Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 December 1888 — THEY WANT OUR GIRLS. [ARTICLE]

THEY WANT OUR GIRLS.

Why Titled Englishmen Seek Fair Americans for Brides. Ixtndon Standard. The frequency with which Englishmen of distinction select their domestic partners from the United States may well set people asking the question what it is that causes the occurrence. The -feet that Lord Randolph Churchill, Sir William Harcourt, M. Clemenceau, *the Duke of Marlborough, and the successor of Count Moltke in the important military post with which his great name is associated have married American ladies may tempt philosophic inquirers to go in search of a true and efficient cause of the occurrence, now brought etill more into prominence by the marriage of Mr. Chamberlain. If we are to imitate them, we might find a certain number of plausible explanations; but, at the end of the exercise of then best ingenuity, we should have to confess ourselves puzzled. That there are a number of American young ladies who are most attractive and charming will readily be admitted. But, without posturing as outrageous patriots in this respect, we are disposed to think that English girls can hold their own against even their fair American cousins in the matter of good looks,and decidedly outstrip them in the qualities which most Englishmen regard as engaging and irresistible. The ideal in the States is notoriously not quite the same as that which for the most part prevails in this country, andwe suspect it would be found, on searching and impartial investigation, that the American standard is less of what is usually meant by an ideal than the English standard. In other words, it is, like the Americans themselves, more practical. Just as, for the most part, they educate their children not so much with the object of making them fine scholars and cultured gentlemen, as of making them capable and successful citizens, so, probably, they aim, even unconsciously, at preparing girls not so much for a brief passage of romance, as for the long and unromantic business of life. At the back of the head, as the phrase is, of most English girls is the idea that Lancelot or Prince Charming, or some equivalent of those agreeable and seductive personages, is living somewhere in the world; that it would be delightful to meet him; ana that conceivably, that happy fate is reserved for them in particular. In a word English girls are what is called romantic, and American girls, if romantic, are so in a less degree. Like the rest of their race, they are educated to understand and be in harmony with the hard and somewhat cynical conditions of their life. They have less “nonsense” about them than English girls. They are sensible women of the world, “knowing all about it,” not easily deluded, and quite equal to the task of confronting existence in all its various phases. Hence they enjoy considerable success in society, even on this side of the ocean. Society does not ask for a romantic disposition, for refinement or delicacy of temperament, but, on the contrary, for practical good sense, for a certain business like quality, and for those gifts which enable people to succeed in dealing with their fellow creatures. It is often remarked that American women push their way where English women possessed of no greater personal advantages would fail. The reason is that the former understand the conditions of success better, and accommodate themselves to them. They are not the women that stir the passions or inspire the song of poets, nor will they go down to posterity as heroines or charmers. But they have their day. They succeed in London drawing rooms as their brothers succeed in r “dry eoods stores” in New York, and for much the same reason. We have no doubt they make excellent wives to men who live in the full glare of society, and prefer a clever, capable associate to a tender domestic companion.