XIV. WOMAN’S YOUTH.

Says the proverb: “A woman is as old as she looks, and a man is as young as he feels,” but like many other widely accepted “glittering generalities,” it will not walk on all fours. For even a girl of fifteen may have an old look and a woman of fifty may have a young look, and a supersensitive person, especially if she lives in the rush and whirl of a city life, will look years younger or older in a few hours, according to her environment. It is one of the oddest things in this queer world, this importance attached to the question of age. The first thing we ask about a proposed acquaintance is: What age is he or she? The commonest form of social gossip is the telling in confidence of the age of some lady who is older than she appears. The one item mentioned in a burial notice is the age of the deceased, and a very frequent remark when a death is announced is, I wonder if they will print her age!

Another curious point is that dislike or malice always exaggerates the age of its object, and kindly or charitable feeling always minimizes it. It is evident, then, that we all desire for ourselves and our friends the reputation of youth, and that there is something disparaging and unattractive in speaking of a person as old, or even middle-aged. Arising from this instinct, no doubt, we have the struggle to appear young so noticeable and so piteous not only in what we call society, but in all classes of the community.

I sat mournfully by one day at a milliner’s while she tried a blue satin and velvet sailor hat with long streamers on a lady of about fifty years old, whose weight must certainly have reached two hundred, and whose great red face suggested unlimited roast beef and port wine. The lady bought the hat and went away, and I mildly inquired of the milliner if she really thought it was the most suitable headgear she could have recommended. She smiled shrewdly and said: “The only other thing she would look at was a bébé bonnet, and that, she concluded, was too old for her. She does not realize that she is no longer fifteen.”

That little incident made a deep impression on me, as throwing a broad light upon one phase of feminine human nature. The woman does not, or will not, “realize that she is no longer fifteen,” and struggles to prevent other people from realizing it either. Is it, then, so much better to be fifteen than fifty, and why?

Why should one cling to sailor hats and bébé bonnets instead of assuming the rich and dignified headgear of middle life? Why is youth the one thing to be struggled and fought for against all odds? And how is it women, otherwise sensible can yield to the delusion that youthful dress lends a youthful appearance to middle age? Looking about me to see how these questions were answered by the elder ladies of my acquaintance, I was considerably puzzled to determine which they were. Many of the girls and women, whose ages I happened to know, looked older in both form and figure than others whom I suspected to be their seniors, and again I found that many of my acquaintances varied so much from time to time that I had to place them afresh at each interview.

But, after all, what is the charm of youth? Is it physical simply? Of course, clear eyes and skin, round, firm outlines, and a certain freshness of lips and cheek are very lovely, but it is by no means all young girls, especially in cities, who possess them. Is it manners? There is nothing sweeter than the half-timid, yet well-trained manner of an ingenuous girl, nothing prettier than her naïve deference to her elders and ready self-effacement; but still I must prefer for my own part the gracious tact and quickness that come only by experience, the ready adjustment of any little social awkwardness, the self-poise that knows just what to say and do and leave undone of the mature man or woman. And surely it is not the intellect and conversational powers of youth to which we so lovingly cling. The crude ideas, the impossible theories, the innocent conviction of originality while uttering the baldest truisms, the misplaced credulity or the sweeping iconoclasm—are these the conditions of mental development in which we would remain?

What then? For, spite of all my wasted words, spite of the reason one can bring to bear upon the matter, the foolish fact remains, and no doubt will remain, that youth is a possession to be clung to as long as possible and feigned as much longer as may be.

But since feigning is useless and long possession is impossible, why will not those who no longer are young consent to beautify and enrich middle age with own attractions? Why do not those who have outgrown the sailor hats invent and wear charming bonnets, carefully suited to the new conditions? Why does not Miss Chick cease to babble childishly, and study to have something to say that will really amuse or please or attract the men of her own age, and so leave the boys alone? When shall we say of a friend: “Oh, she is charming. You will like her ever so much, for she is fifty years old, and has all the varied means of making herself agreeable that her years naturally bring. She has seen so much and read so much and thought so much that it is a liberal education to know her.” Ah, when?

Au contraire, I once asked an Englishman if he did not think a certain lady of about thirty years old very pretty.

“Pretty! Why, she’s gray as a badger,” replied he, referring to the few threads of silver that gave piquancy to her fresh, bright face.

But the old man or woman who has had the tact and the wit to see the question in its true light, and deal with it intelligently, and who has grown old gracefully and wisely, is a treasure not enough to be valued by those who enjoy it. For there is a ripened sweetness in such a life, a calm acceptance of those evils or sorrows against which we younger ones struggle so wildly and so hopelessly; a peace passing understanding that, like an attar, diffuses itself on every side; experience, wisdom and judgment, that only long years ending in quiet thoughtfulness can give.

Have you such a mother or such a grandmother? Make much of her, love her, tell her that you love her, cherish her at once reverently and tenderly; let every day that passes add to the store of happy memories laid by for the time when her chair shall be vacant, her dear, tremulous hand forever still, and her voice forever hushed. And remember as your own years pile themselves one upon another that they are building the monument whereby in the future those who come after will remember you, and let them not say as they turn from it with a pitying smile, she did not realize that she was no longer fifteen.