A YOUNG MAN ON 'ADVICE TO PARENTS.'

Observer, Volume 7, Issue 348, 8 August 1885, Page 3

A YOUNG MAN ON 'ADVICE TO PARENTS.'

We have received numerous letters from all kinds and conditions of men in inference to our article in last weeks issue, in which we embodied a letter from one of the demi-monde giving her own and one or two of her sister's accounts of how they became what they are. It is gratifying to find that without an exception our article has been understood as we meant ifc to be. Our object was to reform society, and we have been credited with having adopted the proper means to that end. At the time of receiving the letter we pondered for some time before deciding to insert it. The result of our meditations was that the letters were printed with very litttle comment from ourselves. We thought then as we think now, that no more effective armour could be provided primarily for parents and secondly for daughters, than the plain unvarnished tales as told by the unfortunate girl. Another of her class has written regretting that before her fall she had not read the stories, one of which she says exactly describes her own case. One who signs herself ' An anxious parent with grown up daughters ' expresses gratitude in glowing terms, her girls have read it, and she informs us that they agreed 'unanimously that they must in future be more circumspect.

We have received a letter from a young man, for which he asks insertion on the ground that the female side should not have all the say. We insert it, not for that reason, but because we believe it is, equally with that of the ghi's, calculated to have a beneficial effect. He writes as follows : — ' Sir, — I have read in the last three O-BSEHVEHSyourreniarks as to the cause of the fall of women. I agree with you generally, but the stories told by the girl would lead one to the belief that all the girls of her class have been the victims of designing and unscrupulous men. This may be so in some cases, but I am sure that in most the evil passion was in them only waiting for opportunity to be gratified. I was in company with four other young fellows, when one read the article in last week's Observer aloud. We discussed the question, and as each had had experience in the matter, our opinion is worth having. We all remembered instances where our advances had been repelled by a look of indignation or a stare of innocent wonder. The result of our deliberations was the conclusion, that no girl who is quite straight is in danger from any number of young men she may be brought in contact with. If she is pure-minded and properly brought up she resents by a look the smallest liberty either of speech or manner. On the other hand, the girl who will allow _ the slightest improper familiarity is certain to give way, provided she has a fancy for the man, opportunity is offered, and he is unscrupulous enough to use the power he has acquired by having once taken a liberty. Nothing but fear of the consequences can save her. What fools girls are ! They think men admire them because they are fast and allow expressions of a doubtful character to be used in their presence, and laugh as if they enjoyed the joke. No man with a grain of sense ever marries one of these. He looks upon them much as a child does toys, to be played with first, broken afterwards and then cast aside for fresh ones. The fallen ones may tell what stories they like about being deceived and all that sort of thing, but I am certain that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it would be found that they are mainly to blame.

The above is very plain writing, and although our correspondent expresses himself very confidently to the effect that the girls are as much to blame as the men who take advantage of them, he comes back after all to the same reason for their fall as the girls give themselves, The moral to be drawn from all these stories is clearly that a liberty once allowed, a girl is never safe. Reform in this respect must originate with the girls themselves. So long as men are men there will always be found those who are ready to entrap them. This is cowardly, inasmuch as the disgrace falls upon the girl and the man gets off comparatively free. Girls must remember, however, that there can be little doubt but that the man is generally, tempted by the woman to sin with her. The slightest looseness of manner or speech is sufficient to tempt. We

have now done with this nauseous subject. We have written plainly and allowed others to do the same: Virulent disease requires strong drugs to conquer it.