FAMOUS WOMEN NO ONE EVER SAW

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1664, 20 January 1904, Page 7 (Supplement)

FAMOUS WOMEN NO ONE EVER SAW

PEEP INTO'THE “WHO’S WHO” OF FICTION.

There is a well-known lady of title jyliom no one hasi_ ever seen. this season of the year, especially, she is more than usually occupied in the numberless good deeds with which her name is associated. Wherever distress an/1 want rear 'then* grizzly heads, this lady is to- be found jplently and going about her self-imposed task of ieve and <nercy, cheering the broken in spirit, Succoring the helpless, and relieving the necessitous. Of aristocratic lineage, Lady Bountiful deservedly ranks high in Ibe esteem of those to whom kindi hearts are indeed more than coronets.

Very different is the character- of another titled lady equally intangible. Ool<L selfish, heartless, going about the worm with tip-tilted nose and an air of haughty superciliousness, who has not at one time or another encountered the freezing glance of Lady Disdain, and who is there who would willingly undergo the ordeal implied in a renewahof the acquaintance? MBS GRUNDY. * ‘•"Wlxat will Mrs Grundy say ?” No one ever saw Mrs Grundy in the street, or met her at an evening party, jjr invited her to a picnic; but the famous old lady, whom everyone professes to ridicule, biut at the same time secretly fears, makes her presence felt ©Ten more palpably than if she were a real corporeal entity. If she be inclined to oensoriousness, and afflicted with an unfortunate habit 0 poking her nose into other people's affairs, it must be admitted, in Him good dame’s favour, that the feai of her feharp eyes, and sharper tongue, has Often a salutary and deterrent effect in

determining our motives in cases of doubtful propriety. How many thousands of people are there in England to-flay who have excellent reason to bless the restraint imposed at one time or another by the fear of Mrs Grundy ? Think of her as we may, revile, esteem, or hold her in affected indifference. Mrs Grundy is unquestionably a potent factor in the formation and development of ou'tf national life and character. Mrs Grundy, by common consent, is generally imagined as a person, of advanced age, soured somewhat by a prolonged study of the follies and frailties of mankind and, truth to tell, she is getting on. in years. The famous monitress of decorum first saw the light in 1798 in the pages of Thomas Morton, dramatist, the author of “Speed the Plough.” Not that she had any real existence even among the dramatis personae. She is referred to fully enough by Mrs Ashfield. one of the characters, who held her opinion in the highest esteem, and whose reiterated ejaculation, “I wonder what Mrs Grundy would say?” sc incensed her husband that be ratliei uu-gallant-ly expressed his conviction that Dame Ashfield’s first question on reaching the next world would he, “Is Mrs Grundy here?” MBS MALAPBOP. Among famous feminine personages whom no one ever sees, but whose sallies from time to time have contributed to the gaiety of nations, is Mrs Mala>prop. She, like Mrs Grundy, is long lived. So far-hack as 1775 Sheridan wrote his inimitable comedy, “Theß vals,” wherein one of the characters is Mrs Malaprop, aunt and guardian to Lydia Languish, the heiress. Mrs Malaprop’s remarkable faculty for misapplying words without mispronouncing or misspelling them, has made her name a synonym for people who aim at- the exhibition of a higher education than'they possess. Her diffident request that no “delusions” to the part he made, her reference to a barbarous “Vandyke” - who was about to precipitate her down the “prejudice,” and her observation that her niece was as headstrong as an “allegory” on the -banks of the Nile, may ho cited as some of Mrs Malaprop’s earliest and happiest efforts.

In this twentieth century Ma.lapropisms mostly flourish in the pages of the comic journals, but evidence is not lacking that the. delightful old dame occasionally invades the theatre, the pfulpit and oven the precincts of Parliament. - MBS HARRIS. What lover of Dickens does not treasure the memory of Mrs Harris? Yet we are assured on the highest authority that that most loyal and indulgent of friends was a purely imaginary person, existing only, for purposes of self-glori-fication, in the brain of Mrs Sara'h Gamp. Surely since the days of Damon and! Pythias never was friendship more close than that existing between Mrs Harris and the immortal woman who f oil lowed the calling of a monthly nurse, and we can almost realise the righteous indignation which filled the breast of Mrs Gamp when a doubt was cast upon the very existence of her much quoted friend. “Have I known Mrs Harris five-and-thirty years, to he told at last that there ain't no sich a person livin’ with her own sweet picture hanging up afore you all the time to shame your Bragian words P Go along with you.” MRS PARTINGTON. How much service has been rendered to statesmen and -the nation at large as a-n apt illustration of the futility of attempting to oppose the inevitable by Mrs Partington it would be difficult to determine.

Sydney Smith, in a speech on reform, first drew attention to the lady. 111 the winter of 1824, he remarked, a great storm arose at Sidmout'h, and the tide rose to an incredible height, threatening all who lived near the beach with destruction. As the waters rolled into the town, the excellent Mrs Partington was seen—in the mind’s eye of the orator —busy with mop and! pail, endeavouring to sop up the Atlantic. “Mrs Partington’s spirit was up. The Atlantic was aroused, but the contest was [uneqnual, and! the invincible ocean, won the day.”

So Mrs Partington has passed into onr everyday speech to point the moral of cheerful acquiescence in the inevitable only after our best efforts have been put forward in vain.