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Show ucm toretorm them. To these qualm-aatious qualm-aatious I should add some acquaintance with society and its rules, with t'te laws of good taste in dress, and sufficient suffi-cient tact and good feeling to set othel people at their ease and to feel easy one's self. Now, 1 know very weii that this definition defi-nition will not meet tho views of a largo class of excellent people, who will exclaim ex-claim in holy horror: "Oh, do you put good breeding and taste in dress, or even education, abovs a good Christian character and modesty and industry and the moral virtues gen orally?" To which I re'-'v: Certainly 1 l t In fact, 1 place l..e things you n. -1 above those 1 mention, bat I co.. 1 them as characteristics of vromanhcni and not of ladyhood. A parson may be. a perfect lady in the exact sense of tho word, and yet be a very contemptible woman, and she may be an admirable woman, and a most valuable member of society, and yet not a lady. Why, then, must everybody be classed under the title ti-tle of conventionality and despise that of nature, especially as the i .nner is ruuch tMur-J fthin our control than th? latter; Any woman can make herself an honor and a glory to her sex by developing develop-ing the inborn power and beauty of her womanhood, any woman can rise by her own persistent cUorts to the first rank among the women of the world with far more certainty than, as is often boasted, any free born American man may rise to the presidential chair. She has but to use the faculties, the will, the mind and the persistence which are hers by birth, but it is not every woman who can become a lady by her own efforts, and self made ladies are never very satisfactory sat-isfactory to themselves or to anybody else. There is an ease, an unconsciousness, unconscious-ness, a gentle assurance of manner and a calm expectation of consideration from other people which are seldom if ever obtained except by birthright, and the lack of which are fatal to the perfection per-fection of ladyhood. As 1 said before, these traits may be joined to a bad heart and a shallow brain, but still the person per-son remains a lady, just as the Caucasian Cauca-sian remains a white man, although he commit every sin under the Decalogue. Would any one willingly confess to the bad heart and shallow brain for the I accident, such as hiving her lace flounce torn off, or her toes stepped on, or her precious bit of china smashed by an awkward visitor. Ono need not perhaps go quite so far as the lady well known in New York, who. when a visitor dropped one of an almost priceless set of ijates, immediately immedi-ately managed to smash another, exclaiming: ex-claiming: "Oh, these brittle things! One can't tonch them without their breaking! break-ing! 1 shall be glad when they ;ue gone!" It was heroic, but to my mind tt really amiable smile and a few words of geutlo reassurance to the mortified guest would have been sufficient. Another mark of ladyhood easily enougft acquired is a refined code of table manners, and a woman cannot be called ladylike, however transcendent her virtues and Christian graces, if she gobbles her fuod, or talks with her mouth full, or makes a mess of all sorts of incongruous viands upon her plate or dues not leave it tidy and with the knife End fork proper) laid upon it instead of spraw ling at the sides. When one comes to habits of speech the distinctions are so delicately graded that the self me.de lady rarely succeeds in grasping tho whole theory. .Some forms of language are perfectly grammatical, gram-matical, and yet a thoroughbred lady would never use them, and rather shudders shud-ders when she hears them used: and yet there is no law except the usage of good society forbidding us to exclaim, "1 want to know," or "Let mo fix yon some lemonade," or "1 guess I'll have to go now." One awful stumbling block in this direction is the use of this very word "lady." An odious habit anion:; ua Americans is using it as an address instead of the French madame or the English madam.. The employees in shops or stores, in hotels or ticket offices and public vehicles constantly inquire "What will you have, lady?" or "Here's your change, lady," or "Your street, lady?" and I have often been accosted by well dressed and well meaning women wom-en in the street with, "Will you tell me where such and such a street is, lady?" or perhaps, "You are losing your veil, lady." Kindred to tlrts fashion is that of calling call-ing a girl's fiance or admirer her gentleman gentle-man or her gentleman friend, and no lady ever speaks of herself as a lady, as "1 and another lady were going," etc., WHAT IS A LADY? THE. WORD ORIGINALLY SIGNIFIED "THE'. BREAD SERVER." Tho :..-( ".r!t.-. K'.cfcad Ar.atheir I.ady OB the Slit) The Wash lady A Good Woman Wom-an Better Than a Fine l.adv Kienie Me. Lady: ICopyrlghl, by American Press Association.) Associa-tion.) Sf AM sometimes ynr 'Eal tempted to wish Im,y hd never V'- -jr 'jRfalSi been invented, or frkhsB t least had been IVV ' confined to its VV'tlr'SkSji original significa-j3""??-' tions, one of 'fl which is thB raised one " i e., raised by marriage to a condition sirperior to that of birth and worthy of a little consideration even from the lords of creation. The other derivation of lady is from an old Saxon word meaning the distributor of bread, that is to say the housewife and general domestic manager According to the former derivation, the wife of King Cophetna is the most prominent lady on record, and 1 fancy it would hardly suit the dignity of an American woman to claim the saute title on the saiue grounds. Nor would there be any eager scramble scram-ble for the honors of the "bread server," since, unfortunately, housewifery is an almost forgotten art among ns, and if practiced is generally so subservient to other interests and pursuits, at least in large communities, that few indeed would care to be addressed habitually as Housewife So-and-so. But since the original meanings are obsolete and altogether inappropriate to modern ambitions, what definition takes their place, and what does "lady" really mean among ns? Why it means absolutely nothing at nil, and had better be abandoned than misused as It is. A friend of mine who devotes herself to missionary labors at the east side of New York tells me some funny stories illustrating these statements, and they are absolutely true. Oneisof the white wifeof a negrowhora she visited the other day, and found ly- instead of "A lady and I were going." 1 have spoken of salesladies and 1 think the compound an absurd Americanism, Ameri-canism, but 1 would not for a moment go upon record as disparaging or belittling belit-tling that great class of young women who serve in our shops. 'Very many of them are as ladylike and far more useful and to be respected than their sisters born to luxury and carefully trained from the cradle into all the refinements of life, but why is it not sufficient in such a position to be known as a woman, a saleswoman if that is the proper prefix? If 1 were to find it necessary to earn my bread and butter by selling ribbons or gloves or bonnets 1 should be neither less nor more of a , lady than I am now, but 1 would by no means allow myself to be called a saleslady, ljsliould say: "No; 1 am a woman doing., womanly work, and 1 glory in it. 1 may be a lady also, but I do not need to insist upon that view of tlie case. " A great deal more might be said on this subject, but my paper has readied its limits and must close with this one Word: Cling to the good solid bone and marrow mar-row of womanhood and don't drop it to snatch at the delusive shadow of ladyhood. lady-hood. Mrs. Frank Leslik. sake of being called a lady? 1 think not. Then why struggle so blindly for a title which may mean both? You will say that all ladies are not of this description, and that many women, not ladies, are jnst as bad. True enough, but then we have no choice as to being women; no matter how fine or how good a lady is, she is primarily a woman, and has it in her own power to be a good woman wom-an in the eyes of all men, and the advantage advan-tage of this side of the question is that a good woman is obviously one; .yon can't mistaka her; she carries the air of it about with her, as if it were a robe of office. How often have smiled into the face of some dear old, toil worn, weather beaten creature whose good honest soul looked out through her poor tired face, and all unconsciously proclaimed, a good woman lives in this uncomely body, and 1 have given her a friendly word, or pleasant look, or perhaps a little present in appreciation of the honor hon-or she did my sex. But 1 never called such an one a lady, nor would she have called herself so: she was something better. Now 1 do not mean to say that ladies are never placed in lowly situations, or that they are any the less ladies for filling fill-ing them. One lady of my acquaintance became so reduced in circumstances that she was glad to accept the position of scrubber to the Hoors of some of our public pub-lic buildings, and did the work faithfully faithful-ly and well until something better was offered; nor was she any the less a lady while on her knees washing those floors than she nad been when, robed in silks, she received her guests and did honor to her station. Many a lady, too, has followed her husband to the western wilds, and while he delved and hewed and conquered the wilderness in one fashion, she cooked and washed and scrubbed and sewed and made that same wilderness to blossom blos-som like a rose with the grace and charm of her ministrations. But the gentleman gentle-man did not cease to be a gentleman nor the lady a lady because of their rough toil; they simply found it easier on that account to rise up to the true nobility no-bility of manhood and womanhood. But although every woman cannot achieve for herself the ease and unconsciousness uncon-sciousness aud nameless air that are the birthright of certain of ber sisters, she may with care and thought become ladylike, and often, very, very often, one meets ladylike women among those industrial classes who are the backbone and vitality of cur community. But a woman of this description, especially if quite young, is often sorely puzzled to know just what manners, what occupations occupa-tions and what use of language are ladylike lady-like and what are not, and perhaps if any such chance to read this paper they will not resent a few friendly hints upon the subject. In the first place, then, the true lady is always self controlled; she has her temper, her bodily movements, her modes of speech just as much in hand as a good coachman has his horses; she may be very much exasperated, but unless un-less she chooses she makes no demonstration demonstra-tion whatever of the fact; it. she does choose, she often utters very cruel and cutting words, but she utters them in a quiet, restrained voice, without gesture, aud certainly without raising her voice; nothing is so absolutely unladylike as scolding, by which one means loud, noisy and uncontrolled vituperation, and the genuine lady does not know how to show her feelings in that way if she wished; another thing impossible for a lady to do is to push and elbow her way, to scramble and wrangle for a seat or a front place in a crowd, or for any other desirable thing only to be obtained by such methods; self respect is one of her chief characteristics, and no front seat would repay ber for even its temporary loss; another mark of a lady is her readiness to accept an apology, and also her readiness to make one In ease of anjr. ing in bed and covered with plasters and bandages. Asking for an account of this condition, 'she was told that "the lady as lives on the Boor above has a great way of- gittin tight an cuttin up rough on washday, an when me an she was bangin out onr clothes on the one shed we lit some, an in the end she kicked me down the steps an broke my head the way you see." Trying to find a nurse to care for this poor creatnre my friend was told by a respectable woman iu the same alley that-r yon won't find a lady, mum, that will go ani miss a "body that's took up with a dark man. unless it's another lady like herself." A second dame complained that "another "an-other lady", was living with her (the complainant's) husband, and they had turned the "childher" into the street to beg for their living. Trying to trace one of her clients who had temporarily disappeared.,- my friend was told: "Oh, yon wants the lady that's gone to the Island for a simple drunk. Well, she's gone, but there's another lady in her room very bad with 'the snakes.' and maybe she'll do yon just as well." And yet another had attacked her neighbor tooth and nail because she had told ber she "was no lady." Wo all have heard of the new servant in some western town who announced herself as "the lady that camd to work for a woman by the name of Brown, if you're' she." And I myself, in sending for a laundress, laun-dress, was informed that the washlady 1 wanted had come. It is not uncommon to see placards in the windows of milliners and dry goods dealers to the effect that salesladies are wanted within, and in one large establishment estab-lishment 1 noticed a placard, "No conversation con-versation with salesladies in business hours. " But I think the drollest nse of the word I have yet heard was when I good naturedly accompanied a friend into an intelligence office and heard the head of it inquire among bis charges: "Is there any lady here that would accept ac-cept a place as kitchen maid?" One lady was found willing to condescend con-descend so far, and was brought into the room were we sat. A conclusion was reached, and the man, opening his book, took down my friend's name and address, and then turning to the candidate candi-date for the part of kitchen maid, inquired. in-quired. "And your name, young lady?" "My name's Brennan." "Ah, yes! Well, Miss Brennan, you rill call at this address as soon as possible, possi-ble, won't you?" But here my friend interposed, quietly saying: , "1 fancy there is some mistake. I want to hire a kitchen maid and not a young lady, and my domestics are always al-ways called by their first names. Do you quite understand?" But hereupon the "young lady" became be-came abusive, the official tried to be jocular, joc-ular, and we retreated minus the kitchen maid. This is funny, but it is also true. Now. if all the persons I have mentioned men-tioned wish to be called ladies, I for one have no objection in life; but let them keep the title all to themselves, and let us reserve the good old title of woman for the rest of the sex. I for one am quite content to be called a woman for the rest of my days, and should never fret if that of lady were denied me. Of course, however, the term does still mean something among persons who nse language with discrimination and appreciation, and the proper definition defini-tion to uiy mind would be a woman of refinement, education and good breeding, breed-ing, brought up in such habits and manners man-ners that, however elevated a station she tuay be called to fillt she, will hevtf |
