Nice Girls

“Young girls I regret to say are seldom nice these days. When I was young, most of them were quite nice; it is to say, they shared their mothers opinions, not only about topics, but what is more remarkable, about individuals, even young men. They said ‘yes Mamma’ and ‘no Mamma’ at the appropriate moments; they loved their father because it was their duty so to do, and their mothers because she preserved them from the slightest hint of wrong doing.

When they become engaged they fell in love with decorous moderation; being married, they recognize it is their duty to love their husband, but gave other women to understand that it was a duty they performed with great difficulty. They behave nicely to their parents-in-law, while they making it clear that any dutiful person would not have done so; they do not speak spitefully of other women, but pursed their lips in such a way as to let it be seen what they might have said but for their angelic charitableness. This type is what is called a pure and noble woman. The type alas now hardly exist except among the old”