Page:About people (IA aboutpeople00well).pdf/147

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THE TRANSITIONAL WOMAN.
141

mands of society, not of life. Our grandmothers would stand aghast at the aphorisms, quaintnesses, points, of the lady conversationalist of to-day, and would miss the old-time calmness, fervor, and acceptance of life's duties.

There is also an increasing tendency, in spite of fashionable and benevolent cookery schools, to disparage housework and sewing. Women hint to each other that they can use their time to greater advantage; that they were born for something better, being of the educated classes; and that manual labor is for the unintelligent. Then, when intelligence directs this mass of unintelligence, it thinks it is doing a great deal, and often sighs pityingly over itself. Often from want of manual knowledge these educated housekeepers are compelled constantly to "change help" and have garments altered. It is doubtful whether there is the same patient endurance of the hard conditions of life now as even fifty

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