Lazy Thoughts of a Lazy Girl | Page 3

and had consented to an
alliance between Jacob and Rachel from the first, provided Leah was
left behind to look after him, the latter would immediately have been
endowed with attractions innumerable to Jacob, tender eyes and all!
Nowhere is there such a fertile soil for love as opposition!
On the other hand, if parents wish to encourage a match, young people
are thrown together as much as possible. However big the gathering,
you are somehow always paired off with the eligible party until you
grow to loathe the man, and would sooner become an "old maid" than
marry him.
Parents have a bad time altogether I am afraid. Their nice little plans
are so nearly always upset by their ungrateful children, and then they
have to be continually looking after their brood. I knew one mother

who used to take her daughters on the pier and lose sight of them at
once, as they paired off with their he-acquaintances. Do what she
would she could not find them again, so many were the nooks and
crannies near at hand. Finally she had recourse to the Camera Obscura,
and, with the help of the views set before her there, she found the
missing girls! "We never can escape her now," they told me in
mournful tones, after her fatal discovery.
Girls are degenerating sadly, it is said. They are getting too masculine,
too independent, too different from man's ideal--the modest little maid
who sits at home and mends her husband's socks.
I do not dispute the fact. They are degenerating. Neither, though I
dislike the ideal specimen, and have a contempt for her, do I stand up
for the other extreme. I have a horror of fast masculine girls, and agree
with all that is said against them. Nevertheless, I do not consider men
have any right to complain, as they are the chief cause of the
deterioration of our sex.
Everyone knows that a girl thinks more of a man's opinion than that of
anyone else. If he applauds, then she is satisfied. She does not consider
it ignominy to be termed "a jolly good fellow!" She gets praise, and in a
way admiration, when she caps his good stories, smokes, and drinks
brandies and sodas. Unfortunately, she does not hear herself discussed
when he is alone with his friends, or perhaps she would be more
cautious in her manners and conversation for the future, for this is not
the kind of girl who is
"Rich in the grace all women desire, Strong in the power that all men
adore."
CHAPTER II.
ON BILLS.
BILLS! BILLS! BILLS! Detestable sound! Obnoxious word! Why
were such things ever invented? Why are they sent to destroy our peace
of mind?

They always come, too, when you are expecting some interesting letter.
You hurry to meet the postman, you get impatient at the length of time
he takes to separate his packets (I sometimes think these men find
pleasure in tantalizing you, and keep you waiting on purpose), and
when he at last presents you with your long-expected missive, behold,
it turns to dust and ashes in your hand--metaphorically speaking, of
course.
It is a pity such a metamorphosis does not occur in reality; for the
wretched oblong envelope, with the sprawly, flourishy writing, so
unmistakably suggests a bill, that you--well, I do not know what you do
on such an occasion; my letter, which I have been so anxious to obtain,
is flung to the other side of the room.
How is it that bills mount up so quickly? You buy a little ribbon, a few
pairs of gloves, some handkerchiefs--mere items in fact, and yet when
quarter day comes round you are presented with a bill a yard long,
which as your next instalment of money is fully mortgaged, is
calculated to fill you with anything but extreme joy.
Why are the paths leading to destruction always so much easier of
access than any other? It takes so much less time to run up a bill, it is so
much simpler to say, "Will you please enter it to my account?" than to
pay your money down. First the bill has to be added up, and, strange as
it may seem, these shop people appear to take hours over a simple
addition sum. "Eight and elevenpence halfpenny if you please, ma'am."
Of course you have not enough silver, and so are obliged to wait for
change. Then someone has to be found to sign. Altogether it takes quite
five minutes longer paying ready money; and think, how five minutes
after each purchase would mount up in a day's shopping! I should say
that, on an average you might call it two important hours regularly
thrown away. "And a good job, too," perhaps our