but in a fashion at +which the refined Cleon laughed as he nudged his neighbour. Yet all +these conventional solecisms, of no account whatever now, would have +weighed heavily against poor Charicles when he went to demand Aglaë's +hand; and the balance would probably have gone down in favour of that +scampish Cleon, who was an Athenian of the Athenians, perfect in all +the graces of the age, but not to be compared to his rival in anything +that makes a man noble or respectable. We, who read only from a +distance, think that Aglaë's father made a mistake, and that the +honester man would have been the better choice of the two. + +It is only when we bring the same circumstances home to ourselves that +we realize the immense importance of the social element; and how, in +this complex life of ours, we are unable to move in a single line +independent of all it touches. Imagine a fine old county family +with a son-in-law who ate peas with his knife, said 'you was' and +'they is,' and came down to dinner in a shooting-jacket and a blue +bird's-eye tied in a wisp about his throat! He might be the possessor +of all imaginable virtues, and, if occasion required, a very hero and +a _preux chevalier_, however rough; but occasions in which a man can +be a hero or a _preux chevalier_ are rare, whereas dinner comes every +day, and the senses are never shut. The core within a conventionally +ungainly envelope may be as sound as is possible to a corrupt +humanity, but social life requires manners as well as principles; and +though eating peas with a knife is not so bad as telling falsehoods, +still we should all agree in saying, Give us truth that does not eat +peas with its knife; let us have honesty in a dress coat and +pureheartedness in a clean shirt, seeing that there is no absolute +necessity why these several things should be disunited. + +Love-marriages, made against the will of the parents before the +character is formed and while the obligations of society are still +unrealized, are generally _mésalliances_ founded on passion and fancy +only. A man and woman of mature age who know what they want may make a +_mésalliance_, but it is made with a full understanding and deliberate +choice; and, if the thing turns out badly, they can blame themselves +less for precipitancy than for wrong calculation. The man of fifty who +marries his cook knows what he most values in women. It is not manners +and it is not accomplishments; perhaps it is usefulness, perhaps +good-temper; at all events it is something that the cook has and that +the ladies of his acquaintance have not, and he is content to take the +disadvantages of his choice with its advantages. But the boy who runs +away with his mother's maid neither calculates nor sees any +disadvantages. He marries a pretty girl because her beauty has touched +his senses; or he is got hold of by an artful woman who has bamboozled +and seduced him. It is only when his passion has worn off that he +wakes to the full consequences of his mistake, and understands then +how right his parents were when they cashiered his pretty Jane so soon +as they became aware of what was going on, and sent that artful Sarah +to the right about--just a week too late. + +It is the same with girls; but in a far greater extent. If a youth's +_mésalliance_ is a millstone round his neck for life, a girl's is +simply destruction. The natural instinct with all women is to marry +above themselves; and we know on what physiological basis this +instinct stands, and what useful racial ends it serves. And the +natural instinct is as true in its social as in its physiological +expression. A woman's honour is in her husband; her status, her social +life, are determined by his; and even the few women who, having made a +bad marriage, have nerve and character enough to set themselves free +from the personal association, are never able to thoroughly regain +their maiden place. There is always something about them which +clogs and fetters them; always a kind of doubtful and depressing aura +that surrounds and influences them. If they have not strength to free +themselves, they never cease to feel the mistake they have made, until +the old sad process of degeneration is accomplished, and the +'grossness of his nature' has had strength to drag her down. After a +time, if her ladyhood has been of a superficial kind only, a woman who +has married beneath herself may ease down into her groove and be like +the man she has married; if, however, she has sufficient force to +resist outside influences she will not sink, and she will never cease +to suffer. She has sinned against herself, her class and her natural +instincts; and has done substantially a worse thing than has the boy +who married his mother's maid. Society understands this, and not +unjustly if harshly punishes the one while it lets the other go +scot-free; so that the woman who makes a _mésalliance_ suffers on +every side, and destroys her life almost as much as the woman who goes +wrong. + +All this is as evident to parents and elders as that the sun shines. +They understand the imperative needs of social life, and they know how +fleeting are the passions of youth and how they fade by time and use +and inharmonious conditions; and they feel that their first duty to +their children is to prevent a _mésalliance_ which has nothing, and +can have nothing, but passion for its basis. But novelists and poets +are against the hard dull dictates of worldly wisdom, and join in +the apotheosis of love at any cost--all for love and the world well +lost; love in a cottage, with nightingales and honeysuckles as the +chief means of paying the rent; Libussa and her ploughman; the +princess and the swineherd, &c. And the fathers who stand out against +the ruin of their girls by means of estimable men of inferior +condition and with not enough to live on, are stony-hearted and cruel, +while the daughters who take to cold poison in the back-garden, if +they cannot compass a secret honeymoon or an open flight, have all the +world's sympathy and none of its censure. The cruel parent is the +favourite whipping-boy of poetry and fiction; and yet which is likely +to be the better guide--reason or passion? experience or ignorance? +calculation or impulse? maturity which can judge or youth which can +only feel? There would be no hesitation in any other case than that of +love; but the love-instinct is generally considered to be superior to +every other consideration, and has to be obeyed as a divine voice, no +matter at what cost or consequence. + +The ideal of life, according to some, is founded on early marriages. +But men are slower in the final setting of their character than women, +and one never knows how a young fellow of twenty or so will turn out. +If he is devout now, he may be an infidel at forty; if, under home +influences, he is temperate and pure, when these are withdrawn he may +become a rake of the fastest kind. His temper, morals, business +power, ability to resist temptation, all are as yet inchoate and +undefined; nothing is sure; and the girl's fancy that makes him +perfect in proportion to his good looks, is a mere instinct determined +by chance association. + +A girl, too, has more character than she shows in her girlhood. Though +she sets sooner than men, she does not set unalterably, and marriage +and maternity bring out the depths of her nature as nothing else can. +It is only common-sense, then, to marry her to a man whose character +is already somewhat formed, rather than to one who is still fluid and +floating. + +It is all very well to talk of fighting the battle of life together, +and welding together by time. Many a man has been ruined by these +metaphors. The theory, partly true and partly pretty, is good enough +in its degree; and, indeed, so far as the welding goes, we weld +together in almost all things by time. We wear our shoe till we wear +it into shape and it ceases to pinch us; but, in the process, we go +through a vast deal of pain, and are liable to make corns which last +long after the shoe itself fits easily. We do not advocate the French +system of marrying off our girls according to our own ideas of +suitableness, and without consulting them; but we not the less think +that, of all fatal social mistakes, _mésalliances_ are the most fatal, +and, in the case of women, to be avoided and prevented at any +cost short of a broken heart or a premature death. And even death +would sometimes be better than the life-long misery, the enduring +shame and humiliation, of certain _mésalliances_. + + + + +_WEAK SISTERS._ + + +The line at which a virtue becomes a vice through excess can never be +exactly defined, being one of those uncertain conditions which each +mind must determine for itself. But there is a line, wheresoever we +may choose to set it; and it is just this fine dividing mark which +women are so apt to overrun. For women, as a rule, are nothing if not +extreme. Whether as saints or sinners, they carry a principle to its +outside limits; and of all partizans they are the most thoroughgoing, +whether it be to serve God or the devil, liberty or bigotry, Bible +Communism or Calvinistic Election. Sometimes they are just as extreme +in their absolute negation of force, and in the narrowness of the +limits within which they would confine all human expression either by +word or deed--and especially all expression of feminine life. These +are the women who carry womanly gentleness into the exaggeration of +self-abasement, and make themselves mere footstools for the stronger +creature to kick about at his pleasure; the weak sisters who think all +self-reliance unfeminine, and any originality of thought or character +an offence against the ordained inferiority of their sex. They +are the parasitic plants of the human family, living by and on the +strength of others; growths unable to stand alone, and, when deprived +of their adventitious support, falling to the ground in a ruin perhaps +worse than death. + +It is sad to see one of these weak sisters when given up to herself +after she has lived on the strength of another. As a wife, she was +probably a docile, gentle kind of Medora--at least on the outside; for +we must not confound weakness with amiability--suffering many things +because of imperfect servants and unprofitable tradesmen, maybe +because of unruly children and encroaching friends, over none of whom +she had so much moral power as enabled her to hold them in check; but +on the whole drifting through her days peacefully enough, and, though +always in difficulties, never quite aground. She had a tower of +strength in her husband, on whom she leaned for assistance in all she +undertook, whether it were to give a dose of Dalby to the child, or a +scolding to the maid, or to pronounce upon the soundness of two rival +sects each touting for her soul. While he lived she obeyed his +counsel--not always without a futile echo of discontent in her own +heart--and copied his opinions with what amount of accuracy nature had +bestowed on her; though it must be confessed more often making a +travesty than a facsimile, according to the trick of inferior +translators, and not necessarily better pleased with his opinions than +with his counsels. For your weak sister is frequently peevish, +and though unable to originate is not always ready to obey cheerfully; +cheerfulness indeed being for the most part an attribute of power. + +Still, there stood her tower of strength, and while it stood, she, the +parasite growing round it, did well enough, and flourished with a +pleasant semblance of individual life into the hollowness of which it +was no one's business to inquire. But when the tower fell, where was +the ivy? The husband taken away, what became of the wife?--he who had +been the life and she only the parasite. Abandoned to the poor +resources of her own judgment she is like one suddenly thrown into +deep water, not knowing how to swim. She has no judgment. She has been +so long accustomed to rely on the mind of another, that her will is +paralyzed for want of use. She is any one's tool, any one's echo, and +worse than that, if left to herself she is any one's victim. All she +wants is to be spared the hardship of self-reliance and to be directed +free of individual exertion. She is utterly helpless--helpless to act, +to direct, to decide; and it depends on the mere chance of +proprietorship whether her slavery shall be degradation or protection, +ruin or safety. For she will be a slave, whosoever may be her +proprietor; being the pabulum of which slaves and victims are +naturally formed. The old age of Medora is Mrs. Borradaile, who, if +her husband had lived, would have probably ended her life in an +honourable captivity and a well-directed subserviency. + +We often see this kind of helpless weakness in the daughter of a man +of overbearing will, or of a termagant mother fond of managing and +impatient of opposition. During the plastic time of her life, when +education might perhaps have developed a sufficient amount of mental +muscle, and a course of judicious moulding might have fairly set her +up, she is snubbed and suppressed till all power is crushed out of +her. She is taught the virtue of self-abnegation till she has no self +to abnegate; and the backbone of her individuality is so incessantly +broken that at last there is no backbone left in her to break. She has +become a mere human mollusc which, when it loses its native shell, +drifts helplessly at the mercy of chance currents into the maw of any +stronger creature that may fancy it for his prey. One often sees these +poor things left orphans and friendless at forty or fifty years of +age. They have lived all their lives in leading-strings, and now are +utterly unable to walk alone. They are infants in all knowledge of the +world, of business, of human life; their youth is gone, and with it +such beauty and attractiveness as they might have had, so that men who +liked them when fresh and gentle at twenty do not care to accept their +wrinkled helplessness at forty. They have been kept in and kept down, +and so have made no friends of their own; and then, when the +strong-willed father dies and the termagant mother goes to the place +where the wicked cease from troubling, the mollusc these have hitherto +protected is left defenceless and alone. If she has money, her +chances of escape from the social sharks always on the look-out for +fat morsels are very small indeed. It is well if she falls into no +worse hands than those of legitimate priests of either section, +whether enthusiastic for chasubles or crazy for missions; and if her +money is put to no baser use than supplying church embroidery for some +Brother Ignatius at home, or blankets for converted Africans in the +tropics. It might go into Agapemones, into spiritual Athenæums, into +Bond Street back-parlours, where it certainly would do no good, take +it any way one would; for, as it must go into some side-channel dug by +stronger hands than hers, the question is, into which of the +innumerable conduits offered for the conveyance of superfluous means +shall it be directed? + +This is the woman who is sure to go in for religious excess of one +kind or another, and for whom therefore, a convent with a sympathetic +director is a godsend past words to describe. She is unfit for the +life of the world outside. She has neither strength to protect +herself, nor beauty to win the loving protection of men; she cannot be +taken as a precious charge, but she will be made a pitiable victim; +and, though matins and vespers come frightfully often, surely the +narrow safety of a convent-cell is a better fate for her than the +publicity of the witness-box at the Old Bailey! As she must have a +master, her condition depends on what master she has; and the +whole line of her future is ruled according to the fact whether she is +directed or 'exploited,' and used to serve noble ends or base ones. + +As a mother, the weak sister is even more unsatisfactory than as a +spinster left to herself with funds which she can manipulate at +pleasure. She is affectionate and devoted; but of what use are +affection and devotion without guiding sense or judgment? Even in the +nursery, and while the little ones need only physical care, she is +more obstructive than helpful, never having so much self-reliance nor +readiness of wit as to dare a remedy for one of those sudden maladies, +incidental to children, which are dangerous just in proportion to the +length of time they are allowed to run unchecked. And if she should by +chance remember anything of therapeutic value, she has no power to +make her children take what they don't like to take, nor do what they +don't like to do. In the horror of an accident she is lost. If her +child were to cut an artery, she would take it up into her lap +tenderly enough, but she would never dream of stopping the flow; if it +swallowed poison, she would send for the doctor who lives ten miles +away; and if it set itself on fire, she would probably rush with it +into the street, for the chance of assistance from a friendly +passer-by. She never has her senses under serviceable command; and her +action in a moment of danger generally consists in unavailing pity or +in obstructive terror, but never in useful service nor in valuable +suggestion. + +But if useless in her nursery while her children are young, she is +even more helpless as they get older; and the family of a weak woman +grows up, unassisted by counsel or direction, just as the old Adam +wills and the natural bent inclines. Her girls may be loud and fast, +her sons idle and dissipated, but she is powerless to correct or to +influence. If her husband does not take the reins into his own hands, +or if she be a widow, the young people manage matters for themselves +under the perilous guidance of youthful passions and inexperience. And +nine times out of ten they give her but a rough corner for her own +share. They have no respect for her, and, unless more generously +compassionate than young people usually are, scarcely care to conceal +the contempt they cannot help feeling. What can she expect? If she was +not strong enough to root out the tares while still green and tender, +can she wonder at their luxuriant growth about her feet now? She, like +every one else, must learn the sad meaning of retribution, and how the +weakness which allowed evil to flourish unsubdued has to share in its +consequences and to suffer for its sin. + +Unsatisfactory in her home, the weak sister does not do much better in +society. She is there the embodiment of restriction. She can bear +nothing that has any flavour or colour in it. Topics of broad human +interest are forbidden in her presence because they are vulgar, +improper, unfeminine. She takes her stand on her womanhood, and makes +that womanhood to be something apart from humanity in the gross. +There must be no cakes and ale for others if she be virtuous; and +spades are not to be called spades when she is by to hear. She is the +limit beyond which no one must go, under pain of such displeasure as +the weak sister can show. And, weak as she is in many things, she can +compass a certain strength of displeasure; she can condemn, +persistently if not passionately. + +Nothing is more curious than the way in which the weak sister +exercises this power of condemnation, and nothing much more wide than +its scope. If incapable of yielding to certain temptations, because +incapable of feeling them, she has no pity for those who have not been +able to resist; yet, on the other hand, she cannot comprehend the +vigour of those who withstand such influences as conquer her. If she +be under the shadow of family protection, safe in the power of those +who know how to hold her in all honour and prosperity, she cannot +forgive the poor weak waif--no weaker than herself!--who has been +caught up in the outside desert of desolation, and made to subserve +evil ends. Yet, on the other hand, for the woman who is able to think +and act for herself she has a kind of superstitious horror; and she +shrinks from one who has made herself notorious, no matter what the +mode or method, as from something tainted, something unnatural and +unwomanly. She has even grave doubts respecting the lawfulness of +doing good if the manner of it gets into the papers and names are +mentioned as well as things; and though the fashion of the day favours +feminine notoriety in all directions, she holds by the instinct of her +temperament, and languidly maintains that woman is the cipher to which +man alone gives distinctive value. Griselda and Medora are the types +to her of womanly perfection; and the only strength she tolerates in +her own sex is the strength of endurance and the power of patience. +She has no doubt in her own mind that the ordained purpose of woman is +to be convenient for the high-handedness and brutality of man; and any +woman who objects to this theory, and demands a better place for +herself, is flying in the face of Providence and forfeiting one of the +distinctive privileges of her sex. For the weak sister thinks, like +some others, that it is better to be destroyed by orthodox means than +to be saved by heterodox ones; and that if good Christians uphold +moral suttee, they are only pagans and barbarians who would put out +the flames and save the victim from the burning. So far she is +respectable, in that she has a distinct theory about something; but it +is wonderfully eloquent of her state that it should only be the theory +of Griseldadom as womanly perfection, and the beauty to be found in +the moral of Cinderella sitting supinely among the ashes, and +forbidden to own even the glass-slipper that belonged to her. +Fortunately for the world, the weak sister and her theories do not +rule. Indeed we are in danger of going too much the other way in +these times, and the revolt of our women against undue slavery goes +very near to a revolt against wise submission. Still, women who are to +be the mothers of men ought to have some kind of power, if the men are +to be worth their place in the world; and if we want creatures with +backbones we must not give our strength to rearing a race of molluscs. + + + + +_PINCHING SHOES._ + + +There are two ways of dealing with pinching shoes. The one is to wear +them till you get accustomed to the pressure, and so to wear them +easy; the other is to kick them off and have done with them +altogether. The one is founded on the accommodating principle of human +nature by which it is enabled to fit itself to circumstances, the +other is the high-handed masterfulness whereby the earth is subdued +and obstacles are removed; the one is emblematic of Christian +patience, the other of Pagan power. Both are good in certain states +and neither is absolutely the best for all conditions. There are some +shoes indeed, which, do what we will, we can never wear easy. We may +keep them well fixed on our feet all our life, loyally accepting the +pressure which fate and misfortune have imposed on us; but we go lame +and hobbled in consequence, and never know what it is to make a free +step, nor to walk on our way without discomfort. Examples abound; for +among all the pilgrims toiling more or less painfully through life to +death, there is not one whose shoes do not pinch him somewhere, how +easy soever they may look and how soft soever the material of which +they may be made. Even those proverbial possessors of roomy +shoes, the traditional King and Princess, have their own little +private bedroom slippers which pinch them, undetected by the gaping +multitude who measure happiness by lengths of velvet and weight of +gold embroidery; and the envied owners of the treasure which all seek +and none find might better stand as instances of sorrow than of +happiness--examples of how badly shod poor royalty is, and how, far +more than meaner folk, it suffers from the pinching of its regal +shoes. + +The uncongeniality of a profession into which a man may have been +forced by the injudicious overruling of his friends, or by the +exigencies of family position and inherited rights, is one form of the +pinching shoe by no means rare to find. And here, again, poor royalty +comes in for a share of the grip on tender places, and the consequent +hobbling of its feet. For many an hereditary king was meant by nature +to be nothing but a plain country gentleman at the best--perhaps even +less; many, like poor 'Louis Capet,' would have gone to the end quite +happily and respectably if only they might have kicked off the +embroidered shoes of sovereignty and betaken themselves to the +highlows of the herd--if only they might have exchanged the sceptre +for the turning-lathe, the pen or the fowling-piece. 'Je déteste mon +métier de roi,' Victor Emmanuel is reported to have said to a +republican friend who sympathized with the monarch's well-known tastes +in other things beside his hatred of the kingly profession; and +history repeats this frank avowal in every page. But the purple is as +hard to be got rid of as Deianeira's robe; for the most part carrying +the skin along with it and trailed through a pool of blood in the act +of transfer--which is scarcely what royalty, oppressed with its own +greatness, and willing to rid itself of sceptre and shoes that it may +enjoy itself in list-slippers after a more bourgeoise fashion, would +find in accordance with its wishes. + +Lower down in the social scale we find the same kind of misfit between +nature and position as a very frequent occurrence--pinching shoes, +productive of innumerable corns and tender places, being many where +the feet represent the temperament and the shoes are the profession. +How often we see a natural 'heavy' securely swathed in cassock and +bands, and set up in the pulpit of the family church, simply because +the tithes were large and the advowson was part of the family +inheritance. But that stiff rectorial shoe of his will never wear +easy. The man's secret soul goes out to the parade-ground and the +mess-table. The glitter and jingle and theatrical display of a +soldier's life seem to him the finest things in the whole round of +professions, and the quiet uneventful life of a village pastor is of +all the most abhorrent. He wants to act, not to teach. Yet there he +is, penned in beyond all power of breaking loose on this side the +grave; bound to drone out muddled sermons half an hour long and +eminently good for sleeping draughts, instead of shouting terse +and stirring words of command which set the blood on fire to hear; +bound to rout the shadowy enemy of souls with weapons he can neither +feel nor use, instead of prancing off at the head of his men, waving +his drawn sword above his head in a whirlwind of excitement and +martial glory, to rout the tangible enemies of his country's flag. He +loves his wife and takes a mild parsonic pleasure in his roses; he +energizes his schools and beats up recruits for his parish penny +readings; he lends his pulpit to missionary delegates and takes the +chair at the meeting for the conversion of Jews; he does his duty, +poor man, so far as he knows how and so far as nature gave him the +power; but his feet are in pinching shoes all his life long, and no +amount of walking on the clerical highway can ever make them pleasant +wearing. Or he may have a passionate love for the sea, and be mewed up +in a lawyer's musty office where his large limbs have not half enough +space for their natural activity; where he is perched for twelve hours +out of the twenty-four on a high stool against a desk instead of +climbing cat-like up the ropes; and where he is set to engross a +longwinded deed of conveyance, or to make a fair copy of a bill of +costs, instead of bearing a hand in a gale and saving his ship by +pluck and quickness. He could save a ship better than he can engross a +deed; while, as for law, he cannot get as much of that into his heavy +brain as would enable him to advise a client on the simplest case of +assault; but he knows all the differences of rig, and the whole +code of signals, and can tell you to a nicety about the flags of all +nations, and the name and position of every spar and stay and sheet, +and when to reef and when to set sail, with any other nautical +information to be had from books and a chance cruise as far as the +Nore. That pen behind his ear never ceases to gall and fret; his shoe +never ceases to pinch; and to the last day of his life the high stool +in the lawyer's office will be a place of penance and the sailor's +quarter-deck the lost heaven of his ambition. + +No doubt, by the time the soldier wrongly labelled as a parson or the +sailor painfully working the legal treadmill, comes to the end of his +career, the old shoe which has pinched him so long will be worn +comparatively easy. The gradual decay of manly vigour, and the slow +but sure destruction of strong desires, reduce one's feet at last to +masses of accommodating pulp; but what suffering we go through before +this result can be attained!--what years of fruitless yearning, of +fierce despair, of pathetic self-suppression, of jarring discord +between work and fitness, pound all the life out of us before our +bones become like wax and pinching shoes are transformed to +easy-fitting slippers! For itself alone, not counting the beyond to +which the hope clings, it would scarcely seem that such a life were +worth the living. + +Another pinching shoe is to be found in climate and locality. A man +hungering for the busy life of the city has to vegetate in the +rural districts, where the days drop one after the other like leaden +bullets, and time is only marked by an accession of dulness. Another, +thirsting for the repose of the country, has to jostle daily through +Cheapside. To one who thinks Canadian salmon-fishing the supreme of +earthly happiness, fate gives the chance of chasing butterflies in +Brazil; to another who holds 'the common objects of the seashore' of +more account than silver and gold, an adverse fortune assigns a +station in the middle of a plain as arid as if the world had been made +without water; and a third, who cares for nothing but the free +breathing of the open moors or the rugged beauty of the barren fells, +is dropped down into the heart of a narrow valley where he cannot see +the sun for the trees. At first this matter of locality seems to be +but a very small grip on the foot, not worth a second thought; but it +is one of a certain cumulative power impossible to describe, though +keen enough to him who suffers; and the pinching shoe of uncongenial +place is quite as hard to bear as that of uncongenial work. + +Again, a man to whom intellectual companionship means more than it +does to many is thrown into a neighbourhood where he cannot hope to +meet with comprehension, still less with sympathy. He is a +Freethinker, and the neighbourhood goes in for the strictest Methodism +or the highest ultra-Ritualism; he is a Radical, and he is in the very +focus of county Toryism, where the doctrine of equality and the +rights of man is just so much seditious blasphemy, while the British +Constitution is held as a direct emanation from divine wisdom second +only to the Bible; or he is a Tory to the backbone--and his backbone +is a pretty stiff one--and he is in the midst of that blatant kind of +Radicalism which thinks gentlehood a remnant of the dark ages, and +confounds good breeding with servility, and loyalty to the Crown with +oppression of the people. Surrounded by his kind, he is as much alone +as if in the middle of a desert. An Englishman among Englishmen, he +has no more mental companionship than if he were in a foreign country +where he and his neighbour spoke different tongues, and each had a set +of signs with not two agreeing. And this kind of solitude makes a +pinching shoe to many minds; though to some of the more self-centred +or defying kind it is bearable enough--perhaps even giving a sense of +roominess which closer communion would destroy. + +Of course one of the worst of our pinching shoes is matrimony, when +marriage means bondage and not union. The mismated wife or husband +never leaves off, willingly or unwillingly, squeezing the tender +places; and the more the pressure is objected to the worse the pain +becomes. And nothing can relieve it. A country gentleman, hating the +dust and noise of London, with all his interest in his county position +and all his pleasure in his place, and a wife whose love lies in +Queen's balls and opera-boxes, and to whom the country is simply a +slice out of Siberia wherever it may be; a hearty hospitable man, +liking to see his table well filled, and a wife with a weak digestion, +irritable nerves and a morbid horror of society; a pushing and +ambitious man, with a loud voice and an imposing presence, and a +shrinking fireside woman, who asks only to glide unnoticed through the +crowd and to creep noiselessly from her home to her grave--are not all +these shod with pinching shoes, which, do what they will, go on +pinching to the end, and which nothing short of death or the Sir James +Hannen of the time can remove? The pinching shoe of matrimony pinches +both sides equally--excepting indeed, one of the two is specially +phlegmatic or pachydermatous, and then the grip is harmless; but, as a +rule, the ring-fence of marriage doubles all conditions, and when A. +walks hobbled, B. falls lame, and both suffer from the same misfit. +However, the only thing to do is to bear and wear till the +upper-leather yields or till the foot takes the required shape; but +there is an eternity of pain to be gone through before either of these +desirable ends comes about; and the instinct which dreads pain, and +questions its necessity, is by no means a false one. For all that, we +must wear our pinching shoes of matrimony till death or the Divorce +Court pulls them from our feet; which points to the need of being more +careful than we usually are about the fit beforehand. + +Poverty has a whole rack full of pinching shoes very hard to get +accustomed to, and as bad to dance in lightly as were the fiery +slippers of the naughty little girl in the German fairy-tale. Given a +large heart, generous instincts and an empty purse, and we have the +conditions of a real tragedy, both individual and social. For poverty +does not mean only that elemental want of food and clothing which we +generally associate with its name. Poverty may have two thousand a +year as well as only a mouldy crust and three shillings a week from +the parish; and poverty cursing its sore feet in a brougham is quite +as common as poverty, full of corns and callosities, blaspheming +behind a costermonger's barrow. The shoe may pinch horribly, though +there is no question of hunger or the 'twopenny rope;' for it is all a +matter of relative degree, and the means wherewith to meet wants. But +as poverty is not one of those fixed conditions of human life which no +human power can remove, we have not perhaps quite so much sympathy +with its grips and pinches as in other things less remediable. For +while there is work still undone in the world, there is gain still to +be had. The man whose energies stagnate now in a dry channel can, if +he will, turn them into one more fertile; and if he is making but a +poor business out of meal, it is his own fault if he does not try to +make a better out of malt. Where the shoe pinches hardest is in places +which we cannot protect and with a grip which we cannot prevent; but +we cannot say this of poverty as a necessary and inalienable +condition, and sympathy is so much waste when circumstances can be +changed by energy or will. + + + + +_SUPERIOR BEINGS._ + + +Every now and then one comes across the path of a Superior Being--a +being who seems to imagine itself made out of a different kind of clay +from that which forms the coarser ruck of humanity, and whose presence +crushes us with a sense of our own inferiority, exasperating or +humiliating, according to the amount of natural pride bestowed upon +us. The superior being is of either sex and of all denominations; and +its superiority comes from many causes--being sometimes due to a wider +grasp of intellect, sometimes to a loftier standard of morals, +sometimes to better birth or a longer purse, and very often to the +simple conceit of itself which simulates superiority and believes in +its own apery. The chief characteristic of the superior being is that +exalted pity for inferiority which springs from the consciousness of +excellence. In fact, one of the main elements of superiority consists +in this sublime consciousness of private exaltation, and the immense +interval that separates it from the grosser condition it surveys. +Rivalry is essentially angry and contentious, but confessed +superiority can afford to be serene and compassionate. The little +people who live in that meagre sphere of theirs, mental and social, +with which not one point of its own extended circle comes in contact, +are deserving of all pity and are below anything like active +displeasure. That they should be content with such a meagre sphere +seems inconceivable to the superior being, as it contemplates its own +enlarged horizon with the complacency proper to a dweller in vastness. +Or it may be that its own world is narrow; and its superiority will +then be that it is high, safe, exclusive, while its pity will flow +down for those poor wayfarers who wander afield in broad latitudes, +and know nothing of the pleasure found in reserved places. In any case +the region in which a superior being dwells is better than the region +in which any other person dwells. + +Take a superior being who has made up a private account with truth, +and who has, in his own mind at least, unlocked the gate of the great +mysteries of life, and got to the back of that eternal Why? for ever +confronting us. It does not in the least degree signify how the key is +labelled. It may be High Church or Low Church, Swedenborgianism or +Positivism. The name has nothing to do with the thing. It is the +contented certainty of having unlocked that great gate at which others +are hammering in vain which confers the superiority, and how the thing +has been done does not affect the result. Neither does it disturb the +equanimity of the superior being when he meets with opposing superior +beings who have also made up their private accounts with truth, +but in quite another handwriting and with a different sum-total at the +bottom of the page; who have also unlocked the gate of the great +mysteries, but with a key of contradictory wards, while the gate +itself is of another order of architecture altogether. But then +nothing ever does disturb the equanimity of the superior being; for, +as he is above all rivalry, so is he beyond all teaching. The meeting +of two superior beings of hostile creed is like the meeting of the two +blind kings in the story, each claiming the crown for his own and both +ignorant of the very existence of a rival. It may be that the superior +being has soared away into the cold region of spiritual negation, +whence he regards the praying and praising multitudes who go to church +and believe in Providence as grown people regard children who still +believe in ghosts and fairies. Or it may be that he has plunged into +the phosphorescent atmosphere of mysticism and an all-pervading +superstition; and then all who hold by scientific law, and who think +the test of common sense not absolutely valueless, are Sadducees who +know nothing of the glorious liberty of the light, but who prefer to +live in darkness and to make themselves the agents of the great Lord +of Lies. + +Sometimes the superior being goes in for the doctrine of love and +impulse, as against reason or experience, holding the physiologist and +political economist as creatures absolutely devoid of feeling; and +sometimes his superiority is shown in the application of the +hardest material laws to the most subtle and delicate manifestations +of the mind. But on which side soever he ranks himself--as a +spiritualist to whom reason and matter are stumbling-blocks and +accursed, or as a materialist denying the existence of spiritual +influences at all--he is equally secure of his own superiority and +serene in his own conceit. That there should be two sides to any +question never seems to strike him; and that a man of another creed +should have as much right as himself to a hearing and consideration is +the one hard saying impossible for him to receive. With a light and +airy manner of playful contempt--sometimes with a heavy and Johnsonian +scorn that keeps no terms with an opponent--the superior being meets +all your arguments or batters down all your objections; sometimes, +indeed, he will not condescend even so far as this, but when you +express your adverse opinion just lifts up his eyebrows with a +good-humoured kind of surprise at your mental state, but lets you see +that he thinks you too hopeless, and himself too superior, to waste +powder and shot upon you. It is of the nature of things that there +should be moles and that there should be eagles; so much the worse for +the moles, who must be content to remain blind, not seeing things +patent to the nobler vision. + +The superior being is sometimes a person who is above all the passions +and weaknesses of ordinary men; a philosopher, or an etherealized +woman dwelling on serene Olympian heights which no clouds obscure +and where no earth-fogs rise. The passions which shake the human soul, +as tempests shake the forest trees, and warp men's lives according to +the run of their own lines, are unknown to these Olympian personages +who cannot understand their power. They look on these tempestuous +souls with a curious analytical gaze, speculating on the geography of +their Gethsemane, and wondering why they cannot keep as calm and quiet +as they themselves are. They sit in scornful judgment on the +mysterious impulses regulating human nature--regulating and +disturbing--and think how perfect all things would be if only passions +and instincts were cut out of the great plan, and men and women were +left to the dominion of pure reason. But they do not take into account +the law of constitutional necessity, and they are utterly unable to +strike a balance between the good and evil wrought both by the +tempests of souls and by those of nature. They only know that storms +are inconvenient, and that for themselves they have no need of such +convulsions to clear off stagnant humours; nor are they made of +elements which kindle and explode at the contact of such or such +materials. And if they know nothing of all this, why then should +others? If they can sit on Olympian heights serene above all passion, +why should not the whole world sit with them, and fogs and fires, +earthquakes and deluges, be conditions unknown? + +When this kind of superior being is a woman, there is something pretty +in the sublime assumption of her supremacy and the sweeping range +of her condemnation. Sheltered from temptation and secure from danger, +she looks out on life from the serene heights of her safe place, and +wonders how men can fail and women fall before the power of trials of +which she knows only the name. Her circulation is languid and her +temperament phlegmatic; and the burning desire of life which sends the +strong into danger, perhaps into sin, is as much unknown to her as is +the fever of the tropics to a Laplander crouching in his snow-hut. But +she judges none the less positively because of her ignorance; and, as +she looks into your quivering face with her untroubled eyes, lets you +see plainly enough how she despises all the human frailties under +which you may have tripped and stumbled. Sometimes she rebukes you +loftily. Your soul is sore with the consciousness of your sin, your +heart is weak with the pain of life; but the superior being tells you +that repentance cannot undo the evil that has been done, and that to +feel pain is weak. + +The superiority which some women assume over men is very odd. It is +like the grave rebuke of a child, not knowing what it is that it +rebukes. When women take up their parable and censure men for the wild +or evil things they do, not understanding how or why it has come about +that they have done them, and knowing as little of the inner causes as +of the outer, they are in the position of superior beings talking +unmitigated rubbish. To be sure, it is very sweet and innocent +rubbish, and has a lofty air about it that redeems what else +would be mere presumption; but there is no more practical worth in +what they say than there is in the child's rebuke when its doll will +not stand upright on sawdust legs, nor eat a crumb of cake with waxen +lips. This is one reason why women of the order of superior beings +have so little influence over men; they judge without knowledge and +condemn without insight. If they could thoroughly fathom man's nature, +so as to understand his difficulties, they would then have moral power +if their aims were higher than his, their principles more lofty, their +practice more pure. As it is, they have next to none; and the very men +who seem to yield most go only so far as to conceal what the superior +being disapproves of; they do not change because of her greater weight +of doctrine. + +Men show themselves as superior beings to women on another +count--intellectually, rather than morally. While women rebuke men for +their sins, men snub women for their follies; the one wields the +spiritual, the other the intellectual, weapon of castigation, and both +hold themselves superior, beyond all possibility of rivalry, according +to the chance of sex. The masculine view of a subject always imposes +itself on women as something unattainable by the feminine mind. Nine +times out of ten it brings them to a due sense of their own +inferiority, save in the case of the superior being, to whom of course +the masculine view counts for nothing against her own. But even when +women do not accept a man's opinions, they instinctively +recognize his greater value, his greater breadth and strength. Perhaps +they cry out against his hardness, if he is a political economist and +they are emotional; or against his lower morality if he goes in for +universal charity and philosophical latitudinarianism, and they are +enthusiasts with a clearly-defined faith and a belief in its +infallibility. These are wide tracts of difference between the two +minds, not to be settled by the _ipse dixit_ of even a superior being; +but in general the superiority of the man makes itself more felt than +the superiority of the woman. While one preaches, the other ridicules; +and snubbing does more than condemnation. + + + + +_FEMININE AMENITIES._ + + +A man's foes are those of his own household, and the keenest enemies +of women are women themselves. No one can inflict such humiliation on +a woman as can a woman when she chooses; for if the art of high-handed +snubbing belongs to men, that of subtle wounding is peculiarly +feminine, and is practised by the best-bred of the sex. Women are +always more or less antagonistic to each other. They are gregarious in +fashions and emulative in follies, but they cannot combine; they never +support their weak sisters; they shrink from those who are stronger +than the average; and if they would speak the truth boldly, they would +confess to a radical contempt for each other's intellect--which +perhaps is the real reason why the sect of the 'emancipated' commands +so small a following. + +Half a dozen ordinary men advocating 'emancipation' doctrines would do +more towards leavening the whole bulk of womankind than any number of +first-class women. Where these do stand by each other it is from +instinctive or personal affection rather than from class solidarity. +And this is one of the most striking distinctions of sex, and one +cause, among others, why men have the upper hand, and why they are +able to keep it. Certainly there are reasons, sufficiently good, why +women do not more readily coalesce; and one is the immense difference +between the two extremes--the silly being too silly to appreciate the +wise, and the weak too weak to bear the armour of the strong. There is +more difference between outsiders among women than there is among men; +the feminine characteristic of exaggeration making a gap which the +medium or average man fills. The ways of women with each other more +than all else show the great difference between their _morale_ and +that of men. They flatter and coax as men could not do, but they are +also more rude to each other than any man would be to his fellow. It +is amazing to see the things they can do and will bear--things which +no man would dream of standing and which no man would dare to attempt. +This is because they are not taught to respect each other, and because +they have no fear of consequences. If one woman is insulted by +another, she cannot demand satisfaction nor knock the offender down; +and it is unladylike to swear and call names. She must bear what she +can repay only in kind; but, to do her justice, she repays in a manner +undeniably effective and to the point. + +There is nothing very pronounced about the feminine modes of +aggression and retaliation; and yet each is eloquent and sufficient +for its purpose. It may be only a stare, a shrug, a toss of the +head; but women can throw an intensity of disdain into the simplest +gesture which answers the end perfectly. The unabashed serenity and +unflinching constancy with which one woman can stare down another is +in itself an art that requires a certain amount of natural genius, as +well as careful cultivation. She puts up her eyeglass--not being +shortsighted--and surveys the enemy standing two feet from her, with a +sublime contempt for her whole condition, or with a still more sublime +ignoring of her sentient existence, that no words could give. If the +enemy be sensitive and unused to the kind of thing, she is absolutely +crushed, destroyed for the time, and reduced to the most pitiable +state of self-abasement. If she be of a tougher fibre, and has had +some experience of feminine warfare, she returns the stare with a +corresponding amount of contempt or of obliviousness; and from that +moment a contest is begun which never ceases and which continually +gains in bitterness. The stare is the weapon of offence most in use +among women, and is specially favoured by the experienced against the +younger and less seasoned. It is one of the instinctive arms native to +the sex; and we have only to watch the introduction of two girls to +each other to see this, and to learn how even in youth is begun the +exercise which time and use raise to such deadly perfection. + +In the conversations of women with each other we again meet with +examples of their peculiar amenities to their own sex. They never +refrain from showing how much they are bored; they contradict +flatly, without the flimsiest veil of apology to hide their rudeness; +and they interrupt ruthlessly, whatever the subject in hand may be. +One lady was giving another a minute account of how the bride looked +yesterday when she was married to Mr. A., of somewhat formidable +boudoir repute, with whom her listener had had sundry tender passages +which made the mention of his marriage a notoriously sore subject. +'Ah! I see _you_ have taken that old silk which Madame Josephine +wanted to palm off on me last year,' said the tortured listener +brusquely breaking into the narrative without a lead of any kind. And +the speaker was silenced. In this case it was the interchange of +doubtful courtesies, wherein neither deserved pity; but to make a +disparaging remark about a gown, in revenge for turning the knife in a +wound, was a thoroughly feminine manner of retaliation, and one that +would not have touched a man. Such shafts fall blunted against the +rugged skin of the coarser creature; and the date or pattern of a bit +of cloth would not have told much against the loss of a lover. But as +most women passionately care for dress, their toilet is one of their +most vulnerable parts. Ashamed to be unfashionable, they tolerate +anything in each other rather than shabbiness or eccentricity, even +when picturesque; hence a sarcastic allusion to the age of a few yards +of silk as a set-off against a grossly cruel stab was a return wound +of considerable depth cleverly given. + +The introduction of the womankind belonging to a favourite male +acquaintance of somewhat lower social condition affords a splendid +opportunity for the display of feminine amenity. The presentation +cannot be refused, yet it is resented as an intrusion. 'Another +daughter, Mr. C.! You must have a dozen daughters surely,' a peeress +said disdainfully to a commoner whom personally she liked, but whose +family she did not want to know. The poor man had but two; and this +was the introduction of the second. + +Very painful to a high-spirited gentlewoman must be the way in which a +superior creature of this kind receives her, if not of the same set as +herself. The husband of the inferior creature may be adored, as men +are adored by fashionable women who love only themselves, and care +only for their own pleasures. Artist, man of letters, _beau sabreur_, +he is the passing idol, the temporary toy, of a certain circle; and +his wife has to be tolerated for his sake, and because she is a lady +and fit to be presented, though an outsider. So they patronize her +till the poor woman's blood is on fire; or they snub her till she has +no moral consistency left in her, and is reduced to a mere mass of +pulp. They keep her in another room while they talk to her husband +with their other intimates; or they admit her into their circle, where +she is made to feel like a Gentile among the faithful, for either they +leave her unnoticed altogether or else speak to her on subjects quite +apart from the general conversation, as if she were incapable of +understanding them on their own ground. They ask her to dinner without +her husband, and take care that there is no one to meet her whom she +would like to see; but they ask him when they are at their grandest, +and express their deep regret that his wife (uninvited) cannot +accompany him. They know every turn and twist that can humiliate her +if she has pretensions which they choose to demolish. They praise her +toilet for its good taste in simplicity, when she thinks she is one of +the finest on an occasion on which no one can be too fine. They tell +her that pattern of hers is perfect, and made just like the dear +duchess's famous dress last season, when she believes that she has +Madame Josephine's last, freshly imported from Paris. They celebrate +her dinner as the very perfection of a refined family dinner without +parade or cost, though it has all been had from the crack +confectioner's, and though the bill for the entertainment will cause +many a day of family pinching. These are the things which women say to +one another when they wish to pain and humiliate; things which pain +and humiliate some more than would a positive disgrace. For some women +are distressingly sensitive about these little matters. Their lives +are made up of trifles, and a failure in a trifle is a failure in +their object of life. + +Women can do each other no end of despite in a small way in society, +not to speak of mischief of a graver kind. A hostess who has a grudge +against one of her more famous lady-guests can always ensure her +a disappointing evening under cover of doing her supreme honour and +paying her extra attention. If she sees the enemy engaged in a +pleasant conversation with one of the male stars, down she swoops, and +in the sweetest manner possible carries her off to another part of the +room, to introduce her to some school-girl who can only say yes or no +in the wrong places--'who is dying for the honour of talking to you, +my dear;' or to some unfledged stripling who blushes and grows hot and +cannot stammer out two consecutive sentences, but who is presented as +a rising genius and to be treated with the consideration due to his +future. As her persecution is done under the guise of extra +friendliness, the poor victim cannot cry out, nor yet resist; but she +knows that whenever she goes to Mrs. So and So's she will be seated +next the stupidest man at table, and prevented from talking to any one +she likes in the evening; and that every visit to that lady is made in +some occult manner unpleasant to her. And yet what has she to complain +of? She cannot complain in that her hostess trusts to her for help in +the success of her entertainment, and moves her about the room as a +perambulating attraction which she has to dispense fairly among her +guests, lest some should be jealous of the others. She may know that +the meaning is to annoy; but who can act on meaning as against manner? +How crooked soever the first may be, if the last is straight the case +falls to the ground, and there is no room for remonstrance. + +Often women flirt as much to annoy other women as to attract men +or amuse themselves. If a wife has crossed swords with a friend, and +the husband is in any way endurable, let her look out for retaliation. +The woman she has offended will take her revenge by flirting more or +less openly with the husband, all the while loading the enemy with +flattery if she be afraid of her, or snubbing her without much +disguise if she feel herself the stronger. The wife cannot help +herself, unless things go too far for public patience. A jealous woman +without proof is the butt of her society, and brings the whole world +of women like a nest of wasps about her ears. If wise, she will ignore +what she cannot laugh at; if sensitive, she will fret; if vindictive, +she will repay. Nine times out of ten she does the last, and, may be, +with interest; and so goes on the duel, though all the time the +fighters appear to be intimate friends and on the best possible terms +together. + +But the range of these feminine amenities is not confined to women; it +includes men as well; and women continually take advantage of their +position to insult the stronger sex by saying to them things which can +be neither answered nor resented. A woman can with the quietest face +and the gentlest voice imaginable insinuate that you have just cheated +at cards; she can give you the lie direct as coolly as if she were +correcting a misprint; and you cannot defend yourself. To brawl with +her would be unpardonable; to contradict her is useless; and the sense +of society does not allow you to show her any active displeasure. +In this instance the weaker creature is the stronger, and the more +defenceless is the safer. You have only the rather questionable +consolation of knowing that you are not singular in your discomfiture, +and that when she has made an end of you she will probably have a turn +with your betters, and make them too, dance to her piping, whether +they like the tune or not. At all events, if she humiliates you she +humiliates her sisters still more; and with the knowledge that, hardly +handled as you have been, others are yet more severely dealt with, you +must learn to be content, and to practise as much of that grim kind of +patience, which suffers keenly and bears silently, as your nature will +permit. + + + + +_GRIM FEMALES._ + + +Almost all histories and mythologies embody the idea of a race of grim +females. Whether as fabulous and complex monsters, like the Sphinx and +the Harpies, or in the more human forms of the Fates and the Furies, +unsexed women have been universally recognized as forming part of the +system of nature and to be accepted among the stranger manifestations +of human life. Yet it is hard to understand why they should exist at +all. As moral 'sports,' they are so far interesting to the +psychologists; but, as women with definite duties and fixed functions, +nothing can be less admirable. They are even worse than effeminate +men--which is saying everything. + +The grim female must be carefully distinguished from the masculine +woman; for they are by no means essentially the same, though the types +may run into each other, and sometimes do. But the masculine woman, if +not grim but only Amazonian, has often much that is fine and beautiful +in her, as we see in her great prototype Pallas Athene; but the grim +female _pur sang_ is never noble, never beautiful; and the only +meaning of her existence--the only mission she seems sent into the +world to fulfil--is that of serving as a warning to the young what to +avoid. + +The grim female is not necessarily an old maid, as would appear likely +at first sight. We find her of all conditions indifferently--as maid, +wife, widow, as mother and childless alike--and we do not find that +her condition in any way affects her character. If born grim, she +remains grim to the end; and neither marriage nor motherhood modifies +her. The grim female of novelists is generally an old maid; but she is +a caricature, painted in the broadest lines and copied from the +outsides of things. She is emphatically an odd woman; odd in her +dress, her mode, her state. She wears a flapping cap, skimpy skirts +and rusty brown mittens on her bony hands. She has a passionate +aversion against men and matrimony; and she lives queerly behind a +barricaded house-door, with a small slavey, or an elderly female +afflicted with deafness, to do her work and bear the brunt of her +temper. But she is always odd, unmarried, unfashionable and unlike +everybody else, and could never be mistaken for an ordinary woman from +the first phrase which stamps her personality on the page to the last +paragraph of her fictitious existence. + +Now the grim female of real life may be one of the most conventional +of her sex, and in fact, she generally is one of the most conventional +of her sex. She is one who rules her household with a rod of iron +carefully wrought after the pattern of her neighbours' rods, and to +whom a dish set awry, or the second-best china instead of the best, +counts for as great a moral delinquency in her servants as a breach of +all the Ten Commandments together. She is a woman who regards being +out of the fashion, or being foremost in the fashion, as equally +reprehensible, and to whom dress is among the most important matters +of life. Wherefore she is notorious for a certain grim grandeur of +style, as one who respects herself by her clothes, and is known among +other women as possessing handsome lace and costly velvet in +profusion. Are not lace and velvet _de rigueur_ for women of +condition? and what is the grim female but the embodiment of the +'rigour of the game' in all matters? Therefore she clothes herself +sumptuously, without elegance or taste; and would as soon be seen +abroad in her dressing-gown and slippers as without her characteristic +heavy velvet or rustling silk. But the artist's little wife, in her +fresh muslin and nice admixture of colours, sails round her for grace +and beauty at about one-twentieth part of what the grim female's +stately ugliness has cost. + +One characteristic of the grim female is her want of womanly passion +for children. She may have so much maternal instinct, perverted, as to +be on friendly terms with a dog or two, a cat, or may be a cockatoo; +but she has no real affection for children, no comprehension of +child-nature, and the 'sublime nonsense' of the nursery is a thing +unknown to her from first to last. If she have children of her +own, she treats them in a hard wooden way that has nothing of the +ideal mother about it. She generally sees that they are properly cared +for, because she is a disciplinarian; but, though she is inexorable on +the score of cold baths and 'no trash,' she never condescends to the +weakness of love. If her little ones are sick, they are set aside and +dosed until they are well; if they are naughty, they are punished; but +they never know those moments of tender indulgence which help them +over a period of indisposition not severe enough for actual doctoring, +yet throwing them out of gear and inducing a spell of what ignorance +calls naughtiness. Rhadamanthus was a weakling compared to the grim +female in the nursery; and what she is in her nursery she continues to +be in the schoolroom, and the drawing-room to follow. Her children are +always causes of annoyance to the grim female, and the first stirrings +of individuality, the first half-unconscious trials of their young +strength, are offences she cannot away with. Children and inferiors +are they in her eyes, even when grown up and married; and she exacts +from them the humility and deference of their lower condition. Hence +she is one to whom the present generation is undeniably worse than the +past; one who groans over the follies and shortcomings of the times +and who thinks that good conduct died out with her own youth, and that +it is not likely, by the look of things, to be restored. In fact, +youth itself is the root and basis of offence; and if she coerces +children, she tyrannizes over girls and snubs young men, with +inexorable impartiality. + +The grim female is not necessarily a strong-minded woman, nor a +learned woman, like those who wear spectacles, go to scientific +meetings and are great in the classics and the 'ologies. She may be of +the emancipated class; it all depends on chance; and a grim female, +when of the emancipated, is a very formidable person indeed. But she +is not necessarily one of these. On the contrary, part of her very +grimness comes from her intense conservatism and uncompromising +conventionality. Nothing is so abhorrent to her as innovation or +novelty in any shape. She does not hold with any one out of the +narrowest groove of respectable belief, in what direction soever the +diverging line may go. A Romanist or a Baptist, a Jew or an infidel, +it is all one to her; each is equally dreadful to her, and each is +eternally foredoomed. She is of the orthodox Church without fal-lals; +as far removed from Ritualism as she is from ranting, and demanding +for herself that infallibity of judgment and absolute possession of +the truth which she denies to the Pope and all his Cardinals. Beware +how you broach new doctrines in her presence. She has been known +before now to abjure her nearest relations for no greater moral lapse +than a weak belief in globules; while, as for anything like graver +aberrations, say on the ape theory or on the plurality of races, on +development in religions or on a republican form of government, +she has no toleration whatever. If the Smithfield fires existed at the +present day, the grim female would be the first to light the faggots. +It is all the same if she belongs to any Dissenting persuasion; part +of her grimness coming from her intolerance, and her own beliefs being +simply the springboard on which she stands. + +Many causes produce the grim female. It may be that she is grim from +social pride as well as from natural hardness. If she has been used to +live with people whom, rightly or wrongly, she considers her +inferiors, she will probably queen it over them in a very +unmistakeable manner. The prelatic blood is renowned for this sort of +thing; and a bishop's daughter, or an archbishop's grand-daughter, or +Mrs. Proudie, prelatic by marriage only, if of the grim class, is one +of the grimmest of her class. The halo of sanctity round the mitre and +the crozier will be greater in her eyes than even the glitter of the +strawberry leaves; and she holds herself consecrated by her birth or +marriage to the understanding of every moral question, and specially +to the final settlement of every tough theological position. Or she +may be grim because of her isolation and meagre intercourse with the +world at large; such as she is found in the remoter districts. This +kind comes into the exceptional or novelist's class, and is often more +masculine than grim. These are the women who hunt and fish and shoot +like men, and who may be found in all weathers wandering alone +about the mountains in short petticoats and spatterdashes--women who +affect to be essentially mannish in person, habits and attire, and who +may be quite jolly easy-going fellows in their own way, or else grim +and trenchant, as nature or the fit takes them. This is a kind not at +all uncommon in country places among the higher class of resident +ladies--ladies who are so highly placed locally that they can afford +to disregard public opinion, and who are so independent by disposition +that they naturally go off to the manly side, and make themselves bad +imitations, as the best they can do. + +The grim female tries her strength with all newcomers. She is like one +of the giants or black knights of old romance, who lived in castles or +caves, whence they pounced on all passers-by, and either wrung their +necks if they conquered or retreated howling if discomfited. This is +what the grim female does in her degree. She dashes on all who are +presented to her, and has a passage of arms as the first act of the +new drama. If her opponents yield out of timidity or good-breeding, or +perhaps from not understanding the warlike nature of the encounter, +she puts her foot on them forthwith, and ignominiously crushes them; +if they defy her, and give her back blow for blow, ten to one she cuts +them and becomes their enemy for ever after. For she has not breadth +enough to be magnanimous, and the one thing she never forgives is +successful opposition. Very grim is she in the presence of human +weakness, moral and physical. Woe to that unhappy maid of hers +who has slipped on the narrow path of prudence! She will be turned out +to perish with no more compunction than if she were a black-beetle to +be swept out of the way. + +As a nurse the grim female is precise, punctual, obedient to orders, +but inexorable. She would give the patient a fit of nervous hysterics +which would throw him back for a week, rather than allow him five +minutes' grace in the matter of a painful operation or a nauseous +draught. Without variableness or weakness herself, she cannot endure +it in others, and whosoever comes under her hand must be content to +remain in shape, and to keep himself well braced up to the utmost +rigidity of duty. If she had to lose an arm or a leg, she would go to +her trouble like a Trojan; and why not others? She would merely +tighten her lips and hold her breath, and then would sit down to let +herself be hacked and mangled without a groan or a word. To judge by +the notice given of her in her sister's life, Emily Brontë was of the +grim class, and about the grimmest for her age and state that could +well be found. Had she lived, and lived unsoftened, she would have +been one unbroken mass of iron and granite, without a soft spot +anywhere. Her very love was fiercer than other women's hate; her +strength was more terrible than a man's anger; her passions were as +fiery as furnace flames. Of all the examples we could cite, she seems +about the fittest for our model. + +A grim female has no mercy. She may be just, but if so, it is in a +hard uncompromizing way that makes her justice worse than others' +partiality. For justice can be sympathetic, even if unwavering; and +the grim female is never sympathetic, how painful soever the work on +hand and the sentence to be executed. Neither is she gay; for she is +not plastic enough to be either one or the other. She is run into an +iron mould, where her nature is compressed as in a vice; and she +allows of no expansion, no lipping over, no bursting of bonds anyhow. + +What would become of us if all our women were like her? Without any of +the feminine little weaknesses at which we have our laugh yet which we +do not wholly dislike--without any of the pretty coaxing ways which we +know warp our better judgment and take us out of the strict course; +and yet how pleasant that warping process is!--without any even of the +transient petulances which give so much light and shade to a woman's +character, the grim female stands like an old-world Gorgon, turning +living flesh and blood to stone. When we look at her we are inclined +to forgive all the smallness and silliness which sometimes vex us in +the ordinary woman, and to think that there are worse things than the +love of dress for which we so often reproach our wives and daughters; +that flirting, which is reprehensible no doubt, might be exchanged for +something even more reprehensible; and that vanity, of the giggling, +coquettish kind, though to be steadily discouraged and sternly +reproved, is not quite the worst feminine thing after all. Surely not! +A grim female who cannot flirt nor giggle nor cry, nor yet kiss and +make up again when scolded, is far away a worse kind of thing than a +feather-headed little puss who is always doing wrong by reason of her +foolish brain, but who manages somehow to pull herself right because +of her loving heart. Weak women, vain women, affected women, and the +whole class of silly women, whatever the speciality of silliness +exhibited, are tiresome enough, heaven knows; but, unsatisfactory as +they are, they are better than the grim female--that woman of no sex, +born without softness or sympathy and living without pity and without +love. + + + + +_MATURE SIRENS._ + + +Nothing is more incomprehensible to girls than the love and admiration +sometimes given to middle-aged women. They cannot understand it; and +nothing but experience will ever make them understand it. In their +eyes, a woman is out of the pale of personal affection altogether when +she has once lost that shining gloss of youth, that exquisite +freshness of skin and suppleness of limb, which to them, in the +insolent plenitude of their unfaded beauty, constitute the chief +claims to admiration of the one sex from the other. And yet they +cannot conceal from themselves that the pretty maid of eighteen is +often deserted for the handsome woman of forty, and that the patent +witchery of their own youth and brilliant colouring goes for nothing +against the mysterious charms of a mature siren. What can they say to +such an anomaly? There is no good in going about the world +disdainfully wondering how on earth a man could ever have taken up +with such an antiquated creature!--suggestively asking their male +friends what could he see in a woman of her age, old enough to be his +mother? There the fact stands; and facts are stubborn things. The +eligible suitor who has been coveted by more than one golden-haired +girl has married a woman twenty years her senior, and the middle-aged +siren has quietly carried off the prize which nymphs in their teens +have frantically desired to win. What is the secret? How is it done? +The world, even of silly girls, has got past any belief in spells and +talismans, such as Charlemagne's mistress wore, and yet the man's +fascination seems to them quite as miraculous and almost as unholy as +if it had been brought about by the black art. But if they had any +analytical power they would understand the _diablerie_ of the mature +siren clearly enough; for it is not so difficult to understand when +one puts one's mind to it. + +In the first place, a woman of ripe age has a knowledge of the world, +and a certain suavity of manner and moral flexibility, wholly wanting +to the young. Young girls are for the most part all angles--harsh in +their judgments, stiff in their prejudices, narrow in their +sympathies. They are full of combativeness and self-assertion if they +belong to one type of young people, or they are stupid and shy if they +belong to another type. They are talkative with nothing to say, and +positive with nothing known; or they are monosyllabic dummies who +stammer out Yes or No at random, and whose brains become hopelessly +confused at the first sentence with which the stranger, to whom they +have just been introduced, attempts to open a conversation. They are +generally without pity; their want of experience making them hard +towards sorrows which they do not understand--let us charitably hope +also making them ignorant of the pain they inflict. That famous +article in the _Times_ on the cruelty of young girls, _àpropos_ of +Constance Kent's confession, though absurdly exaggerated, had in it +the core of truth which gives the sting to such papers, which makes +them stick, and which is the real cause of the outcry they create. + +Girls are cruel; there is no question about it. If passive rather than +active, they are simply indifferent to the sufferings of others; if of +a more active temperament, they find a positive pleasure in giving +pain. A girl will say horribly cruel things to her dearest friend, +then laugh at her because she cries. Even her own mother she will hurt +and humiliate if she can; while, as for any unfortunate aspirant not +approved of, were he as tough-skinned as a rhinoceros she would find +means to make him wince. But all this acerbity is toned down in the +mature woman. Experience has enlarged her sympathies, and knowledge of +suffering has softened her heart to the sufferings of others. Her +lessons of life too, have taught her tact; and tact is one of the most +valuable lessons that a man or woman can learn. She sees at a glance +the weak points and sore places in her companion, and she avoids them; +or if she passes over them, it is with a hand so soft and tender, a +touch so soothing, that she calms instead of irritating. A girl would +have come down on those weak places heavily, and would have torn +off the bandages from the sore ones, jesting at scars because she +herself had never felt a wound, and deriding the sybaritism of +diachylon because ignorant of the anguish it conceals. + +Furthermore, the mature siren is thoughtful for others. Girls are +self-asserting and aggressive. Life is so strong in them, and the +instinct which prompts them to try their strength with all comers and +to get the best of everything everywhere, is so irrepressible, that +they are often disagreeable because of that instinctive selfishness, +that craving, natural to the young, of taking all and giving back +nothing. But the mature siren knows better than this. She knows that +social success entirely depends on what each of us can throw into the +common fund of society; that the surest way to win consideration for +ourselves is to be considerate for others; that sympathy begets +liking, and self-suppression leads to exaltation; and that if we want +to gain love we must first show how well we can give it. Her tact +then, and her sympathy, her moral flexibility and quick comprehension +of character, her readiness to give herself to others, are some of the +reasons, among others, why the society of a cultivated agreeable woman +of a certain age is sought by those men to whom women are more than +mere mistresses or toys. Besides, she is a good conversationalist. She +has no pretensions to any special or deep learning--for, if pedantic, +she is spoilt as a siren at any age--but she knows a little about most +things; at all events, she knows enough to make her a pleasant +companion in a _tête-à-tête_ or at a dinner-table, and to enable her +to keep up the ball when thrown. And men like to talk to intelligent +women. They do not like to be taught nor corrected by them, but they +like that quick sympathetic intellect which follows them readily, and +that amount of knowledge which makes a comfortable cushion for their +own. And a mature siren who knows what she is about would never do +more than this, even if she could. + +Though the mature siren rests her claims to admiration on more than +mere personal charms, and appeals to something beyond the senses, yet +she is personable and well preserved, and, in a favourable light, +looks nearly as young as ever. So the men say who knew her when she +was twenty; who loved her then, and have gone on loving her, with a +difference, despite the twenty years which lie between this and then. +Girls, indeed, despise her charms because she is no longer young; and +yet she may be even more beautiful than youth. She knows all the +little niceties of dress, and, without going into the vulgar trickery +of paint and dyes--which would make her hideous--is up to the best +arts of the toilet by which every point is made to tell and every +minor beauty is given its fullest value. For part of the art and +mystery of sirenhood is an accurate perception of times and +conditions, and a careful avoidance of that suicidal mistake of which +_la femme passée_ is so often guilty--namely, setting herself in +confessed rivalry with the young by trying to look like them, and +so losing the good of what she has retained, and betraying the ravages +of time by the contrast. + +The mature siren is wiser than this. She knows exactly what she has +and what she can do; and before all things avoids whatever seems too +youthful for her years; and this is one reason why she is always +beautiful, because always in harmony. Besides, she has very many good +points, many positive charms still left. Her figure is still good--not +slim and slender certainly, but round and soft, and with that slower, +riper, lazier grace which, quite different from the antelope-like +elasticity of youth, is in its own way as lovely. If her hair has lost +its maiden luxuriance she makes up with crafty arrangements of lace, +which are more picturesque than the fashionable wisp of hay-like ends +tumbling half-way to the waist. She has still her white and shapely +hands with their pink filbert-like nails; still her pleasant smile and +square small teeth--those one or two new, matching so perfectly with +the old as to be undiscoverable! Her eyes are bright yet, and if the +upper muscles are a little shrunk, the consequent apparent enlargement +of the orbit only makes them more expressive; her lips are not yet +withered; her skin is not wrinkled. Undeniably, when well-dressed and +in a favourable light, the mature siren is as beautiful in her own way +as the girlish belle; and the world knows it and acknowledges it. + +That mature sirens can be passionately loved, even when very +mature, history gives us more than one example; and the first name +that naturally occurs to one's mind is that of the too famous Ninon de +l'Enclos. And Ninon, if a trifle mythical, was yet a fact and an +example. But not going quite to Ninon's age, we often see women of +forty and upwards who are personally charming, and whom men love with +as much warmth and tenderness as if they were in the heyday of +life--women who count their admirers by dozens, and who end by making +a superb marriage, and having quite an Indian summer of romance and +happiness. The young laugh at this idea of the Indian summer for a +bride of forty-five; but it is true; for neither romance nor +happiness, neither love nor mental youth, is a matter of years; and +after all we are only as old as we feel, and certainly no older than +we look. + +All women do not harden by time, nor wither, nor yet corrupt. Some +merely ripen and mellow and get enriched by the passage of the years, +retaining the most delicate womanliness--we had almost said +girlishness into quite old age, blushing as swiftly under their grey +hairs, while shrinking from anything coarse or vulgar or impure as +sensitively, as when they were girls. _La femme à quarante ans_ is the +French term for the opening of the great gulf beyond which love cannot +pass; but human history disproves this date, and shows that the heart +can remain fresh and the person lovely long after the age fixed for +the final adieu to admiration--that the mature siren can be adored +by her own contemporaries when the rising generation regard her +as nothing better than a chimney-corner fixture. Mr. Trollope +recognized the claims of the mature siren in his _Orley Farm_ and +_Miss Mackenzie_; and no one can deny the intense naturalness of the +characters and the interest of the stories. + +Another point which tells with the mature woman is, that she is not +jealous nor exacting. She knows the world, and takes what comes with +that philosophy which springs from knowledge. If she be of an enjoying +nature--and she cannot be a siren else--she accepts such good as +floats to the top, neither looking too deep into the cup nor +speculating on the time when she shall have drained it to the dregs. +Men feel safe with her. If they have entered on a tender friendship +with her, they know that there will be no scene, no tears, no +upbraidings, when an inexorable fate comes in to end their pleasant +little drama, with the inevitable wife as the scene-shifter. The +mature siren knows so well that fate and the wife must break in +between her and her friend, that she is resigned from the first to +what is foredoomed, and thus accepts her bitter portion, when it +comes, with dignity and in silence. Where younger women would fall +into hysterics and make a scene, perhaps go about the world taking +their revenge in slander, the middle-aged woman holds out a friendly +hand and takes the back seat gallantly, never showing by word nor look +that she has felt her deposition. She becomes the best friend of the +new household; and if any one is jealous, ten to one it is the +husband who is jealous of her love for his wife. Of course it may be +the wife herself, who cannot see what her husband can find to admire +so much in Mrs. A., and who pouts at his extraordinary predilection for +her, though of course she would scorn to be jealous--as, indeed, she +has no cause. For even a mature siren, however delightful she may be, +is not likely to come before a young wife in the heart of a young +husband. Though the French paint the love of a woman of forty as +pathetic, because slightly ridiculous and certainly hopeless, yet they +arrange their theory of social life so that a youth is generally +supposed to make his first love of a married woman many years his +elder, while a mature siren finds her last love in a youth. + +We have not come to this yet in England, either in theory or practice; +and it is to be hoped that we never shall come to it. Mature sirens +are all very well for men of their own age, and it is pleasant to see +them still loved and admired, and to recognize in them the claims of +women to something higher than mere personal passion; but the case +would be very different if they became ghoulish seducers of the young, +and kept up the habit of love by entangling boyish hearts and +blighting youthful lives. As they are now, they form a charming +element in society, and are of infinite use to the world. They are the +ripe fruit in the garden where else everything would be green and +immature--the last days of the golden summer set against the +disappointing backwardness of spring and before the chills of +autumn have come. They contain in themselves the advantages of two +distinct epochs, and while possessing as much personal charm as youth, +possess also the gains which come by experience and maturity. They +keep things together as the young could not do; and no gathering of +friends is perfect which has not one or two mature sirens to give the +tone, and prevent excesses. They soften the asperities of high-handed +boys and girls, which else would be too biting; and they set people at +ease, and make them in good humour with themselves, by the courtesy +with which they listen to them and the patience with which they bear +with them. Even the very girls who hate them fiercely as rivals love +them passing well as half maternal, half sisterly, companions; and the +first person to whom they would carry their sorrows would be a mature +siren, quite capable for her own part of having caused them. + +It would be hard indeed if the loss of youth did not bring with it +some compensations; but the mature siren suffers less from that loss +than any other kind of woman. Indeed, she seems to have a private +elixir of her own which is not quite drained dry when she dies, +beloved and regretted, at threescore years and ten; leaving behind her +one or two old friends who were once her ardent lovers, and who still +cherish her memory as that of the finest and most fascinating woman +they ever knew--something which the present generation is utterly +incapable of repeating. + + + + +_PUMPKINS._ + + +Pumpkins are among the most imposing of all groundling growths. They +have fine showy flowers, handsome leaves, roving stems, and they bear +solid-looking fruit of a goodly size and gorgeous colour. To see them +spreading over their domain with such rapid luxuriance, one would +imagine them among the best things growing; but a critical examination +proves their flesh to be about three parts water, while as for their +stalks, they are of so pithless a nature that they can only creep +along the earth, unable to stand upright without support;--which tells +something against the pumpkin's claim for extra consideration. Still, +their showy largeness attracts the eye, and not a few of us believe in +pumpkins, and admire both their mode of growth and the fruit +resulting. In like manner the human pumpkins--those beings of imposing +presence and loud self-assertion--get themselves believed in by the +simple; and, as occasions by which their watery and fibreless nature +is revealed do not arise every day, they are for the most part +accepted for the substantialities they assume to be, and the world is +deceived by appearances as it ever has been. + +These human pumpkins abound everywhere. In all states and professions, +and in both sexes, we find them flourishing magnificently on the face +of the earth, taking the lead in their society and setting themselves +out as the finest fellows to be found in their respective gardens. +Among them are the men of the Bombastes type, so dear to the older +playwrights; braggadocios of the kill 'em and eat 'em school, who were +such terrible fellows to look at and listen to, though only pumpkins +of a singularly innocuous nature when stoutly squeezed and analyzed; +fire-eaters of the juggling kind, with special care taken that the +fire shall be harmless and that the danger shall lie only in the fear +of the spectators. Now that duelling has gone out of fashion, and +discharged captains who have signalized themselves in war are rare, +our old swashbuckler type of pumpkins has gone out both in fact and +fiction, on the stage and off it. To be sure we have a few travellers +of slightly apocryphal courage, and more than doubtful accuracy, whose +books of perilous adventure and breathless dangers are to us what +Bombastes and Bobadil were to our fathers; and we have Major +Wellington de Boots with his military swagger and his hare's heart. +But he is a very weak imitation of the old fire-eater; and, on the +whole, this special family of the pumpkins has dwindled into +insignificance, and their place knows them no more. + +Then there is the pumpkin after the cut of the Prince Regent--the man +of deportment, big, handsome, showy, and specially noticeable for +a loud voice, a broad chest, and an indescribable air of superiority +and command; the man who has studied bowing as one of the fine arts, +who walks with a swagger, and even now tips his curly-brimmed hat +slightly to the side. This is the kind of man who influences women. +Bombastes frightens the nervous and inexperienced of his own sex, but +the man of deportment partly fascinates and partly overawes the other. +They take him at his own valuation, and have not skill enough to find +out the flaw in the summing up until perhaps it is too late, when they +have come so near to him that they are able to appraise him for +themselves, and have learnt by bitter experience of what unsound +materials he is made. And then let him look out. There is nothing +women resent so much as pumpkin manhood--nothing which humiliates them +more in their own esteem than to discover that they have been taken in +by appearances, and that what they had believed in as solid wood turns +out to be only squash. + +Women like to rely on men, and dread nothing so much as weakness and +vacillation in their male protectors; save indeed those grim and bulky +females in whom Hood so much delighted, who take small men _vi et +armis_, and subjugate them body and soul, like two-legged poodles +trained to fetch and carry at the word of command. But these are +exceptions; the average woman prizing strength rather than poodle-like +docility. The pumpkin of the Prince Regent cut is generally +notorious for laying down the law on all points. His voice is so loud +and his manner of speech so dictatorial, that no one dreams of +doubting still less of contradicting him, but everybody takes him as +he represents himself to be--a man of prompt decision, of boundless +resources, a granitic tower of strength to be leant against in all +emergencies without the slightest fear of failure; a man who is not +only sufficient for himself but strong enough to bear the weaknesses +of others. He is famous for giving advice--advice of a vague, rapid, +sprawling kind, never quite exact to the circumstances, never quite +practical nor to the point--large advice, general in scope but +wonderfully positive in tone, and, until you analyze, grandly imposing +in effect. Nail him to the point; ask his advice seriously on any +question where the responsibility of counsel will rest with him; place +yourself in his hands where the consequences of failure will touch him +as well as you; and then see to what meagre dimensions your goodly +gourd will shrink. The confident assertion drops into a weak +hesitation; the arrogant dictum melts into a timid refusal to take +such a serious responsibility on himself; you have pricked your +windbag, bisected your pumpkin, and henceforth you know the precise +weight of substance remaining. Yet mankind sees him exactly where he +was before, and he will go about the world in his large, loud way, +saying to every one that if you had followed his advice you would have +succeeded--supposing you have failed; or, if you have succeeded, +he will take all the credit to himself, and say it was he who guided +you and showed you how to go in and win. For himself, and his own +affairs, he has no more moral stamina than he had leadership for you +and yours. The least reverse knocks him over. Care or sorrow, when it +touches him, shrivels him up as completely as frost shrivels up the +pumpkin. In every circumstance requiring promptitude, coolness, keen +perception, just decision, our swaggering man of froth fails +ignominiously; and one hour of real pressure proves incontestably that +he was only a pumpkin of imposing presence, good neither as meat nor +staff when the time of trial came. + +Very often the pumpkin has a wife whose fibre is as close as his is +loose, and whose nature is as tough as his is soft; a hard-eyed, +thin-lipped, tenacious woman, who speaks little and boasts not at all, +but who does all she wishes to do, and whose iron will pins her +pumpkin to the wall as the spear of the Bushman pins the elephant or +the rhinoceros. It is very curious to see how a blatant blustering man +who is so loud and confident abroad, knocks under at home; and how the +high-crested deportment which carries things with such a lofty bearing +out of doors droops into the meek submission of the henpecked husband +so soon as the house-door closes on him, and he is subjected to the +pitiless analysis of home. There is no question of flourish then; and +if by chance the ambitious crest should make an effort to display +itself, the wife knows how to lower it by a few decisive words of a +keen-edged kind, and her pumpkin is made to feel sharply enough the +difference existing between fibre and pulp. It is almost melancholy to +see one of these fine flourishing fellows so subdued. Pumpkin as he +may be, it is not pleasant to see him so cut down in his pride; and +involuntarily one's sympathies go with him rather than with that +tenacious, hard-mouthed wife of his, who would be none the worse +perhaps for a little of her husband's essential softness and with less +than her own hardness. + +How often too, these big fellows have no physical stamina as well as +but very shaky moral fibre! A small, wiry light-weight will do twice +as much as they; not, of course, where muscle only is wanted, but +where the question is of endurance. Large heavy men knock up far +sooner than the light-weights; and though size and weight count for +something at certain times and on occasions, fibre and tenacity go for +more in the long run. In the Crimea, the men who first dropped off +from exposure and privation were the magnificently-built +Guardsmen--men apparently bred and fed to the highest point of +physical perfection; while the undersized little liners, who had +nothing to be admired in them, stood the strain gamely, and were brisk +and serviceable when the others were either dead or in hospital. So +far as we have gone yet, we have not solved the problem of how to +combine toughness and bigness, solidity and size, but for the +most part fail in the one in proportion as we succeed in the other. + +Many of the dark-skinned races are what we may call emotional +pumpkins. Their flashing black eyes and swarthy skins seem to be +instinct with passion; they look like living furnaces filled with +flames and molten metal, terrible fellows, dangerous to meddle with +and almost impossible to subdue. But nine times out of ten we find +them to be marvellously meek persons, timid, amenable to law, unable +to give offence and incapable of taking it--lambs masquerading in +tiger-skins. A fair-faced Anglo-Saxon, with his sensitive blush, +good-humoured smile and light blue eyes, has more pluck and pith in +him than a whole brigade of certain of these dark-skinned men. He has +less ferocity perhaps than they when they are thoroughly roused, +though our good-humoured Anglo-Saxon is by no means destitute of +ferocity on occasions when his blood is up; but his is ferocity of the +quarter-staff and bludgeon stand-up fight kind--the ferocity of +strength fairly put out against an adversary, not the tigerish cruelty +which is almost always found when moral weakness and physical +submission have a momentary triumph and reaction. Cowardly men are +like women in their revenge when once they get the upper hand; and +their revenge is more cruel than that of the habitually brave man who, +after a fair fight, overthrows his opponent. Some of the dark-skinned +races look the very ideal of the melodramatic ruffian--operatic +brigands painted with broad black lines, and up to any amount of +deeds of daring and of crime; but they are only pumpkins at the core. +We need not go so far as Calcutta to find them; we get examples nearer +home, both in Houndsditch and in Rome; for both Jews and Italians are +soft-cored men in spite of their passionate outsides, and both would +be better for an extra twist and toughness in their fibres. + +Intellectual pumpkins are as common as those of the more specially +physical kind. You meet with philosophers and 'thinkers'--perhaps they +are poets, perhaps politicians--who flourish out a vague big +declamation which, when you reduce it to its essence, you find to be a +platitude worth nothing; whipped cream, without any foundation of +solid pudding. If they are of the philosophic sort, they quote you +Fichte and Hegel, to the bewilderment of your brains unless you have +gone into the metaphysical maze on your own account; but they might +have put all they have said into half a dozen words of three letters, +like a child's first reading lesson. The flourish imposes, and people +who cannot analyze take the whipped cream for solid pudding, and think +that platitudes dressed in the garb of Fichte and Hegel are utterances +worthy of deep respect and admiring wonder. + +All the professions which talk, either by word of mouth or in print, +are specially given to this manifestation of pumpkinhood. Preachers +and authors sprawl and flourish over their small inheritance with a +tremendous assumption of vital force and vigorous growth; and +weak hands, with weaker heads, find support and shelter in their +foliage. Poets too, with a knack for turning out large moulds in which +they have run very small ideas, are pumpkins dear to the feminine +mind. Have we not our Tupper? had we not our 'Satan' Montgomery? and a +few others whom we might catalogue if we cared for the task, each with +his multifarious female following and his spiritual harem of ardent +admirers? All artists--that is, the men who create, or rather who +assume to create--are liable to be proved pumpkins when called on to +show themselves solid wood. They talk grandly enough, but when they +have to translate their words into deeds, too often the noble aims and +immortal efforts they have been advocating tail off into pulp and +water, and we have botches and pot-boilers instead of masterpieces and +high art. Perhaps we may take it as a rule that all doers who talk +much and boast grandly are of the pumpkin order, and that art, like +nature, elaborates best in silence. + +Strong-visaged women are often pure pumpkins with a very rough and +corrugated outside. It is astonishing how soon they break down, and +for all their stern and powerful looks sink under burdens under which +a frail little creature, as light as thistledown, will glide along +quite easily. Women with black brows and harsh voices--brigandesses by +appearance, or like the typical Herodias of unimaginative artists--are +often the gentlest and most pithless of their sex, and may be seen +acting quite compassionately towards their infants, or vindicating +their womanhood by meekly sewing on their husbands' buttons and +weeping at their rebukes; while a fair, silver-tongued, languid lady, +as soft as if she were made of nothing harder than the traditional +cream and rose-leaves, will give up her babies as a prey to unfeeling +nurses and let her husband go buttonless and in rags, while she +lounges before the fire indifferent to his wrath and callous to his +wrongs. There is many a house mistress who looks as if she could use +her fists when annoyed, who is absolutely afraid of her servants; and +the maid is always the mistress when the one is fibre and the other +pulp. + +Heaven be praised that the strong-visaged women are not 'clear grit' +all through. If they were as hard as they look, the world would go but +queerly, and society would have to make new laws for the protection of +its weaker male members. But nature is merciful as well as sportive, +and while she amuses herself by creating pumpkins of formidable +aspect, takes care that the core shall not always correspond to the +rind. Like the Athenian images of the satyr which enclosed a god, the +black-browed brigandesses and the men of magnificent deportment are +sometimes impostors of a quite amiable kind; and when you have once +learnt by heart the false analogies of form, you will cease to fear +your typical Herodias, to be impressed by your copy of the Prince +Regent, or to be influenced by your wordy Hegelian talking platitudes +in the philosophic dialect. + + + + +_WIDOWS._ + + +There are widows and widows; there are those who are bereaved and +those who are released; those who lose their support and those whose +chains are broken; those who are sunk in desolation and those who wake +up into freedom. Of the first we will not speak. Theirs is a sorrow +too sacred to be publicly handled even with sympathy; but the second +demand no such respectful reticence. The widow who is no sooner +released from one husband than she plots for another, and the widow +who leaps into liberty over the grave of a gaoler, not a lover, are +fair game enough. They have always been favourite subjects whereon +authors may exercise their wits; and while men are what they +are--laughing animals apt to see the humour lying in incongruity, and +with a spice of the devil to sharpen that same laughter into +satire--they will remain favourite subjects, tragic as the state is +when widowhood is deeper than mere outward condition. + +There are many varieties of the widow and all are not beautiful. For +one, there is the widow who is bent on re-marrying whether men like it +or not; that thing of prey who goes about the world seeking whom +she may devour; that awful creature who bears down on her victims with +a vigour in her assaults which puts to flight the popular fancy about +the weaker sex and the natural distribution of power. No hawk poised +over a brood of hedge birds, no shark cruising steadily towards a +shoal of small fry, no piratical craft sailing under a free flag and +accountable to no law save success, was ever more formidable to the +weaker things pursued than is the hawk widow to men when she is bent +on re-marrying. She knows so much!--there is not a manoeuvre by which +a victory can be stolen that she has not mastered and she is not +afraid of even the most desperate measures. When she has once struck, +he would be a clever man and a strong one who should escape her. +Generally left but meagrely provided for in worldly goods--else her +game would not be difficult--she makes up for her financial poverty by +her wealth of bold resources, and by the courage with which she takes +her own fortunes in hand and, with her own, those of her more eligible +masculine associates. She is a woman of purpose and lives for an end; +and that end is remarriage, with the most favourable settlement that +can be obtained by her lawyer from his. If fate has dealt hardly by +her--though, may be, compassionately by her successive spouses--and +has landed her in the widowed state twice or thrice, she is in nowise +daunted and as little abashed. She merely refits after a certain time +of anchorage, and goes out into the open again for a repetition +of her chance. She has no notion of a perpetuity of weeds, and, though +she may have cleared her half century with a margin besides, thinks +the suggestive orange-blossoms of the bride infinitely more desirable +than the fruitless heliotrope of the widow. If one husband is taken, +she remembers the old proverb, and reflects on the many, quite as +good, who are left potentially subject to her choice. And somehow she +manages. It has been said that any woman can marry any man if she +determines to do so, and follows on the line of her determination with +tenacity and common-sense. + +The hawk widow exemplifies the truth of this saying. She determines +upon marriage; and she usually succeeds; the question being one of +victim only, not of sacrifice. One has to fall to her share; there is +no help for it; and the whole contest is, which shall it be? which is +strongest to break her bonds? which craftiest to slip out of them? +which most resolute not to bear them from the beginning? This the +straggling covey must settle among themselves the best way they can. +When the hawk pounces down upon its quarry, it is _sauve qui peut_! +But all cannot be saved. One has to be caught; and the choice is +determined partly by chance and partly by relative strength. When the +widow of experience and resolve bears down on _her_ prey, the result +is equally certain. Floundering avails nothing; struggling and +splashing are just as futile; one among the crowd has to come to the +slaughter, like Mrs. Bond's ducks, and to assist at his own +immolation. The best thing he can do is to make a handsome surrender, +and to let the world of men and brothers believe he rather likes his +position than not. + +But there are pleasanter types of the re-marrying widow than this. +There is the widow of the Wadman kind, who has outlived her grief and +is not disinclined to a repetition of the matrimonial experiment, if +asked humbly by an experimenter after her own heart. But she must be +asked humbly that she may grant in a pretty, tender, womanly way--if +not quite so timidly as a girl, yet as becomingly in her degree, and +with that peculiar fascination which nothing but the combination of +experience and modesty can give. The widow of the Wadman kind is no +creature of prey, neither shark nor hawk; at the worst she is but a +cooing dove, making just the sweetest little noise in the world, the +tenderest little call to indicate her whereabouts, and to show that +she is lonely and feels a-cold. She sits close, waiting to be found, +and does not ramp and dash about like the hawk sisterhood; neither +does she pretend that she is unwilling to be found, still less deny +that a soft warm nest, well lined and snugly sheltered, is better than +a lonely branch stretching out comfortless and bare into the bleak +wide world. She, too, is almost sure to get what she wants, with the +advantage of being voluntarily chosen and not unwillingly submitted +to. + +This is the kind of woman who is always mildly but thoroughly +happy in her married life; unless indeed her husband should be a +brute, which heaven forefend. She lives in peace and bland contentment +while the fates permit, and when he dies she buries him decently and +laments him decorously; but she thinks it folly to spend her life in +weeping by the side of his cold grave, when her tears can do no good +to either of them. Rather she thinks it a proof of her love for him, +and the evidence of how true was her happiness, that she should elect +to give him a successor. Her blessed experience in the past has made +her trustful of the future; and because she has found one man faithful +she thinks that all are Abdiels. As a rule, this type of woman does +find men pleasant; and by her own nature she ensures domestic +happiness. She is always tenderly, and never passionately, in love, +even with the husband she has loved the best. She gives in to no +excesses to the right nor to the left. Her temperament is of that +serene moonlight kind which does not fatigue others nor wear out its +possessor. Without ambition or the power to fling herself into any +absorbing occupation, she lives only to please and be pleased at home; +and if she be not a wife, wearing her light fetters lovingly and proud +that she is fettered, she is nothing. As some women are born mothers +and others are born nuns, so is the Wadman woman a born wife, and +shines in no other character nor capacity. But in this she excels; and +knowing this, she sticks to her _rôle_, how frequently so ever +the protagonist may be changed. + +There are widows, however, who have no thought nor desire for +remaining anything but widows--who have gained the worth of the world +in their condition, 'Jeune, riche, et veuve--quel bonheur!' says the +French wife, eyeing 'mon mari' askance. Can the most exacting woman +ask for more? And truly such a one is in the most enviable position +possible to a woman, supposing always that she has not lost in her +husband the man she loved. If she has lost only the man who sat by +right at the same hearth with herself--perhaps the man who quarrelled +with her across the ashes--she has lost her burden and gained her +release. + +The cross of matrimony lies heavy on many a woman who never takes the +world into her confidence, and who bears in absolute silence what she +has not the power to cast from her. Perhaps her husband has been a man +of note, a man of learning, of elevated station, a political or a +philanthropic power. She alone knew the fretfulness, the petty +tyranny, the miserable smallness at home of the man of large repute +whom his generation conspired to honour, and whose public life was a +mark for the future to date by. When he died the press wrote his +eulogy and his elegy; but his widow, when she put on her weeds, sang +softly in her own heart a pæan to the great King of Freedom, and +whispered to herself Laudamus with a sigh of unutterable relief. +To such a woman widowhood has no sentimental regrets. She has come +into possession of the goods for which perhaps she sold herself; she +is young enough to enjoy the present and to project a future; she has +the free choice of a maid and the free action of a matron, as no other +woman has. She may be courted and she need not be chaperoned, nor yet +forced to accept. Experience has mellowed and enriched her; for though +the asperities of her former condition were sharp while they lasted, +they have not permanently roughened nor embittered her. Then the sense +of relief gladdens, while the sense of propriety subdues, her; and the +delicate mixture of outside melancholy, tempered with internal warmth, +is wonderfully enticing. Few men know how to resist that gentle +sadness which does not preclude the sweetest sympathy with pleasures +in which she may not join--with happiness which is, alas! denied her. +It gives an air of such profound unselfishness; it asks so mutely, so +bewitchingly, for consolation! + +Even a hard man is moved at the sight of a pretty young widow in the +funereal black of her first grief, sitting apart with a patient smile +and eyes cast meekly down, as one not of the world though in it. Her +loss is too recent to admit of any thought of reparation; and yet what +man does not think of that time of reparation? and if she be more than +usually charming in person and well dowered in purse, what man does +not think of himself as the best repairer she could take? Then, as +time goes on and she glides gracefully into the era of mitigated +grief, how beautiful is her whole manner, how tasteful her attire! The +most exquisite colours of the prismatic scale look garish beside her +dainty tints, and the untempered mirth of happy girls is coarse beside +her subdued admission of moral sunshine. Greys as tender as a dove's +breast; regal purples which have a glow behind their gloom; stately +silks of sombre black softly veiled by clouds of gauzy white or +brightened with the 'dark light' of sparkling jet--all speak of +passing time and the gradual blooming of the spring after the sadness +of the winter; all symbolize the flowers which are growing on the sod +that covers the dear departed; all hint at a melting of the funereal +gloom into the starlight of a possible bridal. She begins too to take +pleasure in the old familiar things of life. She steals into a quiet +back seat at the Opera; she just walks through a quadrille; she sees +no harm in a fête or flower-show, if properly companioned. Winter does +not last for ever; and a life-long mourning is a wearisome prospect. +So she goes through her degrees in accurate order, and comes out at +the end radiant. + +For when the faint shadows cast by the era of mitigated grief fade +away, she is the widow _par excellence_--the blooming widow, young, +rich, gay, free; with the world on her side, her fortune in her hand, +the ball at her foot. She is the freest woman alive; freer even than +any old maid to be found. Freedom, indeed, comes to the old maid +when too late to enjoy it; at least in certain directions; for while +she is young she is necessarily in bondage, and when parents and +guardians leave her at liberty, the world and Mrs. Grundy take up the +reins and hold them pretty tight. But the widow is as thoroughly +emancipated from the conventional bonds which confine the free action +of a maid as she is from those which fetter the wife; and only she +herself knows what she has lost and gained. She bore her yoke well +while it pressed on her. It galled her but she did not wince; only +when it was removed, did she become fully conscious of how great had +been the burden, from her sense of infinite relief through her +freedom. The world never knew that she had passed under the harrow; +probably therefore it wonders at her cheerfulness, with the dear +departed scarce two years dead; and some say how sweetly resigned she +is, and others how unfeeling. She is neither. She is simply free after +having lived in bondage; and she is glad in consequence. But she is +dangerous. In fact, she is the most dangerous of all women to men's +peace of mind. She does not want to marry again--does not mean to +marry again for many years to come, if ever; granted; but this does +not say that she is indifferent to admiration or careless of men's +society. And being without serious intentions herself, she does not +reflect that she may possibly mislead and deceive others who have no +such cause as she has to beware of the pleasant folly of love and its +results. + +In the exercise of her prerogative as a free woman, able to cultivate +the dearest friendships with men and fearlessly using her power, she +entangles many a poor fellow's heart which she never wished to engage +more than platonically, and crushes hopes which she had not the +slightest intention to raise. Why cannot men be her friends? she asks, +with a pretty, pleading look--a tender kind of despair at the +wrong-headedness of the stronger sex. But, tender as she is, she does +not easily yield even when she loves. The freedom she has gone through +so much to gain she does not rashly throw away; and if ever the day +comes when she gives it up into the keeping of another--and for all +her protestations it comes sometimes--the man to whom she succumbs may +congratulate himself on a victory more flattering to his vanity, and +more complete in its surrender of advantages, than he could have +gained over any other woman. Belle or heiress, of higher rank or of +greater fame than himself, no unmarried woman could have made such a +sacrifice in her marriage as did this widow of means and good looks, +when she laid her freedom, her joyous present and potential future, in +his hand. He will be lucky if he manages so well that he is never +reproached for that sacrifice--if his wife never looks back +regretfully to the time when she was a widow--if there are no longing +glances forward to possibilities ahead, mingled with sighs at the +difficulty of retracing a step when made. On the whole, if a woman can +live without love, or with nothing stronger than a tender +sentimental friendship, widowhood is the most blissful state she can +attain. But if she be of a loving nature and fond of home, finding her +own happiness in the happiness of others and indifferent to +freedom--thinking, indeed, that feminine freedom is only another word +for desolation--she will be miserable until she has doubled her +experience and carried on the old into the new. + + + + +_DOLLS._ + + +The love of dolls is instinctive with girl children; and a nursery +without some of these silent simulacra for the amusement of the little +maids is a very lifeless affair. But outside the nursery door dolls +are stupid things enough; and, whether improvised of wisped-up bundles +of rags or made of the costliest kind of composition, they are at the +best mere pretences for the pastime of babies, not living creatures to +be loved nor artistic creations to be admired. Certainly they are +pretty in their own way, and some are made to simulate human actions +quite cleverly; and one of their charms with children is that they can +be treated like sentient beings without a chance of retaliation. They +can be scolded for being naughty; put to bed in broad daylight for a +punishment; seated in the corner with their impassive faces turned to +the wall, just as the little ones themselves are dealt with; the doll +all the time smiling exactly as it smiled before, its round blue beads +staring just as they stared before; neither scolding nor cornering +making more impression on its sawdust soul than do little missy's sobs +and tears when nurse is cross and dolly is her only friend. But +the child has had its hour of play and make-believe sentiment of +companionship and authority; and so, if the doll can do no good of +itself, it can at least be the occasion of pleasantness to others. + +Now there are women who are dolls in all but the mere accident of +material. The doll proper is a simple structure of wax or wood, 'its +knees and elbows glued together;' and the human doll is a complex +machine of flesh and blood. But, saving such structural differences, +these women are as essentially dolls as those in the bazaar which open +and shut their eyes at the word of command enforced by a wire, and +squeak when you pinch them in the middle. There are women who seem +born into the world only as the playthings and make-believes of human +life. As impassive as the waxen creatures in the nursery, no +remonstrance touches them and no experience teaches them. Their final +cause seems to be to look pretty, to be always in perfect drawing-room +order, and to be the occasions by which their friends and companions +are taught patience and self-denial. And they perfectly fulfil their +destiny; which may be so much carried to their credit. A doll woman is +hopelessly useless and can do nothing with her brains or her hands. In +distress or sickness she can only sit by you and look as sorrowful as +her round smooth face will permit; but she has not a helping +suggestion to make, not a fraction of practical power to put forth. + +When a man has married a doll wife he has assigned himself to absolute +loneliness or a double burden. He cannot live with his pretty toy in +any more reality of sympathy than does a child with her puppet. He can +tell her nothing of his affairs, nothing of his troubles nor of his +thoughts, because she can impart no new idea, even from the woman's +point of view, not from want of heart but from want of brains to +understand another's life. Is she not a doll? and does not the very +essence of her dollhood lie in this want of perceptive faculty both +for things and feelings? What are the hot flushes of passion, the +bitter tears of grief, the frenzy of despair, to her? She sees them; +and she wonders that people can be so silly as to make themselves and +her so uncomfortable; but of the depth of the anguish they express she +knows no more than does her waxen prototype when little missy sobs +over it in her arms and confides her sorrows to its deaf ears. +Whatever anxieties oppress her husband, he must keep them to himself, +he cannot share them with her; and the last shred of his credit, like +the last effort of his strength, must be employed in maintaining his +toy wife in the fool's paradise where alone she can make her +habitation. Many a man's back has broken under the strain of such a +burden; and many a ruined fortune might have been held together and +repaired when damaged, had it not been for the exigencies and +necessities of the living doll, who had to be spared all want or +inconvenience at the cost of everything else. How many men are +groaning in spirit at this moment over the infatuation that made them +sacrifice the whole worth of life for the sake of a pretty face and a +plastic manner! + +The doll woman is as helpless practically as she is useless morally. +If she is in personal danger, she either faints or becomes dazed, +according to her physiological conditions. Sometimes she is hysterical +and frantic, and then she is actively troublesome. In general, +however, she is just so much dead weight on hand, to be thought for as +well as protected; a living corpse to be carried on the shoulders of +those who are struggling for their own lives. She can foresee no +possibilities, measure no distances, think of no means of escape. +Never quick nor ready, pressure paralyzes such wits as she possesses; +and it is not from selfishness so much as from pure incapacity to help +herself or to serve others that the poor doll falls down in a helpless +heap of self-surrender, and lets her very children perish before her +eyes without making an effort to protect them. + +As a mother indeed, the doll woman is perhaps more unsatisfactory than +in any other character. She gives up her nursery into the absolute +keeping of her nurse, and does not attempt to control nor to +interfere. This again, is not from want of affection, but from want of +capacity. In her tepid way she has a heart, if only half-vitalized +like the rest of her being; and she is by no means cruel. Indeed, she +has not force enough to be cruel nor wicked anyhow; her worst +offence being a passive kind of selfishness, not from greed but from +inactivity, by which she is made simply useless for the general good. +As for her children, she understands neither their moral nature nor +their physical wants; and beyond a universal 'Oh, naughty!' if the +little ones express their lives in the rampant manner proper to young +things, or as a universal 'Oh, let them have it!' if there is a howl +over what is forbidden or unwise, she has no idea of discipline or +management. If they teaze her, they are sent away; if they are +naughty, they are whipped by papa or nurse; if they are ill, the +doctor is summoned and they have medicine as he directs; but none of +the finer and more intimate relations usual between mother and child +exist in the home of the doll mother. The children are the property of +the nurse only; unless indeed the father happens to be a specially +affectionate and a specially domestic man, and then he does the work +of the mother--at the best clumsily, but at the worst better than the +doll could have done it. + +Very shocking and revolting are all the more tragic facts of human +life to the smooth-skinned easy-going doll. When it comes to her own +turn to bear pain, she wonders how a good God can permit her to +suffer. Had she brains enough to think, the great mystery of pain +would make her atheistical in her angry surprise that she should be so +hardly dealt with. As dolls have a constitutional immunity from +suffering, her first initiation into even a minor amount of +anguish is generally a tremendous affair; and though it may be pain of +a quite natural and universal character, she is none the less +indignant and astonished at her portion. She invariably thinks herself +worse treated than her sisters, and cannot be made to understand that +others suffer as much as, and more than, herself. As she has always +shrunk from witnessing trouble of any kind, and as what she may have +seen has passed over her mind without leaving any impression, she +comes to her own sorrows totally inexperienced; and one of the most +pitiable sights in the world is that of a poor doll woman writhing in +the grasp of physical agony, and broken down or rendered insanely +impatient by what other women can bear without a murmur. + +When she is in the presence of the moral tragedies of life, she is as +lost and bewildered as she is with the physical. All sin and crime are +to her odd and inexplicable. She cannot pity the sinner, because she +cannot understand the temptation; and she cannot condemn from any +lofty standpoint, because she has not mind enough to see the full +meaning of iniquity. It is simply something out of the ordinary run of +her life, and the doll naturally dislikes disturbance, whether of +habit or of thought. Yet if a noted criminal came and sat down by her, +she would probably whisper to her next friend, 'How shocking!' but she +would simper when he spoke, and perhaps in her heart feel flattered by +the attention of even so doubtful a notoriety. If she be a doll +with a bias towards naughtiness, the utmost limit to which she can go +is a mild kind of curiosity about the outsides of things--the mere +husk and rind of the forbidden fruit--such as wondering how such and +such people look who have done such dreadful things; and what they +felt the next morning; and how could they ever come to think of such +horrors! She would be more interested in hearing about the dress and +hair and eyes of the female plaintiff or defendant in a famous cause +than many other women would be; but she would not give herself the +trouble to read the evidence, and she would take all her opinions +secondhand. But whether the colour of the lady's gown was brown or +blue, and whether she wore her hair wisped or plaited, would be +matters in which she would take as intense an interest as is possible +to her. + +The utmost limit to which enthusiasm can be carried with her is in the +matter of dress and fashion; and the only subject that thoroughly +arouses her is the last new colour, or the latest eccentricity of +costume. Talk to her of books, and she will go to sleep; even novels, +her sole reading, she forgets half an hour after she has turned the +last page; while of any other kind of literature she is as profoundly +ignorant as she is of mathematics; but she can discuss the mysteries +of fashion with something like animation, these being to her what the +wire is to the eyes of the dolls in the bazaar. Else she has no power +of conversation. At the head of her own table she sits like a +pretty waxen dummy, and can only simper out a few commonplaces, or +simper without the commonplaces, satisfied if she is well appointed +and looks lovely, and if her husband seems tolerably contented with +the dinner. She is more in her element at a ball, where she is only +asked to dance and not wanted to talk; but her ball-room days do not +last for ever, and when they are over she has no available retreat. + +If a rich doll woman is a mistake, a poor one who has been rich is +about the greatest infliction that can be laid on a suffering +household. Not all the teaching of experience can make wax and glue +into flesh and blood, and nothing can train the human doll into a +dignified or a capable womanhood. She still dresses in faded +finery--which she calls keeping up appearances; and still has +pretensions which no 'inexorable logic of facts' can destroy. She +spends her money on sweets and ribbons and ignores the family need for +meat and calico; and she sits by the fireside dozing over a trashy +novel, while her children are in rags and her house is given over to +disorder. But then she has a craze for the word 'lady-like,' and +thinks it synonymous with ignorance and helplessness. She abhors the +masculine-minded woman who helps her--sister, cousin, daughter--so far +as she can abhor anything; but she is glad to lean on her strength, +despite this abhorrence, and, while grumbling at her masculinity, does +not disdain to take advantage of her power. The doll is only passively +disagreeable though; and for all that she carps under her breath, +will remain in any position in which she is placed. She will not act, +but she will let you act unhindered; which is something gained when +you have to deal with fools. + +This quiescence of hers passes with the world for plasticity and +amiability; it is neither; it is simply indolence and want of +originating force. While she is young, she is nice enough to those who +care only for a pretty face and a character founded on negatives; but +when a man's pride of life has gone, and he has come into the phase of +weakness, or under the harrow of affliction, or into the valley of the +shadow of death, then she becomes in sorrowful truth the chain and +bullet which make him a galley-slave for the remainder of his days, +and which sign him to drudgery and despair. + +As an old woman the doll has not one charm. She has learned none of +that handiness, come to none of that grand maternal power of helping +others, which should accompany maturity and age and has still to be +thought for and protected, to the exclusion of the younger and +naturally more helpless, as when she was young herself, and beautiful +and fascinating, and men thought it a privilege to suffer for her +sake. Nine times out of ten she has lost her temper as well as her +complexion, and has become peevish and unreasonable. She gets fat and +rouges; but she will not consent to get old. She takes to false hair, +dyes, padded stays, arsenic or 'anti-fat,' and to artful contrivances +of every description; but alas! there is no 'dolly's hospital' for her +as there used to be for her battered old prototype in the nursery +lumber-closet; and, whether she likes it or not, she has to succumb to +the inevitable decree, and to become faded, worn out, unlovely, till +the final _coup de grâce_ is given and the poor doll is no more. Poor, +weak, frivolous doll! it requires some faith to believe +that she is of any good whatsoever in this overladen life of ours; but +doubtless she has her final uses, though it would puzzle a Sanhedrim +of wise men to discover them. Perhaps in the great readjustment of the +future she may have her place and her work assigned to her in some +inter-stellar Phalansterie; when the meaning of her helpless earthly +existence shall be made manifest and its absurd uselessness atoned for +by some kind of celestial 'charing.' + + + + +_CHARMING WOMEN._ + + +There are certain women who are invariably spoken of as charming. We +never hear any other epithet applied to them. They are not said to be +pretty, nor amiable, nor clever, though they may be all three, but +simply charming; which we may take as a kind of verbal amalgam--the +concentration and concretion of all praise. The main feature about +these charming women is their intense feminality. There is no blurring +of the outlines here; no confusion of qualities admirable enough in +themselves but slightly out of place considering the sex; no Amazonian +virtues which leave one in doubt as to whether we have not before us +Achilles in petticoats rather than a true Pyrrha or a more tender +Deidamia. + +A charming woman is woman all over--one who places her glory in being +a woman and has no desire to be anything else. She is a woman rather +than a human being, and a lady rather than a woman. One of her +characteristics is the exquisite grace of her manner which so sweetly +represents the tender nature within. She has not an angle anywhere. If +she were to be expressed geometrically, Hogarth's Line of Beauty +is the sole figure that could be used for her. She is flowing, +graceful, bending in mind as in body; she is neither self-asserting +nor aggressive, neither rigid nor narrow; she is a creature who glides +gracefully through life, and adjusts herself to her company and her +circumstances in a manner little less than marvellous; working her own +way without tumult or sharpness; creeping round the obstacles she +cannot overthrow, and quietly wearing down more friable opposition +with that gentle persistency which does so much more than turmoil and +disturbance. + +Even if enthusiastic--which she is for art, either as music, as +painting, or yet as poetry--she is enthusiastic in such a sweet and +graceful way that no one can be offended by a fire which shines and +does not burn. There is no touch of scorn about her and no assumption +of superior knowledge. She speaks to you, poor ignorant Philistine, +with the most flattering conviction that you follow her in all her +flights; and when she comes out, quite naturally, with her pretty +little bits of recondite lore or professional technicalities, you +cannot be so boorish as to ask for an explanation of these trite +matters which she makes so sure you must understand. Are you not an +educated person with a soul to be saved? can you then be ignorant of +things with which every one of culture is familiar? She discourses +confidentially of musicians and painters unknown to fame, and speaks +as if she knew the secret doings of the Conservatoire and the R. A. +council-chamber alike. The models and the methods, the loves and +the hates, of the artistic world are to her things of every-day life, +and you cannot tell her that she is shooting her delicate shafts wide +of the mark, and that you know no more of what she means than if she +were talking in the choicest Arabic. + +If she has been abroad--and she generally has been more or less--she +will pour out her tender little rhapsodies about palazzi and musei of +which you have never heard, but every room of which she assumes you +know by heart; and she will speak of out-of-the-way churches, and grim +old castles perched upon vine-clad mounts, as if you were as well +acquainted with them as with your native hamlet. She will bring into +her discourse all manner of Italian technicalities, as if you +understood the subject as well as she herself understands it; though +your learning is limited to a knowledge of how much has been done in +jute and tallow this last half year, or how many pockets of hops went +off in the market last week. If she has a liking for high life and +titles--and what charming woman has not?--she will mention the names +of all manner of counts and dukes and monsignori unknown to English +society, as though they were her brothers; but if you were to +interrupt the gentle ripple of her speech with such rude breakwaters +as 'who?' and 'what?' the charming woman would think you a horrid +bore--and no man would willingly face that humiliation. One may be a +rhinoceros in one's own haunts, but, as the fable tells us, even +rhinoceroses are ashamed of their parentage when among gazelles. + +Never self-asserting, never contradictory, only sweetly and tenderly +putting you right when you blunder, the charming woman nevertheless +always makes you feel her superiority. True, she lays herself as it +were at your feet and gives you a thousand delicate flatteries--indeed +among her specialities is that of being able to set you on good terms +with yourself by her art of subtle flattery; but despite her own +self-abasement and your exaltation you cannot but feel her +superiority; and, although she is too charming to acknowledge what +would wound your pride, you know that she feels it too, and tries to +hide it. All of which has the effect of making you admire her still +more for her grace and tact. + +The charming woman is generally notoriously in love with her husband, +who is almost always inferior to her in birth, acquirements, manner, +appearance. This Titania-like affection of hers only shows her +feminine qualities of sacrifice and wifely devotion to greater +advantage, and makes other men envy more ferociously the lucky fellow +who has drawn such a prize. The husband of a charming woman is indeed +lucky in the world's esteem; no man more so. Though he may be one of +the most ordinary, perhaps unpleasant, fellows you know, with a sour +face, an underbred air, and by no means famous in his special sphere, +his wife speaks of him enthusiastically as so good, so clever, so +delightful! No one knows how good he is, she says; though of +course he has his little peculiarities of temper and the rest of it, +and perhaps every one would not bear with them as she does. But then +she knows him, and knows his wonderful worth and value! If they are +not seen much together, that comes from causes over which they have no +control, not from anything like disinclination to each other's +society. Certainly, for so happy a marriage, it is a little surprising +how very seldom they are together; and how all her friends are hers +only and not his, and how much she goes into society without him. On +the whole, counting hours, they live very much more apart than united; +but that is the misfortune of his career, of his health, or of hers--a +misfortune due to any cause but that of diversity of tastes, +inharmoniousness of pursuits, or lack of love. + +Full of home affection and the tenderest sentiment as she is, the +charming woman does sometimes the oddest-looking things, which a rough +little domestic creature without graceful pretensions would not dream +of doing. Her child is lying dangerously ill, perhaps dying, and she +appears at the grand ball of the season, subdued certainly--how well +that sweet melancholy becomes her!--but always graceful, always +thoughtful for others, and attentive to the minutest detail of her +social duties. And though indeed, she will tell you, she does not know +how she got dressed at all, because of the state of cruel anxiety in +which she is, yet she is undeniably the best dressed woman in the room +and the most carefully appointed. It is against her own will that +she is there, you may be sure; but she has been forced to sacrifice +herself, and tear herself away for an hour. The exigencies of society +are so merciless!--the world is such a terrible Juggernaut! she says, +raising her eyes with plaintive earnestness to yours in the +breathing-times of the waltz. + +She has another trial if her husband is ordered out to Canada or the +West Indies. Dearly as she loves him, and though she is heart-broken +at the idea of the separation, yet her health cannot stand the +climate; and she must obey her doctor's orders. She is so delicate, +you know--all charming women are delicate--and the doctor tells her +she could not live six months either in Toronto or Port Royal. If her +lord and master had to go on diplomatic service to St. Petersburg or +Madrid, she might be able to stand the climate then; but that is +different. A dull station, without any of her favourite pleasures, +would be more than she could bear; so she remains behind, goes out +into society, and writes her husband tender and amusing letters once a +month. + +The charming woman is the gentlest of her sex. She would not do a +cruel thing nor say an unkind word for the world. When she tells you +the unpleasant things which ill-natured people have said of your +friends or hers, she tells them in the sweetest and dearest way +imaginable. She is so sure there is not a syllable of truth in it all; +and what a shame it is that people should be so ill-natured! In the +gentle tone of sympathy and deprecation peculiar to her, she +gives you all the ugly and uncomfortable reports which have come to +her, and of which you have never heard a breath until this moment. Yet +it is you who are stupid, not she who is initiative, for she tells +them to you as if they were of patent notoriety to the whole world; +only she does not believe them, remember! She takes the most +scrupulous care to deny and defend as she retails, and you cannot +class her with the tribe of the ill-natured whom she censures, +setting, as she does, the whole strength of her gentle words and +generous disbelief in opposition to these ugly rumours. Yet you wish +she had not told you. Her disclaimers spring so evidently from the +affectionate amiability of her own mind, which cannot bear to think +evil, that they have not much effect upon you. The excuse dies away +from your memory, but the ill-savoured report roots; and you feel that +you have lost your respect for your former friends for ever; or, if +they were only hers, then, that nothing should tempt you to know them. +There is no smoke without some fire, you think; and the charming woman +cannot possibly have kindled the flame herself out of sticks and +leaves and rubbish of her own collecting. But how sweet and charitable +she was when she told you! how much you love her for her tenderness of +nature! what a guileless and delightful creature she is! + +The charming woman is kind and graceful, but she does not command the +stronger virtues. She flatters sweetly, but, it must be +confessed, she fibs as sweetly. She sometimes owns to this, but only +to fibs that do more good than harm--fibs into the utterance of which +she is forced for the sake of peace and to avoid mischief. It is a +feminine privilege, she says; and men agree with her. Truth at all +times--bold, uncompromising, stern-faced truth--is coarse and +indelicate she says; a masculine quality as little fitted for women as +courage or great bodily strength. Her husband knows that she fibs; her +friends at times find her out too; but though the women throw it at +her as an accusation, the men accept it as a quality without which she +would be less the charming woman that she is; and not only forgive it, +but like her the better for the grace and tact and suppleness she +displays in the process of manufacture. Hers are not the severer +virtues, but the gentler, the more insinuating; and absolute +truth--truth at any price and on all occasions--does not come into the +list. + +Charming women, with their plastic manners and non-aggressive force, +always have their own way in the end. They are the women who influence +by unseen methods and who shrink from any open display of power. They +know that their _métier_ is to soothe men, to put them on good terms +with themselves, and so to get the benefit of the good humour they +induce; and they dread nothing so much as a contest of wills. They +coax and flatter for their rights, and consequently they are given +privileges in excess of their rights; whereas the women who take +their rights, as things to which they are entitled without favour, +lose them and their privileges together. This art of self-abasement +for future exaltation is one which it is given only to few to carry to +perfection, but no woman is really charming without it. In fact it is +part of her power; and she knows it. Though charming women are +decidedly the favourites with men, they are careful to keep on good +terms with their own sex; and in society you may often see them almost +ostentatiously surrounded by women only, whom they take pains to +please or exert themselves to amuse, but whom they throw into the +shade in the most astonishing way. + +Whatever these really charming women are, or do, or wear, is exactly +the right thing; and every other woman fails in proportion to the +distance she is removed from this model. When a charming woman is +dressed richly, the simpler costumes of her friends look poor and +mean; when she is _à la bergère_, the Court dresses about her are +vulgar; when she is gay, quietness is dullness; when she is quiet, +laughter is coarse. And there is no use in trying to imitate her. She +is the very Will-o'-the-wisp of her circle, and no sooner shows her +light here than she flits away there; she has no sooner set one +fashion, which her admiring friends have adopted with infinite pains +and trouble, than she has struck out a new one which renders all the +previous labour in vain. This is part of her very essence; and the +originality which is simply perfection that cannot be repeated, and +not eccentricity that no one will imitate, comes in as one of the +finest and most potent of her charms. When she lends her patterns to +her friends, or tells them this or that little secret, she laughs in +her heart, knowing that she has shown them a path they cannot possibly +follow and raised up a standard to which they cannot attain. And even +should they do either, then she knows that, by the time they have +begun to get up to her, she will be miles away, and that no art +whatever can approximate them to her as she is. What she was she +tosses among them as a worn-out garment; what she is they cannot be. +She remains still the unapproachable, the inimitable, the charming +woman _par excellence_ of her set, whom none can rival. + + + + +_APRON-STRINGS._ + + +Among other classifications, the world of men and women may be divided +into those who wear aprons and those who are tied to the strings +thereof--those who determine the length of the tether and those who +are bound to browse within its circuit--those who hold the reins and +those who go bitted. All men and women are fond of power, but there is +a wide difference in the ways in which they use it. To men belong the +grave political tyrannies at which nations revolt and history is +outraged, to women the small conventional laws framed against +individual liberty by Mrs. Grundy and society; men rule with rods of +iron and drive with whips of steel, women shorten the tether and tie +up close to apron-strings; men coerce, women forbid. In fact, the +difference is just that which lies between action and negation, +compulsion and restraint; between the masculine jealousy of equality +and the feminine fear of excess. If men debar women from all entrance +into their larger sphere, women try to dwarf men's lives to their own +measure, and not a few hold themselves aggrieved when they fail. They +think that everything which is impossible to them should be +forbidden to others, and they maintain that to be a lamentable extreme +which is simply in excess of their own powers. Not content with +supremacy in the home which is their own undisputed domain, nor +satisfied with binding on men the various rules distinguishing life in +the drawing-room, the dining-room and the breakfast-parlour, they +would, if they could, carry their code outside, and sweep into its +narrow net the club-house and the mess-table, the billiard-room and +the race-course, and wherever else men congregate together--delivered +from the bondage of feminine conventionalities. + +For almost all women have an uneasy feeling when their men are out of +sight, enjoying themselves in their own way. They fear on all +sides--both bodily harm and moral evil; and regard men's rougher +sports and freer thoughts as a hen regards her wilful ducklings when +they take to the water in which she would be drowned, and leave her +high and dry lamenting their danger and self-destruction. The man they +love best for his manliness they would, in their loving cowardice, do +their utmost to make effeminate; and, while adoring him for all that +makes him bold and strong in thought as well as in frame, they would +tie him up to their apron-strings, and keep him there till he became +as soft and narrow as themselves. Not that they would wish to do so; +if you asked them they would tell you quite the contrary. But this +would be the result if they had their own way, their love being +at all times more timid than confident. + +To home-staying women, a brilliant husband courted by the world and +loving what courts him, is a painful cross to bear, however much he +may be beloved--the pain, in fact, being proportionate to the love. +Perhaps no life exemplifies this so much as Moore's. Poor "Bessy" +suffered many things because of the looseness of the apron-string by +which her roving husband was tied, and the length of the tether which +he allowed himself. _Farfallone amoroso_ as he was, his incessant +flutterings out of range and reach caused her many a sad hour; and in +after years she was often heard to say that the happiest time of her +life was when his mind had begun to fail, for then she had him all to +herself and no one came in between them--no great world swept him away +to be the idol of a _salon_, and left her alone at home casting up her +accounts with life and love, and quaking at the result that came out. +When the brilliancy and the idolatry came to an end, then her turn +began; and she tied up her dulled and faltering idol close to her side +for ever after, and was happier to have him there helpless, +affectionate, dependent and imbecile than when he was at his +brightest--and a rover. + +Many a wife has felt the same when sickness has broken down the strong +man's power to a weakness below her own, and made her, so long the +inferior, now the more powerful of the two, and the supreme. She +gathers up the reins with that firm, tight hand peculiar to +women, and ties her master to her apron-string so that he cannot +escape. It is quite a matter of pride with her that she has got him +into such good order. He obeys her so implicitly about his medicines, +and going to bed early, and wrapping himself up, and avoidance of +draughts and night-air, that she feels all the reflected glory of one +who has conquered a hero. The Samson who used to defy the elements and +break her careful strings like bands of tow, has at last laid his head +in her lap and suffered himself to be covered by her apron. It is +worth while to have had the anxiety and loss of his illness for the +sake of the submission resulting; and she generally ends by gaining a +hold over him which he can never shake off again. + +It is pitiful though, to see the stronger life thus dwarfed and bound. +But women like it; and while the need for it lasts men must submit. +The danger is lest the habit of the apron-string should become +permanent; for it is so perilously pleasant to be petted and made much +of by women, that few men can resist the temptation when it offers; +and many have been ruined for the remainder of their days by an +illness which gave them up into the keeping of wife and sisters--those +fireside Armidas who will coddle all the real manliness out of their +finest heroes, if they are let. If this kind of thing occurs at the +break of life, the _mezzo cammino_ between maturity and age, it is +doubly difficult to throw off; and many a man who had good years +of vigour and strength, before him if he had been kept up to the mark, +sinks all at once into senility because his womankind got frightened +at that last small attack of his, and thought the best way to preserve +him from another was to weaken him by over-care out of all wish for +dangerous exposure. + +Perhaps the greatest misfortune that can befall a man is to have been +an only son brought up by a timid widow mother. It is easy to see at a +glance, among a crowd of boys, who has been educated under exclusively +feminine influence. The long curled shining hair, the fantastic +tunic--generally a kind of hybrid between a tunic and a frock--the +lavish use of embroidery, the soft pretty-behaved manner, the clean +unroughened hands, all mark the boy of whom his mother has so often +wished that he had been a girl, and whom she has made as much like a +girl as possible. His intellectual education has been as unboylike as +his daily breeding. Mothers' boys are taught to play the piano, to +amuse themselves with painting, or netting, or perhaps a little +woolwork in the evenings--anything to keep them quietly seated by the +family table, without an outbreak of boyish restlessness or +inconvenient energy; but they are never taught to ride, to hunt, to +shoot, to swim, to play at cricket, football, nor billiards, unless a +stalwart uncle happens to be about who takes the reins in his own hand +at times, and insists on having a word to say to his nephew's +education. + +There is danger in all, and evil in some, of these things; and +women cannot bear that those they love should run the risk of either. +Wherefore their boys are modest and virtuous truly, but they are not +manly; and when they go out into the world, as they must sooner or +later, they are either laughed at for their priggishness, or they go +to the bad by the very force of reaction. The mother has allowed them +to learn nothing that will be of solid use to them, and they enter the +great arena wholly unprepared either to fight or to resist, to push +their own way or to take their own part. They have been kept tied up +to the apron-string to the last moment, and only when absolutely +forced by the necessity of events will she cut the knot and let them +go free. But she holds on to the last moment. Even when the time comes +for college-life and learning, she often goes with her darling, and +takes lodgings in the town, that she may be near at hand to watch over +his health and morals, and continue her careful labours for his +destruction. + +The chances are that a youth so brought up never becomes a real man, +nor worth his salt anyhow. He is a prig if he is good, a debauchee of +the worst kind if he kicks over the traces at all. He is more likely +the first, carrying the mark of the apron-string round his wrist for +life. Like a tame falcon used to the hood and the perch and the lure +home, no matter what the temptation of the quarry afield, he is +essentially a domestic man, at ease only in the society of women; a +fussy man; a small-minded man; delicate in health; with a dread +of strong measures, physical, political, or intellectual; a crotchety +man given to passing quackeries; but not a man fit for man's society +nor for man's work. When there are many boys, instead of only one, in +a widow's family, the opposite of all this is the case. So soon as +they have escaped from the nursery, they have escaped from all control +whatsoever; and if one wants to realize a puerile pandemonium of dirt, +discomfort, noise and general disorganization, the best place in the +world is the household of a feeble-spirited mother of many sons where +there is no controlling masculine influence. + +Daughters, who are naturally and necessarily tied up to the mother's +apron-string, suffer occasionally from too tight a strain; though +certainly it is not the fault of the present day that girls are too +closely fettered, too home-staying or subdued. Still, every now and +then one comes across a matron who has crushed all individuality out +of her family, and whose grown-up daughters are still children to her +in moral go-carts and intellectual leading-strings. They may be the +least attractive of their sex, but a mother of this kind has one fixed +delusion respecting them--namely, that the world is full of wolves +eager to devour her lambs, and that they are only safe when close to +the maternal apron and browsing within an inch of the tether stake. +These are the girls who become hopeless old maids. Men have an +instinctive dread of the maternal apron-string. They do not want to +marry a mother as well as a wife, and to live under a double +dominion and a reduplicated opposition. + +It is all very well to say that a girl so brought up is broken in +already, and therefore more likely to make a good wife than many +others, seeing that it is only a transfer of obedience. That may do +for slaves who cannot be other than slaves whoever is the master; but +it does not do for women who, seeing their friends freer than +themselves, reflect with grief and longing that, had fate so ordered +it, they might have been free too. The chances here, as with the +mothers' boys, are, that the girl kept too close to the apron-string +during her spinsterhood goes all abroad so soon as she gets on the +free ground of matrimony, and lets her liberty run into license. Or +she keeps her old allegiance to her mother intact, and her husband is +never more than the younger branch at best. Most likely he is a +usurper, whom it is her duty to disobey in favour of the rightful +ruler when they chance to come into collision. + +If women had their will, all national enterprise would be at an end. +There would be no Arctic Expeditions, no Alpine Clubs, no dangerous +experiments in science, no firearms at home, no volunteering--in their +own family at least. All the danger would be done by the husbands and +brothers and sons of other women, but each would guard her own. For +women cannot go beyond the individual; and the loss of one of their +own, by misadventure, weighs more with them than the necessity of +keeping up the courage and hardihood of the nation. Nor do they +see the difference between care and coddling, refinement and +effeminacy; consequently, men are obliged to resist their influence, +and many cut the apron-string altogether, because delicate fingers +will tie the knots too tight. They do not remember that the influence +to which men yield as a voluntary act of their own grace is a very +different thing from obedience to the open denial, the undisguised +interference and restraint, which some women like to show. Men respect +the higher standard of morality kept up by women; they obey the major +and the minor laws of refinement which are framed for home life and +for society; and they confess that, without woman's influence, they +would soon degenerate into mere savages and be no better than so many +Choctaws before a generation was over; but they do not like being +pulled up short, especially in public, and hounded into the safe +sheepfold for all the world to see them run. And they resent the +endeavour. And the world resents it too, and feels that something is +wrong when a woman shows that she has the whip hand, and that she can +treat her husband like a petted child or bully him like a refractory +one; that she has him tied to her apron-strings and tethered to the +stake of her will. But there is more of this kind of thing in families +than the world at large always knows of; and many a fine, stalwart +fellow who holds his own among men, who is looked up to at his +club and respected in his office for his courage, decision and +self-reliance, sinks into mere poodledom at home, where his wife has +somehow managed to get hold of the leading-strings, and has taught him +that the only way to peace is by submission and obedience. + + + + +_FINE FEELINGS._ + + +There are people who pride themselves on the possession of what it +pleases them to call fine feelings. Perhaps, if we were all diligent +to call spades spades, these same fine feelings would come under a +less euphemistic heading; but, as things are, we may as well adopt the +softening gloze that is spread over the whole of our language, and +call them by a pretty name with the rest. People who possess fine +feelings are chiefly remarkable for the ease with which they take +offence; it being indeed impossible, even for the most wary of their +associates, to avoid giving umbrage in some shape, and generally when +least intended and most innocently minded. Nothing satisfies them. No +amount of attention, short of absolute devotion and giving them the +place of honour everywhere, sets them at ease with themselves or keeps +them in good-humour. If you ask them to your house, you must not dream +of mixing them up with the rest. Though you have done them an honour +in asking them at all, you must give them a marked position and bear +them on your hands for the evening. They must be singled out from the +herd and specially attended to; introduced to the nicest people; +made a fuss with and taken care of; else they are offended, and feel +they have been slighted--their sensitiveness or fine feelings being a +kind of Chat Moss which will swallow up any quantity of _petits soins_ +that may be thrown in, and yet never be filled. If they are your +intimate friends, you have to ask them on every occasion on which you +receive. They make it a grievance if they hear that you have had even +a dinner party without inviting them, though your space is limited and +you had them at your last gathering. Still, if it comes to their ears +that you have had friends and did not include them, they will come +down on you to a dead certainty if they are of the franker kind, and +ask you seriously, perhaps pathetically, how they have offended you? +If they are of the sullen sort they will meet you coldly, or pass you +by without seeing you; and will either drift into a permanent +estrangement or come round after a time, according to the degree of +acidity in their blood and the amount of tenacity in their character. +They have lost their friends many times for no worse offence than +this. + +They are as punctilious too, as they are exacting. They demand visit +for visit, invitation for invitation, letter for letter. Though you +may be overwhelmed with serious work, while they have no weightier +burden strapped to their shoulders than their social duties and social +fineries, yet you must render point for point with them, keeping an +exact tally with not a notch too many on their side, if you want +to retain their acquaintance at all. And they must be always invited +specially and individually, even to your open days; else they will not +come at all; and their fine feelings will be hurt. They suffer no +liberties to be taken with them and they take none with others; +counting all frock-coat friendliness as taking liberties, and holding +themselves refined and you coarse if you think that manners _sans +façon_ are pleasanter than those which put themselves eternally into +stays and stiff buckram, and are never in more undress than a Court +suit. They will not go into your house to wait for you, however +intimate they may be; and they would resent it as an intrusion, +perhaps an impertinence, if you went into theirs in their absence. If +you are at luncheon when they call, they stiffly leave their cards and +turn away; though you have the heartiest, jolliest manner of +housekeeping going, and keep a kind of open house for luncheon +casuals. They do not understand heartiness or a jolly manner of +housekeeping; open houses are not in their line and they will not be +luncheon casuals; so they turn away grimly, and if you want to see +them you have to send your servant panting down the street after them, +when, their dignity being satisfied, their sensitiveness smoothed down +and their fine feelings reassured, they will graciously turn back and +do what they might have done at first without all this fuss and fume. + +When people who possess fine feelings are poor, their +sensitiveness is indeed a cross both for themselves and their friends +to bear. If you try to show them a kindness or do them a service, they +fly out at you for patronizing them, and say you humiliate them by +treating them as paupers. You may do to your rich acquaintances a +hundred things which you dare not attempt with your poor friends +cursed with fine feelings; and little offices of kindness, which pass +as current coin through society, are construed into insults with them. +Difficult to handle in every phase, they are in none more dangerous to +meddle with than when poor, though they are as bad if they have become +successful after a period of struggle. Then your attention to them is +time-serving, bowing to the rising sun, worshipping the golden calf, +&c. Else why did you not seek them out when they were poor? Why were +you not cap in hand when they went bare-headed? Why have you waited +until they were successful before you recognized their value? + +It is funny to hear how bitter these sensitive folks are when they +have come out into the sunlight of success after the dark passage of +poverty; as if it had been possible to dig them out of their obscurity +when their name was still to make--as if the world could recognize its +prophets before they had spoken. But this admission into the +penetralia after success is a very delicate point with people of fine +feelings, supposing always the previous struggle to have been hard; +and even if there has been no struggle to speak of, then there are +doubts and misgivings as to whether they are liked for themselves +or not, and morbid speculations on the stability and absolute value of +the position they hold and the attentions they receive, and endless +surmises of what would be the result if they lost their fame or wealth +or political power or social standing--or whatever may be the hook +whereon their success hangs, and their fine feelings are impaled. The +act of wisdom most impossible to be performed by these self-torturers +is the philosophic acceptance of life as it is and of things as they +fall naturally to their share. + +Women remarkable for fine feelings are also remarkable for that uneasy +distrust, that insatiable craving which continually requires +reassuring and allaying. As wives or lovers they never take a man's +love, once expressed and loyally acted on, as a certainty, unless +constantly repeated; hence they are always pouting or bemoaning their +loveless condition, getting up pathetic scenes of tender accusation or +sorrowful acceptance of coolness and desertion, which at the first may +have a certain charm to a man because flattering to his vanity, but +which pall on him after a short time, and end by annoying and +alienating him; thus bringing about the very catastrophe which was +deprecated before it existed. + +Another characteristic with women of fine feelings is their inability +to bear the gentlest remonstrance, the most shadowy fault-finding. A +rebuke of any gravity throws them into hysterics on the spot; but even +a request to do what they have not been in the habit of doing, or to +abstain from doing that which they have used themselves to do, is +more than they can endure with dry-eyed equanimity. You have to live +with them in the fool's paradise of perfectness, or you are made to +feel yourself an unmitigated brute. You have before you the two +alternatives of suffering many things which are disagreeable and which +might easily be remedied, or of having your wife sobbing in her own +room and going about the house with red eyes and an expression of +exasperating patience under ill-treatment, far worse to bear than the +most passionate retaliation. Indeed women may be divided broadly into +those who cry and those who retort when they are found fault with; +which, with a side section of those wooden women who 'don't care,' +leaves a very small percentage indeed of those who can accept a rebuke +good-temperedly, and simply try to amend a failing or break off an +unpleasant habit, without parade of submission and sweet Griseldadom +unjustly chastised, but kissing the rod with aggravating meekness. + +For there are women who can make their meekness a more potent weapon +of offence than any passion or violence could give. They do not cry, +neither do they complain, but they exaggerate their submission till +you are driven half mad under the slow torture they inflict. They look +at you so humbly; they speak to you in so subdued a voice, when they +speak to you at all, which is rarely and never unless first addressed; +they avoid you so pointedly, hurrying away if you are going to meet +them about the house, on the pretext of being hateful to your +sight and doing you a service by ridding you of their presence; they +are so ostentatiously careful that the thing of which you mildly +complained under some circumstances shall never happen again under any +circumstances, that you are forced at last out of your entrenchments, +and obliged to come to an explanation. You ask them what is amiss? or, +what do they mean by their absurd conduct? and they answer you +'Nothing,' with an injured air or affected surprise at your query. +What have they done that you should speak to them so harshly? They are +sure they have done all they could to please you, and they do not know +what right you have to be vexed with them again. They have kept out of +your way and not said a word to annoy you; they have only tried to +obey you and to do as you ordered, and yet you are not satisfied! What +can they do to please you? and why is it that they never can please +you whatever they do? You get no nearer your end by this kind of +thing; and the only way to bring your Griselda to reason is by having +a row; when she will cry bitterly, but finally end by kissing and +making up. You have to go through the process. Nothing else, save a +sudden disaster or an unexpected pleasure of large dimensions, will +save you from it; but as we cannot always command earthquakes nor +godsends, and as the first are dangerous and the last costly, the +short and easy method remaining is to have a decisive 'understanding,' +which means a scene and a domestic tempest with smooth sailing till +the next time. + +Sometimes fine feelings are hurt by no greater barbarity than that +which is contained in a joke. People with fine feelings are seldom +able to take a joke; and you will hear them relating, with an injured +accent and as a serious accusation, the merest bit of nonsense you +flung off at random, with no more intention of wounding them than had +the merchant the intention of putting out the Efreet's eye when he +flung his date-stones in the desert. As you cannot deny what you have +said, they have the whip-hand of you for the moment; and all you can +hope for is that the friend to whom they detail their grievance will +see through them and it, and understand the joke if they cannot. Then +there are fine feelings which express themselves in exceeding +irritation at moral and intellectual differences of opinion--fine +feelings bound up in questions of faith and soundness of doctrine, +having taken certain moral and theological views under their especial +patronage and holding all diversity of judgment therefrom a personal +offence. The people thus afflicted are exceedingly uncomfortable folks +to deal with, and manage to make every one else uncomfortable too. You +hurt their feelings so continually and so unconsciously, that you +might as well be living in a region of steel-traps and spring-guns, +and set to walk blindfold among pitfalls and water-holes. You fling +your date-stone here too, quite carelessly and thinking no evil, +and up starts the Efreet who swears you have injured him intentionally. +You express an opinion without attaching any particular importance +to it, but you hurt the fine feelings which oppose it, and unless you +wish to have a quarrel you must retract or apologize. As the worst +temper always carries the day, and as fine feelings are only bad tempers +under another name, you very probably do apologize; and so the matter +ends. + +Other people show their fineness of feeling by their impatience of +pain and the tremendous grievance they think it that they should +suffer as others--they say, so much more than others. These are the +people who are great on the theory of nervous differences, and who +maintain that their cowardice and impatience of suffering means an +organization like an Æolian harp for sensibility. The oddest part of +the business is the sublime contempt which these sensitives have for +other persons' patience and endurance, and how much more refined and +touching they think their own puerile sensibility. But this is a +characteristic of humanity all through; the masquerading of evil under +the name of good being one of the saddest facts of an imperfect nature +and a confused system of morals. If all things showed their faces +without disguise, we should have fine feelings placed in a different +category from that in which they stand at this moment, and the world +would be the richer by just so much addition of truth. + + + + +_SPHINXES._ + + +There are people to whom mystery is the very breath of life and the +main element of their existence. Without it they are insignificant +nobodies; by its aid they are magnified into vague and perhaps awful +potentialities. They are the people who take the Sphinx for their +model, and like her, speak darkly and in parables; making secrets of +every-day matters which would be patent to the whole world in their +simplicity, but which, by the magic of enigmatic handling, become +riddles that the curious would give their lives to unravel. + +Nothing with these people is confessed and above board, and nothing is +shown openly so that you may look at it all round and judge for +yourself what it is like and what it is worth. The utmost they do is +to uncover just a corner of something they keep back in the bulk, +tantalizing you with glimpses that bewilder and mislead; or they will +dangle before you the end of a clue which they want you to take up and +follow, making you believe that you will be guided thereby into the +very heart of a mystery, and that you will find a treasure hidden in +the centre of the maze which will abundantly repay you for the +trouble of hunting it out. Nine times out of ten you will find nothing +but a scarecrow of no more value than the rags of which it is +composed--if even you find that. They are the people who repeat to you +the most trivial things you may have said, and who remind you of the +most unimportant things you may have done, years ago, all of which you +have totally forgotten; but they will speak of them in a mysterious +manner, as if they had been matters of vital meaning at the +time--things which would open, if followed up, a page in your private +history that it were better should be forgotten. As it is a question +of memory, you cannot deny point-blank what they affirm; and as we all +have pages of private history which we would rather not hear read +aloud at the market-cross, you are obliged to accept their highly +suggestive recollections with a queer feeling of helplessness and +being somehow in their power--not knowing how much they are really +acquainted with your secret affairs, nor whether the signal they have +flashed before your eyes is a feint or a revelation. + +Of the same sort, with a difference, are those who are always going to +tell you something some day--people burdened with a perennial mystery +which never sees the light. You are for ever tormented with these folks' +possibilities of knowledge. You turn over in your own mind every +circumstance that you think they could have got hold of; you cunningly +subject all your common friends to crafty cross-examination; you go, +link by link, through the whole chain connecting you with them; but +you can find nothing that leads to the mere outskirts of the mystery. +You can make nothing of it; and your sphinx goes on to the end promising +some day to tell you something which dies with him untold. Your only +consolation is the inner conviction that there was nothing to tell +after all. + +Then there are sphinxes of a more personal kind--people who keep their +affairs a profound secret from every one, who wash all their dirty +linen scrupulously at home and double-lock the door of the cupboard +where the family skeleton lives. They are dungeons of silence, +unfathomable abysses of reserve. You never know more of them, mind nor +estate, than what you can learn from the merest outside of things. +Look back, and you cannot recollect that you have ever heard them +speak of their family or of their early days; and you are not +acquainted with a living soul with whom they are connected. You may +visit them for years without knowing that such and such a friend is +their cousin, or maybe their sister. If they are unmarried men, they +have no address save at their club; and neither you nor their most +intimate friends have an idea where they sleep. For all you know to +the contrary they may be married, with a fine flourishing family +snugly stowed away in some suburban villa, where perhaps they live +under another name, or with the omission or addition of a title that +effectually masks their real individuality. If this is their +special manifestation of sphinxhood, they take as many precautions +against being identified as a savage when out on a scouting +expedition. They obliterate all traces of themselves so soon as they +leave their office in the City, and take it as a terrible misfortune +if the truth is ever discovered; though there is nothing disgraceful +in their circumstances, and their wives and children are healthy and +presentable. + +Most of us have been startled by the sudden discovery, in our own +circle of friends, of the wife and children of some member of our +society hitherto supposed to be a bachelor and unshackled. All the +time that we have been joking him on his celibacy and introducing him +to various young ladies likely to make good wives if properly taught, +he has been living in the holy estate a little way out of town, where +he is at last stumbled on by some OEdipus who tells the secret to all +the world and blows the mystery to the winds. We may be very sure that +the officious OEdipus in question gets no thanks for his pains, and +that the sphinx he has unmasked would rather have gone on living in +congenial secrecy with his unacknowledged family in that remote +suburban villa, than be forced into publicity and recognition. Leading +two lives and personating two men--the one as imagined by his friends, +the other as known to his belongings--was a kind of existence he liked +infinitely better than the commonplace respectability of being _en +évidence_ throughout. + +With certain sphinxes, no one but the officials concerned ever +knows what they have done, where they have served, what laurels they +have gained. It comes out quite by accident that they were in the +Crimea, where, like Jack Poyntz in _School_, they were heroes in their +own way, though they don't talk about it; or that they performed +prodigies of valour in the Indian Mutiny and obtained the Victoria +Cross, which they never wear. This kind has at least the merit of +being unboastful; keeping their virtues hidden like the temple which +the real sphinx held between her paws, and to which only those had +access who knew the secret of the way. But though it is hateful to +hear a man blowing his own trumpet in season and out of season, yet it +is pleasant to know the good deeds of one's neighbours, and to have +the power of admiring what is worthy of admiration. Besides, modesty +and mystery are not the same things; and there is a mean to be found +between the secrecy of a sphinx making riddles of commonplace matters, +and the cackle of a hen when she has laid an egg for the family +breakfast. + +The monetary or financial sphinx is one of the oddest of the whole +tribe and one of the most mysterious. There are people who live on +notoriously small incomes--such as the widows, say, of naval or +military men, whose pensions are printed in blue-books and of whose +yearly receipts the world can take exact cognizance--yet who dress in +velvet and satin, perpetually go about in cabs and hired carriages, +and are never without money to spend, though always complaining +of poverty. How these financial sphinxes manage surpasses the +understanding of every one; and by what royal road they arrive at the +power of making two do the work of four is hidden from the ordinary +believers in Cocker. You know their ostensible income; indeed, they +themselves put it at so much; but they keep up a magnificent +appearance on a less sum than that on which you would go shabby and +dilapidated. When you ask them how it is done, they answer, 'by +management.' Anything can be done by management, they say, by those +who have the gift; which you feel to be an utterance of the sphinx--a +dark saying the key to which has not yet been forged. + +You calculate to the best of your ability, and you know that you are +sound in your arithmetic; but, do what you will, you can never come to +the rule by which five hundred a year can be made to compass the +expenditure of a thousand. If you whisper secret supplies, concealed +resources, your sphinx will not so much as wink her eyelid. How she +contrives to make her ostensible five hundred do the work of a +thousand--how she gets velvet and satin for the value of cotton and +stuff, and how, though always complaining of poverty, she keeps +unfailingly flush of cash--how all this is done is her secret, and she +holds it sacred. And you may be quite sure of one thing--it is a +secret she will never share with you nor any one else. + +The rapidly-working _littérateur_ is another sphinx worth +studying as a curiosity--we might say, indeed, a living miracle. There +he stands, a jovial, self-indulgent, enjoying man, out in society +every night in the week; by no means abstinent from champagne, and as +little given to early rising as he is to consumption of the midnight +oil. But he gets through a mass of work which would be respectable in +a mere copyist, and which is little less than miraculous in an +original producer. How he thinks, when he finds time to make up his +plots, to work out his characters, even to correct his proofs, are +riddles unanswerable by all his friends. Taking the mere mechanical +act alone, he must write faster than any living man has ever been +known to write, to get through all that goes under his name. And when +is it done? Literary sphinxes of this kind go about unchallenged; +indeed, they are very much about, and to be beheld everywhere; and one +looks at them with respect, not knowing of what material they are +made, nor of what mysterious gifts they are the possessors. Novels, +plays, essays, poems, come pouring forth in never slackening supply. +The railway stations and all hoardings are made gorgeous by the +announcement of their feats set out in red and blue and yellow. No +sooner has one blaze of triumph burnt itself out than another blaze of +triumph flares up; and nothing but death or a rich inheritance seems +likely to stop their mysterious fecundity. How is it done? That is the +secret of the literary sphinx, to which the admiring and amazed +brotherhood is anxiously seeking some clue; but up to the present hour +it has been kept jealously guarded and no solution has been arrived +at. + +There is another form of the literary sphinx in the Nobodies and Anons +who speak from out the darkness and let no man see whence the voice +proceeds. They are generally tracked to their lair sooner or later, +and the sphinx's head turns out to be only a pasteboard mask behind +which some well-known Apuleian hid himself for a while, working much +amazement among the wondering crowd while the clasps held good, but +losing something of that fervid worship when the reality became known. +Others, again, of these Anons have, like Junius, kept their true abode +hidden and their name a mystery still, though there be some who swear +they have traced the footsteps and know exactly where the sphinx +lives, and what is the name upon his frontlet, and of what race and +complexion he is without his mask. It may be so. But as every +discoverer has a track of his own, and as each swears that his sphinx +is the real one and no other, the choice among so many becomes a +service of difficulty; and perhaps the wisest thing to do is to +suspend judgment until the literary sphinx of the day chooses to +reveal himself by the prosaic means of a title-page, with his name as +author printed thereon and his place of abode jotted down at the foot +of the preface. + + + + +_FLIRTING._ + + +There are certain things which can never be accurately +described--things so shadowy, so fitful, so dependent on the mood of +the moment, both in the audience and the actor, that analysis and +representation are equally at fault. And flirting is one of them. What +is flirting? Who can define or determine? It is more serious than +talking nonsense and not so serious as making love; it is not chaff +and it is not feeling; it means something more than indifference and +yet something less than affection; it binds no one; it commits no one +though it raises expectations in the individual and sets society on +the look-out for results; it is a plaything in the hands of the +experienced but a deadly weapon against the breast of the unwary; and +it is a thing so vague, so protean, that the most accurate measurer of +moral values would be puzzled to say where it exactly ends and where +serious intentions begin. + +But again we ask: What is flirting? What constitutes its essence? What +makes the difference between it and chaff on the one hand, and it and +love-making on the other? Has it a cumulative power, and, +according to the old saying of many a pickle making a mickle, does a +long series of small flirtings make up a concrete whole of love? or is +it like an unmortared heap of bricks, potential utilities if +conditions were changed, but valueless as things are? The man who +would be able to reduce flirting to a definite science, who could +analyze its elements and codify its laws, would be doing infinite +service to his generation; but we fear that this is about as difficult +as finding the pot of gold under the end of a rainbow, or catching +small birds with a pinch of salt. + +Every one has his or her ideas of what constitutes flirting; +consequently every one judges of that pleasant exercise according to +individual temperament and experience. Faded flowers, who see +impropriety in everything they are no longer able to enjoy, say with +more or less severity that Henry and Angelina are flirting if they are +laughing while whispering together in an alcove, probably the most +innocent nonsense in the world; but the fact that they are enjoying +themselves in their own way, albeit a silly one, is enough for the +faded flower to think they are after mischief, flirting being to her +mind about the worst bit of mischief that a fallen humanity can +perpetrate. The watchful mother, intent on chances, says that dancing +together oftener than is necessary for good breeding and just the +amount of attention demanded by circumstances, is flirting; timid +girls newly out, and not yet used to the odd ways of men, think +they are being flirted with outrageously if their partner fires off +the meekest little compliment at them, or looks at them more tenderly +than he would look at a cabbage; but bolder spirits of both sexes +think nothing worthy of the name which does not include a few +questionable familiarities, and an equivoke or two, more or less +risky. With some, flirting is nothing but the passing fun of the +moment; with others, it is the first lesson of the great unopened book +and means the beginning of the end; with some, it is not even angling +with intent; with others, it is deep-sea fishing with a broad, +boldly-made net, and taking all fish that come in as good for sport if +not for food. + +Flirts are of many kinds as well as of all degrees. There are quiet +flirts and demonstrative flirts; flirts of the subtle sort whose +practice is made by the eyes alone, by the manner, by the tender +little sigh, by the bend of the head and the wave of the hand, to give +pathos and point to the otherwise harmless word; and flirts of the +open and rampant kind, who go up quite boldly towards the point, but +who never reach it, taking care to draw back in time before they +fairly cross the border. This is the kind which, as the flirt male, +does incalculable damage to the poor little fluttering dove to whom it +is as a bird of prey, handsome, bold, cruel; but this is the kind +which has unlimited success, using as it does that immense moral +leverage we call 'tantalizing'--for ever rousing hopes and exciting +expectations, and luring a woman on as an _ignis fatuus_ lures us +on across the marsh, in the vain belief that it will bring us to our +haven at last. + +Akin to this kind are those male flirts who are great in the way in +which they manage to insinuate things without committing themselves to +positive statements. They generally contrive to give the impression of +some mysterious hindrance by which they are held back from full and +frank confession. They hint at fatal bonds, at unfortunate +attachments, at a past that has burnt them up or withered them up, at +any rate that has prevented their future from blossoming in the +direction in which they would fain have had it blossom and bear fruit. +They sketch out vaguely the outlines of some thrilling romance; a few, +of the Byronic breed, add the suspicion of some dark and melancholy +crime as a further romantic charm and personal obstacle; and when they +have got the girl's pity, and the love that is akin to pity, then they +cool down scientifically, never creating any scandal, never making any +rupture, never coming to a moment when awkward explanations can be +asked, but cooling nevertheless, till the thing drops of its own +accord and dies out from inanition; when they are free to carry their +sorrows and their mysteries elsewhere. Some men spend their lives in +this kind of thing, and find their pleasure in making all the women +they know madly or sentimentally in love with them; and if by chance +any poor moth who has burned her wings makes too loud an outcry, +the tables are turned against her dexterously, and she is held up to +public pity--contempt would be a better word--as one who has suffered +herself to love too well and by no means wisely, and who has run after +a Lothario by no means inclined to let himself be caught. + +Then there are certain men who flirt only with married women, and +others who flirt only with girls; and the two pastimes are as +different as tropical sunlight and northern moonshine. And there are +some who are 'brothers,' and some who are 'fathers' to their young +friends--suspicious fathers on the whole, not unlike Little Red +Ridinghood's grandmother the wolf, with perilously bright eyes, and +not a little danger to Red Ridinghood in the relationship, how +delightful soever it may be to the wolf. Some are content with +cousinship only--which however breaks down quite sufficient fences; +and some are 'dearest friends,' no more, and find that an exceedingly +useful centre from which to work onward and outward. For, if any peg +will do on which to hang a discourse, so will any relationship or +adoption serve the ends of flirting, if it be so willed. + +But what is flirting? Is sitting away in corners, talking in low +voices and looking personally affronted if any unlucky outsider comes +within earshot, flirting? Not necessarily. It is just possible that +Henry may be telling Angelina all about his admiration for her sister +Grace; or Angelina may be confessing to Henry what Charley said to +her last night;--which makes her lower her eyes as she is doing now, +and play with the fringe of her fan so nervously. May be, if not +likely. So that sitting away in corners and whispering together is not +necessarily flirting, though it may look like it. Is dancing all the +'round' dances together? This goes for decided flirting in the code of +the ball-room. But if the two keep well together? If they are really +fond of dancing, as one of the fine arts combining science and +enjoyment, they would dance with each other all night, though outside +the 'marble halls' they might be deadly enemies--Montagues and +Capulets, with no echo of Romeo and Juliet to soften their mutual +dislike. So that not even dancing together oftener than is absolutely +necessary is unmistakeable evidence, any more than is sitting away in +corners, seeing that equal skill and keeping well in step are reasons +enough for perpetual partnership, making all idea of flirtation +unnecessary. In fact, there is no outward sign nor symbol of flirting +which may not be mistaken and turned round, because flirting is so +entirely in the intention and not in the mere formula, that it becomes +a kind of phantasm, a Proteus, impossible to seize or to depict with +accuracy. + +One thing however, we can say--taking gifts and attentions, offered +with evident design and accepted with tacit understanding, may be +certainly held as constituting an important element of flirting. But +this is flirting on the woman's side. And here you are being +continually taken in. Your flirt of the cunningly simple kind, +who smiles so sweetly and seems so flatteringly glad to see you when +you come, who takes all your presents and acted expressions of love +with the most bewitching gratitude and effusion, even she, so simple +as she seems to be, slips the thread and will not be caught if she +does not wish to be caught. At the decisive moment when you think you +have secured her, she makes a bound and is away; then turns round, +looks you in the face, and with many a tear and pretty asseveration +declares that she never understood you to mean what you say you have +meant all along; and that you are cruel to dispel her dream of a +pleasant and harmless friendship, and very wicked indeed because you +press her for a decision. Yes; you are cruel, because you have +believed her honest; cruel, because you did not see through the veil +of flattery and insincerity in which she clothed her selfishness; +cruel, because she was false. This is the flirt's logic when brought +to book, and forced to confess that her pretended love was only +flirting, and that she led you on to your destruction simply because +it pleased her vanity to make you her victim. + +Then there are flirts of the open and rollicking kind, who let you go +far, very far indeed, when suddenly they pull up and assume an +offended air as if you had wilfully transgressed known and absolute +boundaries--girls and women who lead you on, all in the way of good +fellowship, to knock you over when you have got just far enough to +lose your balance. That is their form of the art. They like to +see how far they can make a man forget himself, and how much stronger +their own delusive enticements are than prudence, experience and +common-sense. And there are flirts of the artful and 'still waters' +kind, something like the male flirts spoken of just now; sentimental +little pusses--perhaps pretty young wives with uncomfortable husbands, +whose griefs have by no means soured nor scorched, but just mellowed +and refined, them. Or they may be of the sisterly class; creatures so +very frank, so very sisterly and confiding and unsuspicious of evil, +that really you scarcely know how to deal with them at all. And there +are flirts of the scientific kind; women who have studied the art +thoroughly; and who are adepts in the use of every weapon known--using +each according to circumstances and the nature of the victim, and +using each with deadly precision. From such may a kind Providence +deliver us! As the tender mercies of the wicked, so are the scientific +flirts--the women and the men who play at bowls with human hearts, for +the stakes of a whole life's happiness on the one side and a few weeks +of gratified vanity on the other. + +It used to be an old schoolboy maxim that no real gentleman could be +refused by a lady, because no real gentleman could presume beyond his +line of encouragement. _À fortiori_, no lady would or could give more +encouragement than she meant. What are we to say then of our flirts if +this maxim be true? Are they really 'no gentlemen' and 'no ladies,' +according to the famous formula of the kitchen? Perhaps it would +be said so if gentlehood meant now, as it meant centuries ago, the +real worth and virtue of humanity. For flirting with intent is a +cruel, false, heartless amusement; and time was when cruelty and +falsehood were essentially sins which vitiated all claims to +gentlehood. And yet the world would be very dull without that innocent +kind of nonsense which often goes by the name of flirting--that +pleasant something which is more than mere acquaintanceship and less +than formal loverhood--that bright and animated intercourse which +makes the hours pass so easily, yet which leaves no bitter pang of +self-reproach--that indefinite and undefinable interest by which the +one man or the one woman becomes a kind of microcosm for the time, the +epitome of all that is pleasant and of all that is lovely. The only +caution to be observed is:--Do not go too far. + + + + +_SCRAMBLERS._ + + +There are people who are never what Northern housewives call +'straight'--people who seem to have been born in a scramble, who live +in a scramble, and who, when their time comes, will die in a scramble, +just able to scrawl their signature to a will that ought to have been +made years ago, and that does not embody their real intentions now. +Emphatically the Unready, they are never prepared for anything, +whether expected or unexpected; they make no plans more stable than +good intentions; and they neither calculate nor foresee. Everything +with them is hurry and confusion; not because they have more to do +than other people, but because they do it more loosely and less +methodically--because they have not learnt the art of dovetailing nor +the mystery of packing. Consequently half their pleasures and more +than half their duties slip through their fingers for want of the +knack of compact holding; and their lives are passed in trying to pick +up what they have let drop and in frantic endeavours to remedy their +mistakes. For scramblers are always making mistakes and going through +an endless round of forgetting. They never remember their +engagements, but accept in the blandest and frankest way imaginable +two or more invitations for the same day and hour, and assure you +quite seriously when, taught by experience, you push them hard and +probe them deep, that they have no engagement whatever on hand and are +certain not to fail you. In an evil hour you trust to them. When the +day comes they suddenly wake to the fact that they had accepted Mrs. +So-and-So's invitation before yours; and all you get for your empty +place and your careful arrangements ruthlessly upset, is a hurried +note of apology which comes perhaps in the middle of dinner, perhaps +sometime next day, when too late to be of use. + +If they forget their own engagements they also ignore yours, no matter +how distinctly you may have tabulated them; and are sure to come +rattling to your house on the day when you said emphatically you were +engaged and could not see them. If you keep to your programme and +refuse to admit them, more likely than not you affront them. +Engagements being in their eyes moveable feasts, which it does not in +the least degree signify whether they keep on the date set down or +not, they cannot understand your rigidity of purpose; and were it not +that as a tribe they are good-natured, and too fluid to hold even +annoyance for any length of time, you would in all probability have a +quarrel fastened on you because your scrambling friends chose to make +a calendar for themselves and to insist on your setting your diary by +it. + +As they ignore your appointed hours, so do they forget your +street and number. They always stick to your first card, though you +may have moved many times since it was printed, duly apprizing them of +each change as it occurred. That does not help you, for they never +note the changes of their friends' addresses, but keep loyally to the +first. It all comes to the same in the end, they say, and the postman +is cleverer than they. But they do not often trouble their friends +with letters on their own account, for they have a speciality for not +answering such as are written to them. When they do by chance answer +them, they never reply to the questions asked nor give the news +demanded. They do not even reply to invitations like other people, but +leave you to infer from their silence the acceptance or rejection they +are meditating. When they in their turn invite you, they generally +puzzle you by mismatching the day of the week with the date of the +month, leaving you tormented with doubt which you are to go by; and +they forget to give you the hour. Besides this, they write an +illegible hand; and they are famous for the blots they make and the +Queen's heads they omit. + +A scrambling wife is no light cross to a man who values order and +regularity as part of his home life. She may be, and probably is, the +best-tempered creature in the world--a peevish scrambler would be too +unendurable--but a fresh face, bright eyes and a merry laugh do not +atone for never-ending disorder and discomfort. This kind of thing +does not depend on income and is not to be remedied by riches. The +households where my lady has nothing to do but let her maid keep +her to the hours she herself has appointed are just as uncomfortable +in their way as poorer establishments, if my lady is a scrambler, and +cannot be taught method and the value of holding on by the forelock. +Sometimes my lady gets herself into such an inextricable coil of +promises and engagements, all crossing each other, that in despair she +takes to her bed and gives herself out as ill, and so cuts what she +cannot untie. People wonder at her sudden indisposition, looking as +she did only yesterday in the bloom of health; and they wonder at her +radiant reappearance in a day or two without a trace of even languor +upon her. They do not know that her retirement was simply a version of +the famous rope trick, and that, like the Brothers Davenport, she went +into the dark to shake herself free of the cords with which she had +suffered herself to be bound. It is a short and easy method certainly, +but it has rather too much of the echo of 'Wolf' in it to bear +frequent repetition. + +In houses of a lower grade, where the lady is her own housekeeper, the +habit of scrambling of course leads to far greater and more manifest +confusion. The servants catch from the mistress the trick of +overstaying time; and punctuality at last comes to mean an elastic +margin, where fixed duties and their appointed times appear +cometically at irregular intervals. The cook is late with dinner; the +coachman begins to put-to a little after the hour he was ordered +to be at the door; but they know that, however late they are, the +chances are ten to one their mistress will not be ready for them, and +that in her heart she will be grateful to them for the shelter their +own unpunctuality affords her. This being so, they take their time and +dawdle at their pleasure; thus adding to the pressure which always +comes at the end of the scrambler's day, when everything is thrown +into a chaotic mass and nothing comes out straight or complete. + +Did any one ever know a scrambling woman ready at the moment in her +own house? That she should be punctual to any appointment out of her +house is, of course, not to be thought of; but she makes an awkward +thing of it sometimes at home. Her guests are often all assembled, and +the dinner hour has struck, before she has torn off one gown and +dragged on another. What she cannot tie she pins; and her pins are +many and demonstrative. She wisps up her hair, not having left herself +time to braid it; and the consequence is that before she has been half +an hour in the room ends and tails are sure to stray playfully from +their fastenings and come tumbling about her ears. Her jewels are +mismatched, her colours ill-assorted, her belt is awry, her bouquet +falling to pieces. She rushes into the drawing-room in her morning +slippers, smiling and good-tempered, with a patch-work look about +her--something forgotten in her attire that makes her whole appearance +shaky and unfinished--fastening her last button or clasping on +her first bracelet. She is full of regrets and excuses delivered in +her joyous, buoyant manner, or in a voice so winning, an accent so +coaxing, that you cannot be annoyed. Besides, you leave the annoyance +to her husband, who is sure to have in reserve a pickle quite +sufficiently strong for the inevitable rod, as the poor scrambler +knows too well. All you can do is to accept her apologies with a good +grace, and to carry away with you a vivid recollection of an awkward +half-hour, a spoilt dinner, and a scrambling hostess all abroad and +out of time, sweeping through the room very heated, very +good-tempered, only half-dressed and chronically out of breath. + +Scramblers can never learn the value of money, neither for themselves +nor for others. They are famous for borrowing small sums which they +forget to return; but, to do them justice, they are just as willing to +lend what they never dream of asking for again. Long ago they caught +hold of the fact that money is only a circulating medium, and they +have added an extra speed to the circulation at which slower folk +stand aghast. To be sure, the practical results of their theory are +not very satisfactory, and the confusion between the possessive +pronouns which distinguishes their financial catechism is apt to lead +to unpleasant issues. + +Scrambling women are especially notorious for the way in which they +set themselves afloat without sufficient means to carry them on; +finding themselves stranded in mid-career because they have made +no calculations and have forgotten the rule of subtraction. They find +themselves at a small Italian town, say, where the virtues of the +British banking system are unknown, and where their letters of credit +and circular notes are not worth more than the value of the paper they +are written on. More than one British matron of respectable condition +and weak arithmetic has found herself in such a plight as this, with +her black-eyed landlord perfectly civil and well-bred, but as firm as +a rock in his resolution that the Signora shall not depart out of his +custody till his little account is paid--a plight out of which she has +to scramble the best way she can, with the loss perhaps of a little +dignity and of more repute--at least in the locality where her solid +scudi gave out and her precious paper could not be cashed. This is the +same woman who offers an omnibus conductor a sovereign for a +three-penny fare; who gives the village grocer a ten-pound note for a +shilling's-worth of sugar; and who, when she comes up to London for a +day's shopping, and has got her last parcel made up and ready to be +put into her cab, finds she has not left herself half enough money to +pay for it--with a shopman whose faith in human nature is by no means +lively, and who only last week was bitten by a lady swindler of +undeniable manners and appearance, and not very unlike herself. She +has been known too, to go into a confectioner's and, after having made +an excellent luncheon, to find to her dismay that she has left +her purse in the pocket of her other dress at home, and that she has +not six-pence about her. In fact there is not an equivocal position in +which forgetfulness, want of method, want of foresight, and all the +other characteristics which make up scrambling in the concrete, can +place her, in which she has not been at some time or other. But no +experience teaches her; the scrambler she was born, the scrambler she +will die, and to the last will tumble through her life, all her ends +flying and deprecating excuses on her lips. + +Scramblers are notoriously great for making promises, and as notorious +for not performing what they promise. Kindhearted as they are in +general, and willing to do their friends a service--going out of their +way indeed to proffer kindnesses quite beyond your expectations and +the range of their duties towards you, and always undertaking works of +supererogation; which works in fact lead to more than half their +normal scramble--they forget the next hour the promise on which you +have based your dearest hopes. Or, if they do not forget it, they find +it is crowded out of time by a multitude of engagements and prior +promises, of all of which they were innocently oblivious when they +offered to do your business so frankly, and swore so confidently they +would set about it now at once and get it out of hand without delay. +The oath and the offer which you took to be as sure as the best +chain-cable, you will find on trial to be only a rope of sand that +could not bind so much as a bunch of tow together, still less +hold the anchor of a life; and many a heart, sick with hope deferred +and wrung with the disappointment which might have been so easily +prevented, has been half broken before now from the anguish that has +followed on the failure of the kindhearted scrambler to perform the +promise voluntarily made, and the service earnestly pressed on a +reluctant acceptor. + +This is the tragic side of the scrambler's career, the shadow thrown +by almost every one of the class. For all the minor delinquencies of +hurry and unpunctuality in social affairs it is not difficult to find +full and ample forgiveness; but when it comes to untrustworthiness in +graver matters, then the scrambler becomes a scourge instead of only +an inconvenience. The only safe way of dealing with the class is to +take them when we can get hold of them, and to accept them for what +they are worth; but not to rely on them, and not to attempt any +mortising of our own affairs with their promises. They are the froth +and foam of society, pretty and pleasant enough in the sunlight as +they splash and splutter about the rocks; but they are not the deep +waters which bear the burden of our ships and by which the life of the +world is maintained. + + + + +_FLATTERY._ + + +Nothing is so delightful as flattery. To hear and believe pleasant +fictions about oneself is a temptation too seductive for weak mortals +to resist, as the typical legends of all mythologies and the private +histories of most individuals show; in consequence of which, home +truths, to one used to ideal portraiture, come like draughts of +'bitter cup' to the dram-drinker. And flattery is dram-drinking; and +yet not quite without good uses to balance its undeniable evil, if it +be only exaggeration and not wholly falsehood; that is, if it assumes +as a matter of course the presence of virtues potential to your +character but not always active, and praises you for what you might be +if you chose to live up to your best. Many a weak brother and weaker +sister, and all children, can be heartened into goodness by a little +dash of judicious praise or flattery where ponderous exhortation and +grave reproof would fail; just as a heavily-laden horse can be coaxed +up-hill when the whip and spur would lead to untimely jibbing. If, on +the contrary, the flattery is of a kind that makes you believe +yourself an exceptionally fine fellow when you are only 'mean +trash'--a king of men when you are nothing better nor nobler than a +moral nigger--making you satisfied with yourself when at your +worst--then it is an unmitigated evil; for it then becomes +dram-drinking of a very poisonous kind, which sooner or later does for +your soul what unlimited blue ruin does for your body. But this is +what we generally mean when we speak of flattery; and this is the kind +which has such a deservedly bad name from moralists of all ages. + +The flatteries of men to women, and those of women to men, are very +different in kind and direction. Men flatter women for what they +are--for their beauty, their grace, their sweetness, their +charmingness in general; while a woman will flatter a man for what he +does--for his speech in the House last night, of which she understands +little; for his book, of which she understands less; or for his +pleading, of which she understands nothing at all. Not that this +signifies much on either side. The most unintellectual little woman in +the world has brains enough to look up in your face sweetly, and +breathe out something that sounds like 'beautiful--charming--so +clever,' vaguely sketching the outline of a hymn of praise to which +your own vanity supplies the versicles. For you must have an +exceptionally strong head if you can rate the sketch at its real value +and see for yourself how utterly meaningless it is. + +You may be the most mystical poet of the day, suggesting to your +acutest readers grave doubts as to your own power of comprehending +yourself; or you may be the most subtle metaphysician, to follow +whom in your labyrinth of reasoning requires perhaps the rarest +order of brains to be met with; but you will nevertheless believe +any narrow-browed, small-headed woman who tells you in a low sweet +voice, with a gentle uplifting of her eyes and a suggestive curve +of her lip, that she has found you both intelligible and charming, +and that she quite agrees with you and shares your every sentiment. +If she further tells you that all her life long she has thought in +exactly the same way but was wholly unable to express herself, and +that you have now supplied her want and translated into words her +vague ideas, and if she says this with a reverential kind of +effusiveness, you are done for, so far as your critical power goes; +and should some candid friend, whom she has not flattered, tell you +with brutal frankness that your bewitching little flatterer has +neither the brains nor the education to understand you, you will set +him down as a slanderer, spiteful and malignant, and call his candour +envy because he has not been so lucky as yourself. + +The most subtle form of flattery is that which asks your advice with +the pretence of needing it--your advice, particularly--yours above +that of all other persons, as the wisest, best, most useful to be +obtained. This too is a form that belongs rather to women in their +relations with men than the converse; though sometimes men will +pretend to want a woman's advice about their love affairs, and +will perhaps make-believe to be guided by it. Not unfrequently, +however, asking one woman's opinion and advice about another is a +masked manner of love-making on its own account; though sometimes it +may be done for flattery only, when there are reasons. Of course not +all advice-asking is flattery; but when intended only to please and +not meant to be genuine, it is perhaps one of the most potent +instruments of the art to be met with. + +But if seeking advice be the most subtle form of flattery, the most +intoxicating is that which pretends to moral elevation or reform by +your influence. The reformation of a rake is a work which no woman +alive could be found to resist if the rake offered it to her as his +last chance of salvation; and to lead a pretty sinner back to the ways +of picturesque virtue by his own influence only is a temptation to +self-reliance which no man could refuse--a flattery which not Diogenes +nor Zeno himself could see through. The pretensions of any one else +would be laughed at cruelly enough; but this is one of the things +where personal experience and critical judgment never go in harness +together--one of the manifestations of flattery which would overcome +the calmest and bewilder the wisest. + +Priests of all denominations are especially open to this kind of +flattery; not only from pretty sinners who have gone openly out of the +right line, but from quite comely and respectable maids and matrons +who have lived blamelessly so far as the broad moral distinctions +go, yet who have not lived the Awakened Life until roused thereunto by +this peculiarly favoured minister. It is a tremendous trial of a man's +discernment when such flattery is offered to him. How much of this +pretended awakening is real? How much of this sudden spiritual insight +is true, and not a mere phrasing, artfully adopted for pleasantness +only? These are the cases where we most want that famous spear of +Ithuriel to help us to a right estimate, for they are beyond the power +of any ordinary man to determine. + +But if priests are subject to these delusions of flattery on the one +hand, they know how to practise them on the other. Take away the +flattery which, mingled with occasional rebuke, forms the great +ministerial spur, and both Revivalism and Ritualism would flag like +flowers without 'the gentle dews.' Scolded for their faults in dress, +for their vanity, extravagance and other feminine vices, are not women +also flattered as the favourites of heaven and of the Church? Are they +not told that they are the lilies of the ecclesiastical garden? the +divinely appointed missionaries for the preservation of virtue and +godly truth in the world? without whom the coarser race of men would +be given over to inconceivable spiritual evil, to infidelity and all +immorality. We may be very sure of this, that if humanity, and +especially feminine humanity, were not flattered as well as chastened, +clerical influence would not last for a day. + +There is one kind of flattery which is common to both men and women, +and that is the expressed preference of sex. Thus, when men want to +flatter women, they say how infinitely they prefer their society to +that of their own sex; and women will say the same to men. Or, if they +do not say it, they will act it. See a set of women congregated +together without the light of a manly countenance among them. They may +talk to each other certainly; and one or two will sit away together +and discuss their private affairs with animation; but the great mass +of them are only half vitalized while waiting the advent of the men to +rouse them into life and the desire to please. No man who goes up +first from the dinner-table, and earlier than he was expected, can +fail to see the change which comes over those wearied, limp, +indifferent-looking faces and figures so soon as he enters the room. +He is like the prince whose kiss woke up the Sleeping Beauty and all +her court; and can any one say that this is not flattery of the most +delightful kind? To be the Pygmalion even for a moment, and for the +weakest order of soul-giving, is about the greatest pleasure that a +man can know, if he be susceptible to the finer kinds of flattery. + +Some women indeed, not only show their preference for men, but openly +confess it, and confess at the same time to a lofty contempt or +abhorrence for the society of women. These are generally women who +are, or have been, beauties; or who have literary and intellectual +pretensions; or who despise babies and contemn housekeeping, and +profess themselves unable to talk to other women because of their +narrowness and stupidity. But for the most part they are women who, by +their beauty or their position, have been used to receive extra +attention from men; and thus their preference is not flattery so much +as _exigence_. Women who have been in India, or wherever else they are +in the minority in society, are of this kind; and nothing is more +amazing to them when they first come home than the attentions which a +certain style of Englishwoman pays to men, instead of demanding and +receiving attentions from them. + +There are also those sweet, humble, caressing women who flatter you +with every word and look, but whose flattery is nothing but a pretty +dress put on for show and taken off when the show is done with. +Anything serves for an occasion with these people. Why, the way in +which certain unmarried women will caress a child before you is an +implied flattery; and they know it. If only they would be careful to +carry these pretty ante-nuptial ways into the home where nothing is to +be gained by them but a humdrum husband's happiness! But too often the +woman whose whole attitude was one of flattering devotion before her +end was gained, gives up every shred of that which she had in such +profusion, when she has attained her object, and lets the home go bare +of that which was so beautiful and seductive in the ball-room and the +flirting corner. + +Some men however, want more home flattery to keep them tolerably happy +and up to the mark than any woman with a soul to be saved by truth can +give. Poets and artists are of this kind--men who literally live on +praise, without which they droop and can do nothing. With them it is +absolutely necessary that the people with whom they are associated +should be of appreciative and sympathetic natures; but the burden +comes heavy when they want, as they generally do, so much more than +this. For, in truth, they want flattery in excess of sympathy; and if +they do not get it they hold themselves as the victims of an unkind +fate, and fill the world with the echo of their woes. This is +nine-tenths of the cause why great geniuses are so often unhappy in +married life. They demand more incessant flattery than can be kept up +by one woman, unless she has not only an exceptional power of love but +also an exceptional power of self-suppression. They think that by +virtue of their genius they are entitled to a Benjamin's mess of +devotion double that given to other men; and when they get only +Judah's share, they cry out that they are ill-used, and make the world +think them ill-used as well. + +But though a little home flattery helps the home life immeasurably, +and greases the creaking domestic wheels more than anything else can, +a great deal is just the most pernicious thing that can be offered. +The belief prevalent in some families that all the very small and +commonplace members thereof are the world's wonders and greater +than any one else--that no one is so clever as Harry, no one so pretty +as Julia, that Amy's red hair is of a more brilliant gold than can be +found elsewhere, and Edward's mathematical abilities about equal to +Newton's--this belief, nourished and acted on, is sure to turn out an +insufferable collection of prigs and self-conceited damsels who have +to be brought down innumerable pegs before they find their own level. +But we often see this; especially in country places where there is not +much society to give a standard for comparative measurement; and we +know that those fond parents and doting relations are blindly and +diligently sowing seeds of bitterness for a future harvest of sorrow +for their darlings. These young people must be made to suffer if they +are to be of any good whatever in the world; and finding their level, +after the exalted position which they have been supposed to fill so +long, and being pelted with the unsavoury missiles of truth in +exchange for all the incense of flattery to which they have been used, +will be suffering enough. But it has to be gone through; this being +one of the penalties to which the unwisdom of love so often subjects +its objects. + +The flattery met with in society is not often very harmful save to +coarse or specially simple natures. You must be either one or the +other to be able to believe it. Lady Morgan was perhaps the most +unblushing and excessive of the tribe of social flatterers; but that +was her engine, the ladder by which she did a good part of her +climbing. We must not confound with this kind of flattery the +impulsive expression of praise or love which certain outspoken people +indulge in to the last. You may as well try to dam up Niagara as to +make some folks reticent of their thoughts and feelings. And when one +of this kind sees anything that he or she likes, the praise has to +come out, with superlatives if the creature be prone to exaggeration. +But this is not flattery; it is merely a certain childlike +expansiveness which lasts with some into quite old age. Unfortunately, +very few understand this childlike expansiveness when they see it. +Hence it subjects its possessor to misrepresentation and unfriendly +jibes, so soon as his or her back is turned, and the explosion of +exaggerated but perfectly sincere praise is discussed critically by +the uninterested part of the audience. + + + + +_LA FEMME PASSÉE._ + + +Without doubt it is a time of trial to all women, more or less painful +according to individual disposition, when they first begin to grow old +and lose their good looks. Youth and beauty make up so much of their +personal value, so much of their natural final cause, that when these +are gone many feel as if their whole career were at an end, and as if +nothing were left to them now that they are no longer young enough to +be loved as girls are loved, or pretty enough to be admired as mature +sirens are admired. For women of a certain position have so little +wholesome occupation, and so little ambition for anything save indeed +that miserable thing called 'getting on in society,' that they cannot +change their way of life with advancing years. Hence they do not +attempt to find interest in things outside themselves, and independent +of the personal attractiveness which in youth constituted their whole +pleasure of existence. + +This is essentially the case with fashionable women, who have staked +their all on appearance, and to whom good looks are of more account +than noble deeds; and, accordingly, the struggle to remain young +is a frantic one with them, and as degrading as it is frantic. + +With the ideal woman of middle age--that pleasant She with her calm +face and soft manner, who unites the charms of both epochs, retaining +the ready responsiveness of youth while adding the wider sympathies of +experience--with her there has been no such struggle to make herself +an anachronism. Consequently she remains beautiful to the last--far +more beautiful than all the pastes and washes in Madame Rachel's shop +could make her. Sometimes, if rarely in these latter days, we meet her +in society, where she carries with her an atmosphere of her own--an +atmosphere of honest, wholesome truth and love, which makes every one +who enters it better and purer for the time. All children and all +young persons love her, because she understands and loves them. For +she is essentially a mother--that is, a woman who can forget herself; +who can give without asking to receive; and who, without losing any of +the individualism which belongs to self-respect, can yet live for and +in the lives of others, and find her best joy in the well-being of +those about her. There is no exaggerated sacrifice in this; it is +simply the fulfilment of woman's highest duty--the expression of that +grand maternal instinct which need not necessarily include the fact of +personal maternity, but which, with all women worthy of the name, must +find utterance in some line of unselfish action. + +The ideal woman of middle age understands the young because she has +lived with them. If a mother, she has performed her maternal duties +with cheerfulness and love. There has been no giving up her nursery to +the care of a hired servant who is expected to do for so many pounds a +year things which the tremendous instinct of a mother's love could not +find strength to do. When she had children, she attended to them in +great part herself, and learnt all about their tempers, their +maladies, and the best methods of management. As they grew up she was +still the best friend they had--the Providence of their young lives +who gave them both care and justice, both love and guidance. Such a +manner of life has forced her to forget herself. When her child lay +ill, perhaps dying, she had no heart and no time to think of her own +appearance, and whether this dressing-gown was more becoming than +that: and what did the doctor think of her with her hair pushed back +from her face?--and what a fright she must have looked in the morning +light after her sleepless night of watching! The world and all its +petty pleasures and paltry pains faded away in the presence of the +stern tragedy of the hour; and not the finest ball of the season +seemed to be worth a thought compared to the all-absorbing question of +whether her child slept after his draught and whether he ate his food +with better appetite. And such a life, in spite of all its cares, has +kept her young as well as unselfish; we should rather say, young +because unselfish. As she comes into the room with her daughters, +her kindly face unpolluted by paint, her dress picturesque or +fashionable according to her taste, but decent in form and consistent +in tone with her age, it is often remarked that she looks more like +the sister than the mother of her girls. This is because she is in +harmony with her age, and has not therefore put herself in rivalry +with them; and harmony is the very keystone of beauty. Her hair is +thickly streaked with white; the girlish firmness and transparency of +her skin have gone; the pearly clearness of her eye is clouded; the +slender grace of line is lost--but for all that she is beautiful, and +she is intrinsically young. What she has lost in outside material +charm--in that mere _beauté du diable_ of youth--she has gained in +character and expression; and by not attempting to simulate the +attractiveness of a girl, she keeps what nature gave her--the +attractiveness of middle age. And as every epoch has its own +beauty--if women would but learn that truth--she is as beautiful now +as a matron of fifty, because in harmony with her years, as she was +when a maiden of sixteen. + +This is the ideal woman of middle age, met with even yet at times in +society--the woman whom all men respect; whom all women envy, and +wonder how she does it; and whom all the young adore, and wish they +had for an elder sister or an aunt. And the secret of it all lies in +truth, in love, in purity, and in unselfishness. + +Standing far apart from this sweet and wholesome idealization is _la +femme passée_ of to-day--the reality as we meet with it at balls and +fêtes and afternoon At Homes, ever foremost in the mad chase after +pleasure, for which alone she seems to think she has been sent into +the world. Dressed in the extreme of youthful fashion; her thinning +hair dyed and crimped and fired till it is more like red-brown tow +than hair; her flaccid cheeks ruddled; her throat whitened; her bust +displayed with unflinching generosity--as if beauty is to be measured +by cubic inches; her lustreless eyes blackened round the lids, to give +the semblance of limpidity to the tarnished whites; perhaps the pupils +dilated by belladonna; perhaps a false and fatal brilliancy for the +moment given by opium, or by eau de cologne, of which she has a store +in her carriage, and drinks as she passes from ball to ball; no kindly +drapery of lace nor of gauze to conceal the breadth of her robust +maturity, to soften the dreadful shadows of her leanness--there she +stands, the wretched creature who will not consent to grow old, and +who still affects to be a fresh coquettish girl when she is nothing +but _la femme passée--la femme passée et ridicule_ into the bargain. + +There is not a folly for which even the thoughtlessness of youth is +but a poor excuse into which she, in all the plenitude of her abundant +experience, does not plunge. Wife and mother as she may be, she flirts +and makes love as if an honourable issue were as open to her as to her +young daughter; or as if she did not know to what end flirting +and making love lead in all ages. If we watch the career of such a +woman, we see how, by slow but very sure degrees, she is obliged to +lower the standard of her adorers, and to take up at last with men of +inferior social position, who are content to buy her patronage by +their devotion. To the best men of her own class she can give nothing +that they value; so she barters with snobs, who go into the +transaction with their eyes open, and take the whole affair as a +matter of exchange, and _quid pro quo_ rigidly exacted. Or she does +really dazzle some very young and low-born man who is weak as well as +ambitious, and who thinks the fugitive regard of a middle-aged woman +of high rank something to be proud of and boasted about. That she is +as old as his own mother--at this moment selling tapes behind a +village counter, or gathering up the eggs in a country farm--tells +nothing against the association with him; and the woman who began her +career of flirtation with the son of a duke ends it with the son of a +shopkeeper, having between these two terms spanned all the several +degrees of degradation which lie between giving and buying. She cannot +help herself; for it is part of the insignia of her artificial youth +to have the reputation of a love-affair, or the pretence of one, even +if the reality be a mere delusion. When such a woman as this is one of +the matrons, and consequently one of the leaders of society, what can +we expect from the girls? What worse example could be given to +the young? When we see her with her own daughters we feel +instinctively that she is the most disastrous adviser they could have; +and when in the company of girls or young married women not belonging +to her, we doubt whether we ought not to warn their natural guardians +against allowing such association, for all that her standing in +society is undeniable, and not a door is shut against her. + +What good in life does this kind of woman do? All her time is taken +up, first in trying to make herself look twenty or thirty years +younger than she is, and then in trying to make others believe the +same. She has neither thought nor energy to spare from this, to her, +far more important work than is feeding the hungry or nursing the +sick, rescuing the fallen or soothing the sorrowful. The final cause +of her existence seems to be the impetus she has given to a certain +branch of trade manufacture--unless we add to this, the corruption of +society. For whom, but for her, are the 'little secrets' which are +continually being advertised as woman's social salvation--regardless +of grammar? The 'eaux noire, brun, et châtain, which dyes the hair any +shade in one minute;' the 'kohl for the eyelids;' the 'blanc de +perle,' and 'rouge de Lubin'--which does not wash off; the 'bleu pour +les veines;' the 'rouge of eight shades,' and 'the sympathetic blush,' +which are cynically offered for the use and adoption of our mothers +and daughters, find their chief patroness in the _femme passée_ who +makes herself up--the middle-aged matron engaged in her frantic +struggle against time, and obstinately refusing to grow old in spite +of all that nature may say or do. Bad as the Girl of the Period is, +this horrible travesty of her vices in the modern matron is even +worse. Indeed, were it not for her, the girls would never have gone to +such lengths as those to which they have gone; for elder women +naturally have immense influence over younger ones, and if mothers +were resolutely to set their faces against the follies of the day, +daughters would and must give in. As it is, some go even ahead of the +young, and, by example on the one hand and rivalry on the other, sow +the curse of corruption broadcast where they were meant to have only a +pure influence and to set a wise example. Were it not for those who +still remain faithful--women who regard themselves as the trustees for +humanity and virtue--the world would go to ruin forthwith; but so long +as the five righteous are left we have hope and a certain amount of +security for the future, when the present disgraceful madness of +society shall have passed away. + + + + +_SPOILT WOMEN._ + + +Like children and all soft things, women are soon spoilt if subjected +to unwholesome conditions. Sometimes the spoiling comes from +over-harshness, sometimes from over-indulgence; what we are speaking +of to-day is the latter condition--the spoiling which comes from being +petted and given way to and indulged, till they think themselves +better than everybody else, and living under laws made specially for +them. Men get spoilt too in the same manner; but for the most part +there is a tougher fibre in them which resists the flabby influences +of flattery and exaggerated attention better than can the morale of +the weaker sex; besides, even arbitrary men meet with opposition in +certain directions, and the most self-contented social autocrat knows +that his adherents criticize though they dare not oppose. + +A man who has been spoilt by success and a gratified ambition, so that +he thinks himself a small Alexander in his own way and able to conquer +any obstacles which may present themselves, has a certain high-handed +activity of will about him that does not interfere with his duties in +life; he is not made fretful and impatient and exigeant as a +woman is--as if he alone of all mankind ought to be exempt from +misfortunes and annoyances; as if his friends must never die, his +youth never fade, his circumstances run always smooth, protected by +the care of others from all untoward hitch; as if time and tide, which +wait for no one else, are bound to him as humble servants dutifully +observant of his wishes. The useful art of finding his level, which he +learnt at school and in his youth generally, keeps him from any very +weak manifestation of being spoilt; save indeed, when he has been +spoilt by women at home, nursed up by an adoring wife and a large +circle of wife's sisters almost as adoring, to all of whom his +smallest wishes are religious obligations and his faintest virtues +godly graces, and who vie with each other which of them shall wait +upon him most servilely, flatter him most outrageously, coax and +coddle him most entirely, and so do him the largest amount of +spiritual damage, and unfit him most thoroughly for the worth and work +of masculine life. A man subjected to this insidious injury is simply +ruined so far as any real manliness of nature goes. He is made into +that sickening creature, 'a sweet being,' as the women call him--a +woman's man with æsthetic tastes and a turn for poetry; full of +highflown sentiment and morbid sympathies; a man almost as much woman +as man, who has no backbone of useful ambition in him, but who puts +his whole life into love, and who becomes at last emphatically not +worth his salt. + +Bad as it is for men of the world to be kowtowed to by men, it is not +so bad, because not so weakening, as the domestic idolatry which +sometimes goes on when one man is the centre of a large family of +women, and the only object upon which the natural feminine instinct +can expend itself. No greater damage can be done to a man than is done +by this kind of domestic idolatry. But, in truth, the evil is too +pleasant to be resisted; and there is scarcely a man so far master of +himself as to withstand the subtle intoxication, the sweet and +penetrating poison, of woman's tender flattery and loving submission. +To a certain extent he holds it so entirely the right thing, because +it is natural and instinctive, that it is difficult to draw the line +and map out exactly the division between right and wrong, pleasantness +and harmfulness, and where loving submission ends and debasing +slavishness begins. + +Spoilt women are spoilt mainly from a like cause: over-attention from +men. A few certainly are to be found, as pampered daughters, with +indulgent mammas and subservient aunts given up to ruining their young +charges with the utmost despatch possible; but this is comparatively a +rare form of the disease, and one which a little wholesome matrimonial +discipline would soon cure. For it is seldom that a petted daughter +becomes a spoilt wife--human affairs having that marvellous power of +equation, that inevitable tendency to readjust the balance, which +prevents the continuance of a like excess under different forms. +Besides, a spoilt daughter generally makes such a supremely unpleasant +wife that the husband has no inducement to continue the mistake, and +therefore either lowers her tone by a judicious exhibition of +snubbing, or, if she be aggressive as well as unpleasant, leaves her +to fight with her shadows in the best way she can, glad for his own +part to escape the strife she will not forego. + +The spoilt woman is impatient of anything like rivalry. She never has +a female friend--certainly not one of her own degree, and not one at +all in the true sense of the word. Friendship presupposes equality; +and a spoilt woman knows no equality. She has been so long accustomed +to consider herself as lady-paramount that she cannot understand it if +any one steps in to share her honours and divide her throne. To praise +the beauty of any other woman, to find her charming, and to pay her +the attention due to a charming woman, is to insult our spoilt +darling, and to slight her past forgiveness. If there is only one good +thing, it must be given to her--the first seat, the softest cushion, +the most protected situation; and she looks for the best of all things +as if naturally consecrated from her birth to the sunshine of life, +and as if the 'cold shade' which may do for others were by no means +the portion allotted to her. + +It is almost impossible to make the spoilt woman understand the grace +or the glory of sacrifice. By rare good fortune she may sometimes be +found to possess an indestructible germ of conscience which +sorrow and necessity can develop into active good; but only sometimes. +The spoilt woman _par excellence_ understands only her own value, only +her own merits and the absolutism of her own requirements; and +sacrifice, self-abnegation, and the whole class of virtues belonging +to unselfishness, are as much unknown to her as is the Decalogue in +the original, or the squaring of the circle. The spoilt woman, as the +wife of an unsuccessful husband or the mother of sickly children, is a +pitiable spectacle. If obliged to sacrifice her usual luxuries, to +make an old gown serve when a new one is desired, to sit up all night +watching by the sick-bed, to witness the painful details of illness, +perhaps of death, to meet hardship face to face and to bend her back +to the burden of sorrow, she is at the first absolutely lost. Not the +thing to be done, but her own discomfort in doing it, is the one +master idea--not others' needs, but her own pain in supplying them, is +the great grief of the moment. Many are the hard lessons set us by +life and fate, but the hardest of all is that given to the spoilt +woman when she is made to think for others rather than for herself, +and is forced by the exigencies of circumstances to sacrifice her own +ease for the greater necessities of her kind. + +All that large part of the true woman's nature which expresses itself +in serving is an unknown function to the spoilt woman. She must be +waited on, but she cannot in her turn serve even the one she loves. +She is the woman who calls her husband from one end of the room +to the other to put down her cup, rather than reach out her arm and +put it down for herself; who, however weary he may be, will bid him +get up and ring the bell, though it is close to her own hand, and her +longest walk during the day has been from the dining-room to the +drawing-room. It is not that she cannot do these small offices for +herself, but that she likes the feeling of being waited on; and it is +not for love, and the amiable if weak pleasure of attracting the +notice of the beloved, but it is for the vanity of being a little +somebody for the moment, and of playing off the small regality +involved in the procedure, that she claims his attention. She would +not return that attention. Unlike the Eastern women, who wait on their +lords hand and foot, and who place their highest honour in their +lowliest service, the spoilt woman of Western life knows nothing of +the natural grace of womanly serving for love, for grace, or for +gratitude. + +This kind of thing is peculiarly strong among the _demi-monde_ of the +higher class, and among women who are of the _demi-monde_ by nature. +The respect they cannot command by their virtues they demand in the +simulation of manner; and perhaps no women are more tenacious of the +outward forms of deference than those who have lost their claim to the +vital reality. It is very striking to see the difference between the +women of this type, the _petites maîtresses_ who require the utmost +attention and almost servility from man, and the noble dignity of +service which the pure woman can afford to give--which she finds +indeed, that it belongs to the very purity and nobleness of her +womanhood to give. It is the old story of the ill-assured position +which is afraid of its own weakness, and the security which can afford +to descend--the rule holding good for other things besides mere social +place. + +Another characteristic of the spoilt woman is the changeableness and +excitability of her temper. All suavity and gentleness and delightful +gaiety and perfect manners when everything goes right, she startles +you by her outburst of petulance when the first cross comes. If no man +is a hero to his valet, neither is a spoilt woman a heroine to her +maid; and the lady who has just been the charm of the drawing-room, +upstairs in her boudoir makes her maid go through spiritual exercises +to which walking among burning ploughshares is easy-going. A length of +lace unstarched, a ribbon unsewed, a flower set awry, anything that +crumples one of the myriad rose-leaves on which she lies, and the +spoilt woman raves as much as if each particular leaf had become +suddenly a bunch of thorns. If a dove were to be transformed to a hawk +the change would not be more complete, more startling, than that which +occurs when the spoilt woman of well-bred company manners puts off her +mask to her maid, and shows her temper over trifles. Whoever else may +suffer the grievances of life, she cannot understand that she also +must be at times one of the sufferers with the rest; and if by +chance the bad moment comes, the person accompanying it has a hard +time of it. + +There are spoilt women also who have their peculiar exercises in +thought and opinion, and who cannot suffer that any one should think +differently from themselves, or find those things sacred which to them +are accursed. They will hear nothing but what is in harmony with +themselves; and they take it as a personal insult when men or women +attempt to reason with them, or even hold their own without flinching. +This kind is to be found specially among the more intellectual of a +family or a circle--women who are pronounced clever by their friends, +and who have been so long accustomed to think themselves clever that +they have become spoilt mentally as others are personally, and fancy +that minds and thoughts must follow in their direction, just as eyes +and hands must follow and attend their sisters. The spoilt woman of +the mental kind is a horrid nuisance generally. She is greatly given +to large discourse. But discourse of a kind that leans all to one +side, and that denies the right of any one to criticize, doubt, or +contradict, is an intellectual Tower of Pisa under the shadow of which +it is not pleasant to live. + + + + +_DOVECOTS._ + + +Times must be very bad indeed if a faithful few are not still left to +keep the sources of society sweet and wholesome. When corruption has +gone through the whole mass and all classes are bad alike, everything +comes to an end, and there is a general overthrow of national life; +but while some are left pure and unspotted, we are not quite undone, +and we may reasonably hope for better days in the future. In the midst +of the reign of the Girl of the Period, with her slang and her +boldness--of the fashionable woman, with her denial of duty and her +madness for pleasure--we come every now and then upon a group of good +girls of the real old English type; the faithful few growing up +silently among us, but none the less valuable because they are silent +and make no public display; doves who are content with life as they +have it in the dovecot, and have no desire to be either eagles +dwelling on romantic heights, or peacocks displaying their pride in +sunny courts. We find these faithful few in town and country alike; +but they are rifest in the country, where there is less temptation to +go wrong than there is in the large towns, and where life is +simpler and the moral tone undeniably higher. The leading feature of +these girls is their love of home and of their own family, and their +power of making occupation and happiness out of apparently meagre +materials. If they are the elders, they find amusement and interest in +their little brothers and sisters, whom they consider immensely funny +and to whom they are as much girl-mothers as sisters; if they are the +youngers, they idolize their baby nephews and nieces. For there is +always a baby going on somewhere about these houses--babies being the +great excitement of home-life, and the antiseptic element among women +which keeps everything else pure. They are passionately attached to +papa and mamma, whom they think the very king and queen of humanity, +yet whom they do not call by even endearing slang names. It has never +occurred to them to criticize them as ordinary mortals; and as they +have not been in the way of learning the prevailing accent of +disrespect, they have not shaken off that almost religious veneration +for their parents which all young people naturally feel, if they have +been well brought up and are not corrupted. + +The yoke in most middle-class country-houses is one fitting very +loosely round all necks; and as they have all the freedom they desire +or could use, the girls are not fretted by undue pressure, and are +content to live in peace under such restraints as they have. They +adore their elder brothers who are from home just beginning the great +battle of life for themselves, and confidently believe them to be +the finest fellows going, and the future great men of the day if only +they care to put out those splendid talents of theirs, and take the +trouble of plucking the prizes within their reach. They may have a +slight reservation perhaps, in favour of the brother's friend, whom +they place on a pedestal of almost equal height. But they keep their +mental architecture a profound secret from every one, and do not +suffer it to grow into too solid a structure unless it has some surer +foundation than their own fancy. For, though doves are loving, they +are by no means lovesick, and are too healthy and natural and quietly +busy for unwholesome dreams. If one of them marries, they all unite in +loving the man who comes in among them. He is adopted as one of +themselves, and leaps into a family of idolizing sisters who pet him +as their brother--with just that subtle little difference in their +petting, in so much as it comes from sisters unaccustomed, and so has +the charm of novelty without the prurient excitement of naughtiness. +But this kind of thing is about the most dangerous to a man's moral +nature that can befall him. Though pretty to see and undeniably +pleasant to experience, and though perfectly innocent in every way, +still, nothing enervates him so much as this idolatrous submission of +a large family of women. In a widow's house, where there are many +daughters and no sons, and where the man who marries one marries the +whole family and is worshipped accordingly, the danger is of course +increased tenfold; but if there are brothers and a father, the +sister's husband, though affectionately cooed over, is not made quite +such a fuss with, and the association is all the less hurtful in +consequence. + +These girls lead a by no means stupid life, though it is a quiet one, +and without any spasmodic events or tremendous cataclysms. They go a +great deal among the village poor, and they teach at the +Sunday-school, and attend the mothers' meetings and clothing-clubs and +the like, and learn to get interested in their humbler friends, who +after all are Christian sisters. They read their romances in real life +instead of in three-volume novels, and study human nature as it is--in +the rough certainly, but perhaps in more genuine form than if they +learnt it only in what is called society. Then they have their +pleasures, though they are of an unexciting kind and what fast girls +would call awfully slow. They have their horses and their croquet +parties, their lawn tennis and their archery meetings; they have +batches of new music, and a monthly box from Mudie's--and they know +the value of both; they go out to tea, and sometimes to dinner, in the +neighbourhood; and they enjoy the rare county balls with a zest +unknown to London girls who are out every night in the week. They have +their village flower-shows, which the great families patronize in a +free-and-easy kind of way, and which give occupation for weeks before +and subject for talk for weeks after; their school feasts, where the +pet parson of the district comes out with his best anecdotes, and +makes mild jokes at a long distance from Sydney Smith; their +periodical missionary meetings, where they have great guns from +London, and where they hear unctuous stories about the saintliness of +converted cannibals, and are required to believe in the power of +change of creed to produce an ethnological miracle; they have their +friends to stay with them--school-girl friends--with whom they +exchange deep confidences, and go back over the old days--so old to +their youth!--their brothers come down in the summer, and their +brothers' friends come with them, and do a little spooning in the +shrubbery. But there is more spooning done at picnics than anywhere +else; and more offers are made there under the shadow of the old ruin, +or in the quiet leafy nook by the river side, than at any other +gathering time of the country. And as we are all to a certain extent +what we are made by our environment, the doves take to these pleasures +quite kindly and gratefully, as being the only ones known to them, and +enjoy themselves in a simplicity of circumstances which would give no +pleasure at all to girls accustomed to more highly-spiced +entertainments. + +Doves know very little of evil. They are not in the way of learning +it; and they do not care to learn it. The few villagers who are +supposed to lead ill lives are spoken of below the breath, and +carefully avoided without being critically studied. When the railway +is to be carried past their quiet nest, there is an immense +excitement as the report goes that a knot of strange men have been +seen scattering themselves over the fields with their little white +flags and theodolites, their measuring lines and levels. But when the +army of navvies follows after, the excitement is changed to +consternation, and a general sense of evil to come advancing +ruthlessly towards them. The clergy of the district organize special +services, and the scared doves keep religiously away from the place +where the navvies are hutted. They think them little better than the +savages about whom the Deputation tell them once or twice a year; and +they create almost as much terror as an encampment of gipsies. They +represent the lawless forces of the world and the unknown sins of +strong men; and the wildest story about them is not too wild to be +believed. The railway altogether is a great offence to the +neighbourhood, and the line is assumed to destroy the whole scenic +beauty of the place. There are lamentations over the cockneys it will +bring down; over the high prices it will create, the immorality it +will cause. Only the sons who are out in the world and have learnt how +life goes on outside the dovecot, advocate keeping pace with the +times; and a few of the stronger minded of the sisters listen to them +with a timid admiration of their breadth and boldness, and think there +may be two sides to the question after all. When the dashing captain +and his fast wife suddenly appear in the village--as often happens in +these remote districts--the doves are in a state of great moral +tribulation. They are scandalized by Mrs. Highflyer's costume and +complexion, and think her manners odd and doubtful; her slang shocks +them; and when they meet her in the lanes, talking so loudly and +laughing so shrilly with that horrid-looking man in a green cutaway, +they feel as fluttered as their namesakes when a hawk is hovering over +the farmyard. The dashing captain, who does not use a prayer-book at +church, who stares at all the girls so rudely, and who has even been +seen to wink at some of the prettier cottage girls, and his handsome +wife with her equivocal complexion and pronounced fashions, who makes +eyes at the curate, are never heartily adopted by the local magnates, +though vouched for by some far-away backer; and the doves always feel +them to be strange bodies among them, and out of their rightful +element somehow. If things go quietly without an explosion, well and +good; but if the truth bursts to the surface in the shape of a London +detective, and the Highflyers are found to be no better than they +should be, the consternation and half-awed wonderment at the existence +of so much effrontery and villany in their atmosphere create an +impression which no time effaces. The first clash of innocence with +evil is an event in the life of the innocent the effect of which +nothing ever destroys. + +The dovecot is rather dull in the winter, and the doves are somewhat +moped; but even then they have the church to decorate, and the +sentiment of Christmas to enliven them. The absent ones of the +family too, return to the old hearth while they can; and as the great +joy of the dovecot lies in the family union that is kept up, and in +the family love which is so strong, the visits of those who no longer +live at home bring a moral summer as warm and cheering as the physical +sunshine. But they do not all assemble. For many of the doves marry +men whose work lies abroad; these quiet country-houses being the +favourite matrimonial hunting-grounds for colonists and Anglo-Indians. +So that some are always absent whose healths are drunk in the +traditional punch, while eyes grow moist as the names are given. Doves +are not disinclined to marry men who have to go abroad, for all the +passionate family love common to them. Travel is a golden dream to +them in their still homes; but travel properly companioned. For even +the most adventurous among them are not independent, as we mean when +we speak of independence in women. They are essentially home-girls, +family-girls, doves who cannot exist without a dovecot, however +humble. The family is everything to them; and they are utterly unfit +for the solitude which so many of our self-supporting women can accept +quite resignedly. Not that they are necessarily useless even as +breadwinners. They could work, if pushed to it; but it must be in a +quiet womanly way, with the mother, the sister, the husband as the +helper--with the home as the place of rest and the refuge. Their whole +lines are laid in love and quietness; not by any means in inaction, +but all centred within the home circle. If they marry, they find +the love of their husband enough for them, and have no desire for +other men's admiration. Their babies are all the world to them, and +they do not think maternity an infliction, as so many of the miserably +fashionable think it. They like the occupation of housekeeping, and +feel pride in their fine linen and clean service, in their +well-ordered table and neatly-balanced accounts. They are kind to +their servants, who generally come from the old home, and whose +families they therefore know; but they keep up a certain dignity and +tone of superiority towards them in the midst of all their kindness, +which very few town-bred mistresses can keep to town-bred maids. They +have always been the aristocracy in their native place; and they carry +through life the ineffaceable stamp which being 'the best' gives. + +Doves are essentially mild and gentle women; not queens of society +even when they are pretty, because not caring for social success and +therefore not laying themselves out for it; for if they please at home +that is all they care for, holding love before admiration, and the +esteem of one higher than the praise of many. If a fault is to be +found with them it is that they have not perhaps quite enough salt for +the general taste, used as it is to such highly-seasoned social food; +but do we really want our women to have so very much character? Do not +our splendid passionate creatures lead madly wretched lives and make +miserably uncomfortable homes? and are not our glorious heroines +better in pictures and in fiction than seated by the domestic fire, or +checking the baker's bill? No doubt the quiet home-staying doves seem +tame enough when we think of the gorgeous beings made familiar to us +by romance, and history, which is more romantic still; but as our +daily lives run chiefly in prose, our doves are better fitted for +things as they are; and to men who want wives and not playthings, and +who care for the peace of family life and the dignity of home, they +are beyond price when they can be found and secured. So that, on the +whole, we can dispense with the splendid creatures of character and +the magnificent queens of society sooner than with the quiet and +unobtrusive doves. And though they do spoil men most monstrously, they +know where to draw the line, and while petting their own at home they +keep strangers abroad at a distance, and make themselves respected as +only modest and gentle women are respected by men. + + + + +_BORED HUSBANDS._ + + +The curtain falls on joined hands when it does not descend on a +tragedy; and novels for the most part end with a wreath of +orange-blossoms and a pair of high-stepping greys, as the last act +that claims to be recorded. For both novelists and playwrights assume +that with marriage all the great events of life have ceased, and that, +once wedded to the beloved object, there is sure to be smooth sailing +and halcyon seas to the end of time. It sounds very cynical and +shocking to question this pretty belief; but unfortunately for us who +live in the world as it is and not as it is supposed to be, we find +that even a union with the beloved object does not always ensure +perfect contentment in the home, and that bored husbands are by no +means rare. + +The ideal honeymoon is of course an Elysian time, during which nothing +works rusty nor gets out of joint; and the ideal marriage is only a +life-long honeymoon, where the happiness is more secure and the love +deeper, if more sober; but the prose reality of one and the other has +often a terrible dash of weariness in it, even under the most +favourable conditions. Boredom begins in the very honeymoon +itself. At first starting in married life there are many dangers to be +encountered, not a shadow of which was seen in the wooing. There are +odd freaks of temper turning up quite unexpectedly; there is the +sense, so painful to some men, of being tied for life, of never being +able to be alone again, never free and without responsibilities; there +are misunderstandings to-day and the struggle for mastery +to-morrow--the cloud, no bigger than a man's hand, which may prove to +be the tempest that will destroy all; there is the unrest of +travelling, and the awkwardness of unusual association, to help in the +general discomfort; or, if the happy pair have settled down in a vale +and a cottage for their month, there is the 'sad satiety' which all +men feel after a time when they have had one companion only, with no +outside diversion to cause a break. But the honeymoon at last draws to +a close, and the relieved bridegroom gets back to his old haunts, to +his work, his friends, and his club; and though he takes to all these +things again with a difference, still they are helps and additions. +This is the time of trial to a woman. If she gets over this pinch, and +is sensible enough to understand that human nature cannot be kept up +at high pressure, even in love, and that a man must sooner or later +come down from romance to work-a-day prose, from the passionate lover +to the cool and sober husband--if she can understand this, and settle +into his pace, without fretting on the one hand or casting about +for unhealthy distractions on the other--she will do well, and will +probably make a pleasant home, and thereby diminish the boredom of +life. But unfortunately, not every woman can do this; and it is just +during this time of the man's transition from the lover to the friend +that so many women begin to make shipwreck of their own happiness and +his. They think to keep him a romantic wooer still, by their tears at +his prosaic indifference to the little sentimentalities once so +eagerly accepted and offered; they try to hold him close by their +flattering but somewhat tiresome exactions; their jealousies--very +pretty perhaps, and quite as flattering--are infinite, and as baseless +as they are infinite; all of which is very nice up to a certain point +and in the beginning of things, but all of which gets wearisome as +time goes on, and a man wants both a little change and a little rest. +But women do not see this; or seeing it, they cannot accept it as a +necessary condition of things; wherefore they go on in their fatal +way, and by the very unwisdom of their own love bore their husband out +of his. Or they grow substantially cold because he is superficially +cooler, and think themselves justified in ceasing to love him +altogether because he takes their love for granted, and so has ceased +to woo it. + +If they are jealous, or shy, or unsocial, as so many women are, they +make life very heavy by their exclusiveness, and the monastic +character they give the home. A man married to a woman of this +kind is, in fact, a house prisoner, whose only free spaces lie beyond +the four walls of home. His bachelor friends are shut out. They smoke; +or entice him to drink more than his wife thinks is good for him; or +they induce him to bet on the Derby; or to play for half-crowns at +whist or billiards; or they lead him in some other way of offence +abhorrent to women. So the bachelor friends are shouldered out; and +when the husband wants to entertain them, he must invite them to his +club--if he has one--and pay the penalty when he gets home. In a few +years' time his wife will be glad to encourage her sons' young friends +to the house, for the sake of the daughters on hand; but husbands and +sons are in a different category, and there are few fathers who do not +learn, as time goes on, how much the mother will allow that the wife +refused. + +If bachelor friends are shouldered out of the house, all female +friends are forbidden anything like an intimate footing, save those +few whom the wife thinks specially devoted to herself and of whom she +is not jealous. And these are very few. There are perhaps no women in +the world so exclusive in their dealings with their husbands as are +Englishwomen. A husband is bound to one woman only, no doubt; but the +average wife thinks him also bound to have no affection whatever +outside her and perhaps her family. If he meets an intelligent woman, +pleasant to talk to, of agreeable manners and ready wit, and if +he talks to her in consequence with anything like persistency or +interest, he offends against the unwritten law; and his wife, whose +utmost power of conversation consists in putting in a yes or no with +tolerable accuracy of aim, thinks herself slighted and ill-used. She +may be young and pretty, and dearly loved for her own special +qualities; and her husband may not have a thought towards his new +friend, or any other woman, in the remotest degree trenching on his +allegiance to her; but the fact that he finds pleasure, though only of +an intellectual and æsthetic kind, in the society of any other woman, +that he feels an interest in her life, chooses her for his friend, or +finds community of pursuits or sympathy in ideas, makes his wife by +just so much a victim and aggrieved. + +And yet what a miserably monotonous home is that to which she would +confine him! He is at his office all day, badgered and worried with +various business complications, and he comes home tired, perhaps +cross--even well-conducted husbands have that way sometimes. He finds +his wife tired and cross too; so that they begin the evening together +mutually at odds, she irritated by small cares and he disturbed by +large anxieties. Or he finds her preoccupied and absorbed in her own +pursuits, and quite disinclined to make any diversion for his sake. He +asks her for some music; she used to be ready enough to sing and play +to him in the old love-making days; but she refuses now. Either she +has some needlework to do, which might have been done during the +day when he was out, or baby is asleep in the nursery, and music in +the drawing-room would disturb him--at all events she cannot sing or +play to-night; and even if she does--he has heard all her pieces so +often! If he is not a reading-man, those long, dull, silent evenings +are very trying. She works, and drives him wild with the click of her +needle; or she reads the last new novel, and he hates novels, and gets +tired to death when she insists on telling him all about the story and +the characters; or she chooses the evening for letter-writing, and if +the noise of her pen scratching over the paper does not irritate him, +perhaps it sends him to sleep, when at least he is not bored. But +dull, objectless, and vacant as their evenings are, his wife would not +hear of any help from without to give just that little fillip which +would prevent boredom and not create ceremony. She would think her +life had gone to pieces, and that only desolation was before her, if +he hinted that his home was dull, and that though he loves her very +dearly and wants no other wife but her, yet that her society +only--_toujours perdrix_, without change or addition--is a little +stupid, however nice the partridge may be, and that things would be +bettered if Mrs. or Miss So-and-So came in sometimes, just to brighten +up the hours. And if he were to make a practice of bringing home his +men friends, she would probably let all parties concerned feel pretty +distinctly that she considered the home her special sanctuary, and +that guests whom she did not invite were intruders. She would +perhaps go willingly enough to a ball or crowded _soirée_, or she +might like to give one; but that intimate form of society, which is a +mere enlargement of the home life, she dreads as the supplementing of +deficiencies, and thinks her married happiness safer in boredom than +in any diversion from herself as the sole centre of her husband's +pleasure. + +Home life stagnates in England; and in very few families is there any +mean between dissipation and this stagnation. We can scarcely wonder +that so many husbands think matrimony a mistake as we have it in our +insular arrangements; that they look back regretfully to the time when +they were unfettered and not bored; or that their free friends, who +watch them as wild birds watch their caged companions, curiously and +reflectively, share their opinion. Wife and home, after all, make up +but part of a man's life; they are not his all, and do not satisfy the +whole of his social instinct; nor is any one woman the concentration +of all womanhood to a man, leaving nothing that is beautiful, nor in +its own unconjugal way desirable, on the outside. Besides, when with +his wife a man is often as much isolated as when alone, for any real +companionship there is between them. Few women take a living interest +in the lives of men, and fewer still understand them. They expect the +husband to sympathize with them in the kitchen gossip and the nursery +chatter, the neighbours' doings and all the small household politics; +but they are utterly unable to comprehend his pleasures, his +thoughts, his duties, the responsibilities of his profession, or the +bearings of any public question in which he takes a part. + +Even if this were not so, and granting that they could enter fully +into his life and sympathize with him as intelligent equals, not only +as compassionate saints or loving children, there would still be the +need of novelty, and still the certainty of boredom without it. For +human life, like all other forms of life, must have a due proportion +of fresh elements continually added to keep it sweet and growing, else +it becomes stagnant and stunted. And daily intercourse undeniably +exhausts the moral ground. After the close companionship of years no +one can remain mentally fresh to the other, unless indeed one or both +be of the rarest order of mind and of a practically inexhaustible +power of acquiring knowledge. Save these exceptional instances, we +must all of necessity get worn out by constant intercourse. We know +every thought, every opinion, and almost every square inch of +information possessed; we have heard the old stories again and again, +and know exactly what will lead up to them, and at what point they +will begin; we have measured the whole sweep of mind, and have probed +its depths; and though we may love and value what we have learnt, yet +we want something new--fresh food for interest, though not necessarily +a new love for the displacement of the old. But this is what very few +Englishwomen can understand or will allow. They hold so intensely +by the doctrine of unity that they are even jealous of a man's +pursuits, if they think these take up any place in his mind which +might also be theirs. They must be good for every part of his life; +and the poorest of them all must be his only source of interest, +suffering no other woman to share his admiration nor obtain his +friendship, though this would neither touch his love nor interfere +with their rights. Friendship is a hard saying to them, and one they +cannot receive. Wherefore they keep a tight grasp on the marital +collar, and suffer no relief of monotony by judicious loosening, nor +by generous faith in integral fidelity. The practical result of which +is that most men are horribly bored at home, and that the mass of them +really suffer from the domestic stagnation to which national customs +and the exclusiveness of women doom them so soon as they become family +men. It must however, in fairness be added, that in general they +obtain some kind of compensation; and that very few walk meekly in +their bonds without at times slipping them off, with or without the +concurrence of their wives. + + END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. + + S. & H. + + LONDON: PRINTED BY + SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE + AND PARLIAMENT STREET + + * * * * * + +Transcriber's note: + Minor spelling and punctuation inconsistencies, mainly hyphenated + words, have been harmonized. In this version, the oe ligature is + represented by the separate characters oe, e.g. manoeuvre. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Girl of the Period and Other +Social Essays, Vol. I (of 2), by Eliza Lynn Linton + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41735 *** |