OF WOMEN SCOTS AND ENGLISH.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 2180, 4 July 1890, Page 4

OF WOMEN SCOTS AND ENGLISH.

The Englishwoman is wanting in physical and mental angles. She fulfils (in the Swinburnian sense of the word) her raiment, and she has the comeliness of a good digestion and an easy mind. The nature of the land that gave her being — its rich pastures, its fertile spreads of tilth, its centuries of prosperous peace — is innate in and impressed upon her. Her theology, so far as she has any, is optimistic and material. She loves in an easy, good-tempered, respectful way the duties of life, and in eld ahe may well turn either Nickleby or Gram p. Her voice is soft and pleasing to the ear ; she talks with fluency, aud with little difficulty of expression has seldom anything to say. She has no ideas and not many different; words; but her presentation of both is endless, as if the action gave her pleasure. Her mind, in short, is naked and not ashamed. She is not given to introspectiou. She is not shy, nor i.s she impudent. She is honest, pleasant, wholesome, fond of seutimental ficiion, the verse of Weatherly and Sims, the minstrelsy of Maybrick, and the burntcork melodists who never perform out of London, the art of Millais and the Christmas numbergenerally. Physically and mentally the Scotswoman is more addicted to angles than her southern sir.ter. She is not so comely ; very often she is not comely at all. A gloomy sky and a still gloomier theology have stamped their mark on her, body and soul. Her high cheek-bones are one result of many centuries of east wind, and the lines about her mouth of a period less prolonged but more acute of John Knox. She is somewhat shy and reserved and awkward, speaks little, thinks much, and is comparatively wanting in grace of manner. The Scotswoman is strong in mind and body, is truly self-reliant, is well fitted to cope with adverse circumstances — in a word, is really mistress of her fate. She is lesn neat and winning than trustworthy and capable. Her largeness and strength are not without acertain dignity. She shows to best advantage in the heroic moments of life, with whose petty and trivial worries her angularity refuses reconcilement. Exertion and the adversity of work are necessaries of life to her. The great increase of wealth in Scotland during the present century has shut out the femalo members of many districts from the need of toil ; and the change has been by no means an unmixed good, for they have le3S to do than will keep them in perfect health. Although as regards looks the average Scotswoman is not equal to the average Englishwoman, yet are there faces in- the north of higher and more spiritual type than anything you find across the Borders. Indeed, the social averages are like tho climates : the run in England ia better, bub in Scotland there aie such days of brilliant light and exquihile shade and heartening and exhilarating air as England never knew. Also, in matters intellectual, tho palm is with the north ; and this ia duo a little to the sceoery — fur th« Scots landscape, always touched by the inspiration of the mouutain air, is often rugged and is never commonplace—and something to the Shorter Catechism, which is an admirable train-

ing in logic, induces a habit of exact thinking, aod is a complete system of philosophy. — ' The Scots Observer.'