Page:About people (IA aboutpeople00well).pdf/133

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THE TRANSITIONAL WOMAN.
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sciousness of self, are all gone. The face of to-day is stamped with restlessness, wandering purpose, and self-consciousness. The trusting religious tone has vanished from conversation. A modern "lunch" affords opportunity for testing ordinary feminine talk, which is never bad or vulgar, on the whole, not even frivolous, but is marked by superficiality in its discussion of novels and subjects, though showing great familiarity with all known and to be known publications. Each woman could talk far better than she does if she were not hampered by self-consciousness. An Englishwoman said, "At home, politics and party measures are discussed at our ladies' lunches, but in America one must first go to a circulating library before accepting a noonday invitation." Latterly suffrage has become a feature of conversation, but often in a humorous or questioning vein rather than in an argumentative or serious manner. Gossip — not scandal — and allusions to conventional modes of philan-

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