OLDER COUSINS’ LETTERS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLI, Issue 7, 12 August 1908, Page 71

OLDER COUSINS’ LETTERS.

Dear Cousin Kate, —Just a short letter to explain that I have been, and shall be, too busy to write as fully as usual until after fleet week. But I felt it imperative to acknowledge both Cousin Violet’s and Bill’s letters re women’s suffrage, and to express my great satisfaction that, so far, all the elder cousins are against it. Despite the ocular evidence afforded Londoners lately, by the marching in orderly procession of five, or was it ten, thousand suffragettes, I am still convinced that the qualities they are said to have displayed in mien and demeanour, namely, strength, cleverness and dignity, are needed in as great—if not greater—proportion in the rearing and moulding of men, and in the proper ruling of a household. That so many of .these suffragettes are women of superior birth and education does not render them any the more fit for the franchise, either individually or collectively, and it is a fact that since the higher education of women came in, good wives, mothers and homes have been rarer, and fewer really great men have loomed on the world’s horizon. Don’t think for a moment that I am depreciating the intellectuality or the intelligence of my sex, but I maintain that it is of a different order to that of men’s, and also that there are experiences that are absolutely necessary to the framing of most laws, that make it impossible for women to go through and retain their first purity, freshness and refinement of person and manner, and personally I will never turn a sod of the grave of woman’s privilege. Like everybody else I am afflicted with “fleetitis,” and went into town to-day to see how far the decorations had proceeded. A great many of the shops

were in the condition known as upside down. Smith and Caughey’s seem to be making as brave a show as any, and 1 was greatly amused by one.of the windows which was furnished as a diningroom. On the Wiflls Ot this make believe dining room were hanging three p.etures depicting scenes from history. "The Return of Lafayette’’ was appropriate enough, but what “Mozart at the Court of Marie Antoinette” or "Bolingbroke taking leave of Louis XV” had to do with the history of America, or the visit of the American fleet to Auckland, I cannot imagine. But perhaps one of the older cousins whose geography is not so rusty as mine will enlighten me. At one end of the window in which this mimic dining-room was arranged was a crowd so big that it was' impossible to get. near enough to sec what they were gazing at so intently.' But after waiting a little while the crowd thinned, and on getting closer, I saw that a very elaborate menu card had been the attraction. This earl was written in a new sort of language which I should call Anglo - American - cum -. Franeajs Amongst the delicacies enumerated in this extraordinary bill of fare were “Oysters a la Yankee Doodle, Olives a la Fleet Week, Admiralty Soup a la Sperry, Fried Wainwright, Minnesota Brains, Sweetbreads Amerieaine, Boiled Fowl a la Cowie, Salade a la Two Flags (excellent), Anglo-American Plum Pudding, 12-inch Gun Pancakes, and for savoury and dessert Fine Weather Prospects and Pears a la Bartlett, Apples a la Curtis, and Uncle Sam’s Oranges. I don’t want an invitation to this dinner! Do you. Cousins Mine? I could manage a few spoonfuls of Potage a la Sperry, and would have tried to swallow a .slice of Wainwright if ~he ... were only fried brown. Sweetbreads, cooked a la any mode I adore, andi anyone who has lived in Auckland for the last two months would have taken a good helping of “fine weather prospects.” But the idea of dining on “Minnesota Brains” and “12inch gun pancakes,” so “rattled” me that for quite a long time 1 could not realise that I had not been like Captain Baxter’s Biddy—Ax’ed to. I am so tired that I cannot write any more to night. So with a word of thanks to dear little Cousin Beryl who writes in to-dav’s Cousins Page, and with love to yourself and all the Cousins, I remain, your loving Cousin HILDA (Ponsonby). P.S.—I have heaps of news for you next week.