TASMANIAN GIRLS.

New Zealand Times, Volume LI, Issue 9139, 10 November 1890, Page 4

TASMANIAN GIRLS.

The Tasmanians are proud of their boast that their tight little island produces the finest fruits and the prettiest girls of the whole Australasian colonies. While we must acknowledge that their fruit is not to be despised, and that their girls are decidedly passable, it is just possible that our Nelson fruit is not far behind theirs, and our Nelson, Taranaki, and Wellington girls can stand in the front ranks for beauty equally so with the fair Tasmanians. But the girls of Tas* mania hare a grievance, at least so says * Allegro* in the Queenslander, j—There is a prevalent notion to the effect that the special function of aTasmanian girl is to get married. To be suro, the same may bo affirmed of girls in general, but for all that it is as a something marriageable that the Tasmanian girl seems solely and peculiarly to exist. There is, of course, a reason for the notion. Tasmanian girls are pretty. That in itself is enough. Moreover, it is understood that they know it, and act accordingly. Tasmania, too, has attractions in scenery and climate that draw many visitors from the Australian continent, and there are fruit gardens besides. Between those two facts Tasmania has become a sort of Benedict-manufactory for Australia generally, and the exportation of wires a regular feature of Tasmanian industry. All the greater is one’s astonishment at finding that Tasmanian girlhood is not, as generally supposed, unanimous in favour of marriage. There is a town on that tight little island called Bvendale, where the question of * Married life or single life, which is preferable ?* was solemnly tried the other day, with the startling result of a verdict in favour of single blessedness. At a social meeting, at which 150 inhabitants of the town were present, a jury of twelve ladies, six married and six single, were chosen from the audience to decide the momentous question, with the result stated. One can understand it in the case of the married women. The very fact that these were residents of EvendaU proves that they were disappointed in marriage, for it is a well-known general law that no Tasmanian woman marries a fellowislander until she has failed to catch an Australian squatter. But how about the six single girls ? Perhaps after all it was only a verdict of despair. Not only is the marriage market very slack in Tasmania'itself, but for some years, owing to business depression, or the price of wheat, or something, there has been a great falling off in the number of eligible visitors from the mainland. Hence — but of course this is only conjecture.