The Girl of the Period, and Other Social Essays, Vol. 1 (of 2)

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 som...

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 st...

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 m...

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 ver...

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 the...

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 sw...

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 fas...

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 pe...

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. Ve...

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 righ...

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 lit...

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 una...

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...

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 co...

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 unde...

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...

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 ou...

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 cha...

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 th...

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...

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 a...