A Frenchman on American Girls.

Auckland Star, Volume VI, Issue 1625, 1 May 1875, Page 5 (Supplement)

A Frenchman on American Girls.

A traveller, who has recently passed some months on this side of the Xtlantic, furnishes the Mevue dcs Deuoc Monies quite a lengthy sketch of life and manners in America. Without comment we give the portion of his sketch in which reference is made to the manner and customs of the average American girl. The wrier says: "Tne young American girls only live to have the best possible time. They are as free as can be. Fortunately, their exaggerated love of pleasure is checked by calculating temperament ,which saves them from many a fall Then, the laws of the country protects them more efficiently than ours would against the enterprise of the male intriguer. They do not, however, prevent many abuses, and fast young ladies are by no means a rarity in the city of New York. During the day they go with some friends, or with him who has tbo privilege to flirt with them, to the Central Patk. In winter they go sleighing and skating, and air their curiosity in all the stores of Broadway. There they get all sorts of goods spread out before them; they ask the price of each, and buy none- The impassive salesman does not show the least sign of discontent. There is a peculiar word for that singular custom. It is 'shopping.' Another custom which is largely practiced by American ladies is to enter confectionery shops and take ice creams at every opportunity. * * * In the evening the same young ladies are seen at theatres and in the fashionable eating saloons. Tf a great ball is given anywhere, you may be sure to meet them there. In summer they flock to watering-places, such as Saratoga, Long Branch and Newport, where several times a day they make a display of dresses which might ruin a score of husbands; or they cross the ocean and astonish European folks with their merry freaks. # * # Many people accustomed to our habits would not fancy such girls for wives, and they may not be wrong; but the truth is that these gay, light-hearted and often dangerously imprudent girls, make exce lent wives and mothers.