VICTORIAN ERA

Hawera Star, Volume LII, 19 November 1932, Page 13

VICTORIAN ERA

GOOD BAD OLD DAYS

‘ ‘SMU G 1 .’ ’

Over and over again we hear elderly' ladies plaintively' bemoaning the fact that the Victorian era, in whose atmosphere of bulrushes and antimacassars they spent their y'outh, has passed away, and now troubles us no longer with its ample bustles and hoary sidewhiskers, sav.s a writer in the Cape “Times.”. “We enjoyed life more, and were much better off then,” they preach annoyingly, and there are actually certain young women of to-day' who are stupid enough to believe them. They will listen wide-eyed while Grandma, sentimental and silly, relates the thrill of a whiskered kiss, or describes the luxury of a drive in a carriage and pair; they picture what a becoming figure they themselves would have cut on the ballroom floor, and fancy that calling their father “sir” and curtesying to their mother, must have been “too intriguing” till at last they cry in assumed misery, “Oh 1 wish I had lived in grandma’s days.” But, if the.y really sit down and think the matter over sanely, would these women, young or old, really bring back the life of 70 years ago if they had the power to do so? Would the.v honestly' forfeit all the benefits and comforts of 1932 for a lie of smug insincerity and affection ? Surely not! And yet they pretend they' would. They may fancy that the comfortable evening gowns of these times are not as exciting as those whose waistlines were reduced to a ridiculous and wasp-like width, and usually resulted in the wearer having an attack of the “Vapours”! No doubt, it may have been thrilling to them to have been caught as thov fainted by some over-ready swain, with a long and evil-looking moustache, and probably it was the I only chance they had of enjoying the j sensation of being hold in the arms oi ] a- man, but was it worth it? Fancy] having to faint to-dav before you could "feel a good strong arm around vou! Amain, what could have neon more exasperating than the ever-present chaperon, who listened to and observed (with eves and ears) the smallest improprieta’ry, so that conversation had to he restricted to mere hints and j suggestions.