It Is Then That The Sylph-Like
Form Assumes An Unpleasant Angularity, Suggestive Of Weariness And Care.
It Is Remarkable, However, That Ladies Of Recent English Extraction, Under
Exactly The Same Circumstances, Retain Their Good Looks Into Middle Life,
And Advancing Years Produce Embonpoint, Instead Of Angularity.
I was
very agreeably surprised with the beauty of the young ladies of New York;
there is something peculiarly graceful and fascinating in their personal
appearance.
To judge from the costly articles of jewellery displayed in the stores, I
should have supposed that there was a great rage for ornament; but from
the reply I once received from a jeweller, on asking him who would
purchase a five-thousand-guinea diamond bracelet, "I guess some Southerner
will buy it for his wife," I believe that most of these articles find
their way to the South and West, where a less-cultivated taste may be
supposed to prevail. I saw very little jewellery worn, and that was
generally of a valuable but plain description. The young ladies appear to
have adopted the maxim, "Beauty when unadorned is adorned the most." They
study variety in ornament rather than profusion. "What are their manners
like?" is a difficult question to answer. That there is a great difference
between the manners of English and American ladies may be inferred from
some remarks made to me by the most superior woman whom I met in America,
and one who had been in English society in London. In naming a lady with
whom she was acquainted, and one who could scarcely be expected to be
deficient in affection towards herself, she said, "Her manners were
perfectly ladylike, but she seemed to talk merely because conversation was
a conventional requirement of society, and I cannot believe that she had
any heart." She added, "I did not blame her for this; it was merely the
result of an English education, which studiously banishes every appearance
of interest or emotion.
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