THE GIRL WITH A HANDICAP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11644, 4 May 1901, Page 5 (Supplement)

THE GIRL WITH A HANDICAP.

Oxce there was a nice girl who liked to have young men drop in of an evening. She always used them the best she knew how, and she might have closed a deal earlier in the game had it not been for her parents. They were not overly bright, for they carried the delusion that they could help their daughter in her ? c -.>- ' to jolly along the local Lotharios.

Instead or. taking to the back rcor.:3 and giving little Jeanette full leeway in the parlour, they would butt into the tete-a-tete, and try to be cordial with the young man, and sort of throw out the impression that they were ready to entertain any fair and business-like proposition. Father's idea of making himself the life of the party was to tell of his experiences at the battle of Stone River, and what he said to Cap., and what Cap. said to him, and plenty more that never got into the records of the War Department. Mother thought it would help some if she would sit over by the gentleman caller and fill him up with all the teachers said about Jeanette's voice, and also to refer to the two distinguished relatives, so that the young man might know that there was a family tree. Mother's work was very much to the sandpaper, and Jeanette would try to call her off. After father had told all that he could remember about the Civil War, and the pipe had gone out. arid mother had spread herself on the prominence of their relatives in the East, the young man would move, his feet a few times and guess he would have to be going, as it was getting late. Jeanette would follow him out to the hallway and help him with his coat and tuck in his muffler, and tell him to be sure and come back .soon. He would promise, of course, but it was dollars to dumplings that many a moon would wax and wane ere George went against that combination again. Jeanette was a dutiful child, and respected her parents, .and after they had dished many a bright prospect she had to rise up and have her say.

" You two would be strong cards in an Old People's Homo," she said, "but when it comes to ribbing up a good time for one of the boys you are a couple of superannuated shines. lam only a poor, weak maiden, with a vocabulary of about 300 words, and I do not belong to the G.A.R. or know much about our family history, but if you two will go lose yourselves and let me handle all-comers alone and singlehanded I wouldn't be surprised if there would be something doing in a little while." Although convinced that she needed their assistance, they yielded to her wishes, and she moved the sofa out in front of the grate, and extinguished all the lights except a couple of blue candles, and the rlext time a young man called he didn't care if lie never went borne. And there was no war talk. Then, when she began to wear an engagement ring, father and mother had to admit that she had been light. Moral: A good girl doesn't need any help. —George Ade, in the New York Herald.