  Menny essays hav bin writ on the natur ov woman, setting forth her aspirashuns, her genius, her impulses, the delikate mechanicks ov her pashuns, the aroma ov her heart, the soft leading strings ov her dispisishun, the cast iron fortitude ov her resolves, and the lurid glare ov her love and her hate. I hav read menny ov these, only tew be more solid in mi long cultivated opinyun, that woman and her character in the lump, iz like the ranebo in the East, butiful beyond language, full ov promis and impossible tew paint. In mi philosophy, rude and untutored, i call woman the lesser light, the moon, gentle as an angel, stealing softly along the buzzum ov the skey on an errand ov love, light for the hour ov darkness, pashunt watcher while the world sleeps, queen ov the night, jeweled with stars. I compare woman to a vine full ov tendrils, which can’t reach perfection without a pole to climb, and then often mounting far above the pole. Man i call the sun, filling the earth with phrenzy, woman the moon, that chastens the twilight, and steals through the lattice to play on the hearth-stone. Each one haz their sphear, and the loss ov either would be the blotting out ov the sun, or the moon. Each one haz their appointment, which should not be changed. When the moon gits between the earth and the sun, then we alwus have an eclipse. I beleave that a kind Providence, the arktekt ov men, monkeys and things, haz given me and mi wife two paths to travell, side by side, and both ending at the same goal. Sum think that the lives ov the sexes are a mere competition, that what one iz both may be, i shall beleave this when the roze bush bears butternuts and the thistle sheds perfume. Amung charakteristicks so butiful, it would be strange if we shouldn’t find a variety, sum even that are unlovely, 354 for perfeckshun don’t inhabit this world, not even in the disguize ov a woman. Thare is two patches in the paradise ov the female garden, that is devoted to the culture of two funny, and very contrary vegatables, one is lokated in the south east corner of the heart, and the other at the northern, or frigid end. The southern crop is coquetry, and the northern one is prudery. Sumtimes these patches are cultivated more assidiously, to the neglekt ov awl the rest, and form the staple crop of the heart. Coquetry is the cussidness ov an artful pashun, that feels its oats just enuff to want to kick up all the time, and don’t seem to care who gits hurt. It lays in wait, in its butiful wrought net, like a spider for its viktim, and seems to take more fun in ketching a fly, than in keeping him. 355A coquett is a good deal like a rare bush, in the springtime of life it is full of flowers, and in the fall, full of thorns. Thare are sum blossoms that are fore-runners of fruit, but the fragrant glory of a coquett is not of this breed. This pashun iz like avarice, it eats up all the other good ones, and spends its old age, racked with the horrors of an ill digestion. Coquetts are generally long lived, faded emblems of viktorys without honour, mournful az a cypruss, chanting their own dirges. Prudery iz nothing more than the tropikal fruits of the hearts gardens raized at the north end ov it, prudes, and coquets, are the extremes of the same pashuns, and the philosophers tell us, that “extremes meet.” A prude skorns tew make a conquest, not upon principle, but bekause she kant, she hates a man with her love. A prude iz nothing more than an ill looking coquet, give the prude buty, and yer have got a coquet, and the bitterest prudes the world ever saw, are the old, and battle worn coquets, who are too decrepid to take the field. Coquets, and prudes, ought tew be compelled to hunt in couples, so that when the coquet haz wounded the game, the prude kan nuss the dieing viktim. But prudes and coquetts never agree; two ov a trade seldom do. Both ov these pashuns are disgusting, and the old age ov both iz bitterness. Prudery iz the remorse ov cunning that haz been foiled; and coquettry seems to be the abandon ov art and buty. Prudes owe mutch ov their success to their inability to find enny temptashuns, and coquetts are made more viscious by flatterys. But a true woman dont cultivate neither ov these patches in her heart; the ever elegant perceptions ov her instincts teaches her not to take up the sword ov the coquett, nor the remorseless pruning-hook of the prude. It seems to me, the more that I gaze at it, that a prude iz nothing more than a coquett gone to seed. I would rather be a coquett than a prude; thare iz some 356 fun in it—thare is viktory in it; while prudery, at best, iz only a defeat in an inglorious cauze. Coquetts sumtimes git marrid, but they are az hard to tame az a patridge, and aint worth enny more after they are tamed, besides being a heap more jealous than a mother-in-law to their daughters; while a prude, for a wife, iz but the bluest kind ov a school-marm at home on a furlough. In conclusion, I would say, in all kindness, to the coquetts, that they seldom hav but one fust-class man in their nets; all that they bag afterward are of the same breed az themselves; and to the prudes I would suggest that wimmin are growing more plenty every year, and that thare are but few ov them, who insist upon it, that will pay the wear and tear ov a humiliating and laborious siege. |
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