M. PAUL BOURGE ON AMERICAN WOMEN

Otago Witness, Issue 2179, 28 November 1895, Page 50

M. PAUL BOURGE ON AMERICAN WOMEN

In his new book " Outre Mer: Impressions of America,". M. Paul Bourget presents an interesting picture of American women. The first fact which M. Bourget noted was, of course, the extraordinary supremacy which woman has been allowed to attain in America,. ■ Not a hotel, not a bank, not a public " building which has not its ladleß* entrance by which they go in and out as independently, as much a law to themselves, as men can be. One of them enters thoee electric or cable cars which abound in the United States. The seats are all occupied, but 19 times in 20 a man gets up to* give his place to the new-comer, who accepts it without thanks, so entirely natural does the courtesy appear. If this rule has any exceptions, it Is because certain women deem it a reproach „in<i humiliation to be treated differently itrom men. That the young girls of the best families go out alone on foot, or in a carf :lage, is a social custom so well known that one would be ashamed to cite it, except lor the sake of interpreting its meaning more accurately. This proof of their f reeclora of action is also a proof of the iespecb which men in America profess for them. A man who should too boldly stare at a woman who was alone would be so discredited that the most ill-bred person would not venture to do bo. What do I say ? He would not so much as think of it, so fixed is the habit of equality between the two sexes This equality extends from small things to great. You vißit a public school ; you will there see girls working with boys, and the teacher a man or women as it happens. You enter a laboratory of the university. There are young girls bending over the microscope Bide by side with the students. You permit the entrance of a reporter, who comes unannounced in the name of a great newspaper ; it ia a woman who asks to interview you. You ask the address of a doctor ; you ascertain- that there are as many women doctors as men, or if not as many, that they are 60 many as to cease to be exceptional. Yon go into the courts of law ; the secretary who draws up the warrants is a woman. Xhere axe women lawyers. There are women

until their heart has spoken, and the influence of a man has begun to mould them. The American girl exists by herself. She knows it, and wills it so. She is proud of it. She has nothing in common with the Galatea of the pagan myth who receives all from Pygmalion, from the embodiment of her beauty to the fire of her soul. Her individuality is already complete when she arrives at marriage— at the latest possible moment, as I have already said, if her parents have ever so little fortune. . .- , It is for this reason that they willingly remain single till they are 25 or 26 years old, and in these long years of unchecked independence, .each one follows her own tastes, each her own fancy, her own nature indeed, oppressed, by so little constraint. Hence it results that the individuality of each nature is amply developed. • THE POSITION OF AMERICAN WOMEN. And, finally, here is M. Bourget's summiDg up of the position of the American woman. It is a passage which well illustrates bis style and his ideas. A great artist, foremost of' this epoch by the ardour of his efforts, the conscientiousness of his study, and the sincerity of bis vision, John Sargent, has shown what I have tried to express in a portrait which I saw in an exhibition — that of a woman whose name I do not know. . . . The woman is standing, her feet side by side, her kaees close together, in an almost hieratic pose. Her body, rendered supple by exercise, is sheathed — you might say moulded — in a tight-fitting black dress. Rubies, like drops of blood, sparkle on her shoes. Her slender waist is encircled bya girdleof enormous pearls, and from this dress, which makes an intensely dark background for the stony brilliance of . the jewels, the arms and shoulders shine out with another brilliance, that of a flower-like flesh— fine, white flssb, through which flows blood perpetually invigorated by the air of I the country and the ocean. The head, intellectual and daring, with a countenance as of one who bas understood everything bas, for a sort of aureole, the vaguely gilded design of one of those Renaissance stuffs which the Venetians call soj>ra risso. The rounded arms, in which the mu&cles can hardly be seen, are joined by the clasped hands— firm hands, the thumb almost too long, which might guide four horses with the precision of an English coachman. It ia the picture of an energy at once delicate and invincible, momentarily in repose, and all the Bjzan tine Madoiana is in that fac9, with its wide open eyes. Yes, this woman is an idol, for whose service man labours, whom he has decked

coloured always by a wonderful bluish tint, darkening and lightening, glowing, flashing through their restless moving ; now deep as summer skies, now almost extinguished, yet shining steadfast through all the tossing turmoil, and dominating even the fitful red. glare from the abyss below. . Suddenly for a moment the vapours swirled apart, and we saw before OUR ASTONIPHED EYES a star, a sun, a world of intensest azure, soft and pure, yet dazzlingly brilliant. We hung there, straining our sight into the chasm, waiting the brief intervals the mists gave^ place and let us glimpse at the wonder. It was to our bewildered eyes something of overwhelming magnitude lying on the side of the cone near to the apex ; more we could not distinguish, nor could we guess at what it might be. At length we tore ourselves away that we might bring the others to explain it. We arrived at the launch'breathless and shaken. Our description fired the men with curiosity, and again the ascent was undertaken. We attained the summit fearful that the glory might have disappeared, but found it shining steadily as when it first thralled us by its inexplicable beauty. Directly one of the sailors saw it he exclaimed it was an immense sapphire lying broken on the cone. He was positive against all objections, and our faith was ready amid the many strange experiences of that region. I verily believe each man on the edge of THAT SMOULDERING VOLCANO, with all the perils of rock and sea and ice between him and home, built gay dreamß •with that unreal wealth. From desiring it sprang the impulse to obtain it, and without a word of dissent or caution from one among us we bsgan the perilous journey down into the crater. We ventured on the sloping rim where a false step meant a certain and horrible death, with not even the frailest guide to steady our feet. Clambering, crawling down through the whirling vapours, the light from the sapphire a« we neared its level made us more delirious. TheD, lower than it, deeper into the suffocating fumes we plunged. The heat became torturing, the soil beneath was burning, our hands were blistered by contact with the rocks and stones, but we did not heed. All we felt, or thought, or saw was the sapphire. At last we came to where arose the base of the inner cone. The junction with it WUI £oU <tf pbfi«wia and crevices

their way home some of them quarrelled with the captain and elected to be put ashore on the island of St. Pau', near the Cape of Good Hope, where the means of subsistence were the same as those of the island they had just left. Until quite lately, and for many years, a man named Piael — colloquially known as " the King of the Ecrehos, — lived alone on a small island named E sreho?, one of a group near the Island of Jersey, Cnannel Islands. His main kingly occupation wa» tasket-making; and at different times he presented specimens of his handiwork to various members of the Royal Family of Great Britain, receiving 'a reefer coat from her Majesty the Queen as a complimentary return gift. Illness has at last compelled him to leave his kingdom, and to retire to the Island of Jersey for medical treatment. Prince Blucher, a German nobleman, who owbb the Island of Herm, and Mr Austin Lee, of the British Embassy at Paris, the Island of Jethou — both in the Channel Islands — seem to have realised the advantages of a -hermit's life, and retire occasionally from active life to the rest and recreation of AT33OLUTE SOLITUDE, keeping their communication with civilisation entirely under their own control. ; " How did you enjoy Crusoe life ? " the writer once "asked a man who had lived for four months oh the Island of Jethou in the capacity of steward whilst the owner was absent. " Well," he replied, "it is lonely. There's little to do, and not far to go on an island about 800 yards in length and about half that in width. On calm summer evenings I could often hear bands playing in St. Peter's Port, Guernsey (about two and a-half miles distant), and every night the rats scampering about my sleeping rcom and the room above." * Some years ago a gentleman named Price wagered to occupy Jethou alone for 12 months without conversing with any human beiDg during that period of time. Accompanied by a donkey, a dog, and two pigp, he more than fulfilled the conditions of the wager, and showed hia appreciation of Crusoe life by remaining 18 months in this novel situation. The monotony of solitude, however, was broken by SOME STARTLING ADVES TUBES. One day when on an exploring expedition he had the misadventure to fall over a cliff, and remained insensible for hours. When he recovered ooßsoiousness he found he was not

serioußly hurt, and was able to drag himself home to bed. On another occasion he was caught by the tide in a oave. To save his life he attached his scarf to a spur in the face of the rook, and, by gradually palling himself up, kept above the water as it rose, remaining in a most unoomfortable position until the tide receded sufficiently for him to escape from his awkward predioament. Again, one stormy night he rescued the half-dead body of a shipwrecked Frenob sailor from the sea; bnt this real " Man Friday " soon died from the effects of injuries and exposure, and the gallant Crusoe had tho gruesome task of committing his body to the ground. The dying man's groans rang in hia ears for months. This, added to the fact tbat Jethou is supposed to harbour all THE HOBGOBLINS OF THE CHANHEIi, must have been a severe trial to hia nerve*. To while away the time and to improve tho inner aspeot of his dwelling house, he took some wall paper with him to repaper the walls. He found a considerable number of layers of paper already on the walls ; and in tearing it down made the interesting discovery of a quantity of valuable old lace placed between two layers of paper, and undoubtedly hidden there yeara before by enterprise g smugglers, who found the occupation of Jetbou a great advantage to the success of their business when smuggling was more lucrative and less risky than at present. OUR CRUSOE also built a pier, a boat, and a fishpond ;"the remains of the pier are still visible, and form a lasting memorial of that gentleman's interesting adventure. Napoleon Bonaparte also amused himself on lonely St. Helena by buildlug a fishpond ; but the copperas used in the work poisoned the fish transplanted into it, and their loss drew from him that bitter expression of pain : " Everything I love, everything that belong! to me, is immediately struck. Heaven and mankind unite to efllictmo." One clay, early fchig summer, a Sark fishing boat setoufc to gather vraic, or seaweed, from the adjacent rocks and islets of the Channel Islandß. Oa the return journey, heavily ltden with the results of their harvest, the boat struck on a rock and foundered, the crew hastily clambering into a small boat towing astern, and having successfully gained a small ialand called Puffin Island, it being solely inhabited by birds of that name, they were, perforce, obliged to remain there, sleeping under their upturned boat, and subsisting on a few biscuits and A KEG OF WATER. For two boisterous days their attempts to attract the attention of the orfcwu of the mail boats passing to and from Guernsey, and a man ploughing on Herm, were singularly futile. Tuey were ultimately taken off by a tug-boat sent in search of them by their anxious relatives. The notorloas ex captain of artillery, Dreyfus, who was degraded from his rank in the Frercb army for an offence ngairfct his Government, wa.«, ns a further punishment, afterwards banished to a small island off the coast of 'French Guiana, South America, called Devil's Island. The lepers who had previously inhabited the place were removed elsewhere, their huts burnt, and another built for the exoffioer. Two gaards constantly attend him, following him everywhere, and spying on hia least movements with torturirjg assiduity .