Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 February 1888 — TEMPTATIONS OF GIRLS. [ARTICLE]

TEMPTATIONS OF GIRLS.

Allnrementa in City and Country— The Towns Wicked, But the ConnAtry Mot Altogether Moral. “ ■ —X Kiln Wheeler Wileox in St. Louin Globe Bern. All my life girls have made me their confidante. When I was myself a girl, they sought me for sympathy and consolation. Since my marriage thev have come to me for advice and assistance. It will be impossible in this article to more than touch upon the" various phases of temptations to which girls are subjected in this bad. but jolly old world. In fiction and in journalism, the country is al ways represented as a place morally and physically heathful for girls. The city alone is supposed to teem with temptations for the innocent and igno rant.

Without doubt the town offers more opportunities for folly and wrong doing. Yet human nature is the same, in its varying moods, its passions, and its weaknesses the world over; and there are phases of and causes for temptations in the rural regions unknown to the city bred girl. Youth is youth wherever yon find it Young blood flows swift and warm through pulsing veins. ’Ybung hearts long for companionship, young brains indulge in vague sweet dreams of pleas ure yet to come. A healthful yonng girl can no more be content with prosaic duties, without one day of pleasure to brighten her life, than a meadowlark can be content in a cage. To attend faithfully to the most common place tasks all day, to hear no word of praise for her labors, and to retire at 8 o’clock on a beautiful moonlight evening is little less than torture to a girl full of sentiment and undefined longings. Yet this is the existence of hundreds of country girls. The parents regard any hours spent m pleasure as so much lost time. They exact industry and obedience from their offspring, invite no confidences, and object to late hours of merrymakings. The young heart seethes in silent rebellion, and learns to hate its lot, and lives in hope that something will happen to give color to life. If the city idler, or the amorous farm hand, or the married seducer happens to find her in these rebellious moods, why then we read in the newspapers an item about the “Strange Disappearance” or “Uaaccountaole Mesalliance” or “Shocking Depravit”” of a hitherto quiet and respectable young girl. The heart-broken parents are crushed with shame and sorrow. They can not understand why their beloved daugntc. should go astray. Ah! if they had only shown her demonstrations of her their love, if they had only sought to know her secrets thoughts and longinga,if they made an effort once a month to give her a.few hours of pleasure, she .need not have gone astray. Feminine hearts are never satisfied with the love which only best owe food and bodily covering, and finds no tender expression. They crave something more than “good care.” The flattering praises of an unworthy admirer often win a foolish girl’s heart, which starves in the atmosphere of undemonstrative parental affection.

I personally knew a ease which illustrates’this point. A young lady of refinement, but born with that passionate love of music, color, and perfume which is so dangerous to its possessor, was compelled to live the mosr prosaic of lives. Her mother was a devout Christain, whose only command was that her daughter should attend church Sundays. Her father was a domestic tyrant who desired the lights put out at 9 o’clock, and objected to his daughters entertaining company. One superb summer evening—which the full moou rendered a pallid day—she walked down the quiet street to chat with a young lady friend over the gate. “I have been in the kitchen all day,” she said, “and I am just crazy for a drive in this moonlight. I teased father to take me, but he went off to bed and told me that was where I’d better go. I knew I couldn’t sleep, so I stole off to see yon.” Scarcely had she ceased speak ing when a handsome stranger passed, driving a fine equipage. “Oh,” whispered her friend, “there is that handsome commercial man again. I saw him down at the store to-day. He tried to flirt with me.”

“I wish he would ask me to take a drive,” said our desperate young lady. “I would go in a minute.” The man stared at the young ladies with bold, admiring eyes. There was something perhaps in the excited, passionate face of one which gave him courage to speak. He lifted bis hat and said politely: “A lovely evening. for a drive. I wish you young ladies would take pity on a lonely fellow, and accompany me.”

The calmer of the two girls turned away without replying. The other hesitated; the man s&w his advantage, pressed his invitation, ami despite her friend’surgent entreaties shedrove off with the stranger. She returned in half an honr declaring she had done a terrible rash thing, but that she had broken the monotony of life at least, and “no one needeyer know.” But it was found out, of course; the stranger boasted ot his conquest, and the girl’s reputation was tarnished forever.

Parents, in the country especially, are too-much afraid of praising their children. I believe it is better to risk t polling a child than to starve it to death. I have noticed that children who are freely praised for every task well per. formed and for every dutiful act, seldom bring sorrow into their parents’ lives. Mothers are too reticent with daughters on subj icts of vital importance to onr sex. Curiosity to investigate the mysterious causes many girls to read unhealthy books or converse with unworthy people who excite their imaginations and tarnish the purity of their minds.

In the country, children ramble home from school together promiscuously, and ever creative nature, reveals her mysteries to wide-open young eyes. If motheis would satisfy the natural curiosity of young girls regarding all these mysteries, and teach them to regard the wonders of nature with reverence, the temptation to personal investigation would be removed.

City streets teem with cheap opportunities for flirtations with unknown men who designs e themselves as “mashers,” Only the silliest or most depraved of our sex risk lives and reputations bi responding to them. A lady is seldom accosted or troubled by these men in the day-lit streets of New York. A handsome young girl who earns her living by newspaper work, which calls her into ‘all sorts of business offices, recently told me that she had never received an insinuating or embarrassing word or look in all her career

The profession of an actress is supposed to be more fraught with temptations than other vacations, but I do not know this to be true. in one of our large cities west of New York there was a young lady clerking in a dry goods establishment at the princely sum of 44 per week. Finding this inadequate to her personal expenses of board, washing and shoe leather, she complained to her employer. “What shall I do?” she asked. “Well, you know what some girls do to improve their situations,” he said,and left her to consider his words. Without doubt the managers of some theaters do abuse and misuse their power. Two pitiful cases have been recited to me personally within two years. One pretty young woman, who had been deserted bv her good-for-nothing, dissolute husband dee lived to make her really fine vo ; ee a means of support. After much hard i tudy and months of constant appearance in a small part, she begged her manager to give her a trial in a more ambitions role. He answered her that she was capable of better things, but he refused to advance her unless she sacrificed her self-respect to him. Bhe is still appearing in her unimportant role. < Another more recent ease was that of a young girl scarcely out of short dresses. She was almost born on the sta?e, and has played youthful parts from her childhood. She is pure as a lily-bud, and has blossomed into a lovely young woman who is anxious to make a success of her profession. When she asked a well-known manager to give her his influence, he promised to do so on condition that she gave him her honor in return.

Surely no hell fire eould be too ho* for such men. The girl is an orphan, and obliged to earn her living by the profession in which she was reared. The most dangerous of all temptations is that which comes through love. I know personally one case where a young man carefully and delicately won the. confidence and gratitude and love of a working girl by the most gentle of actions and a repetition of thoughtful kindness. Then, when he had made himself necessary to her life, he gave her the alternative of sharing his unlawful companionship or never seeing his face. The girl had the strength to send him away, but she never recovered from the shock to mind and body. Men temptwomen through their vani ty and affections. Women tempt men through their •motions er their ambitions. A clever young woman was d»droas of living in luxury and respectability. She worked night and day to improve herself, and became) a brilliant musician and linguist Then she threw herself in the way es a man who possessed money, but whose social ambitions were balked by an exceedingly commonplace and uneducated 'wife. The man made comparisons, and finally fell into the snare. The wife was divorced, and the scheming young woman shortly filled the vacant position.

I do not belive the Creator made man any more wicked than woman. Both sexes have the same impulses and emotion?. Women are compelled to fight against their own weakness and to combat those of men. Where ten women are tempted two only fait Where ten men are tempted, two only stand. And yet we are called the weaker sex. If the penalties for folly were as severe for men as for women, and if the world demanded as high mozaiity from them, they would be as good as we are. , 1 ' ' ."‘I The Saltan strongly urged W. K.Vanderbilt to undertime the construction of a system of Asiatic railways for the Turkish Government, and if he couldn’t do so, to ask Jay Gould to lend a hand .