les woman for her vanity. At the same time it is
the particular delight of the man who will himself wear no decoration to
load upon his willing wife the trinkets of his fancy as far as his purse
will pay for them. Without woman's almost savage love of display, man
would be robbed of nearly all the pleasure which

PERSONAL ORNAMENTS

now give him. He loves woman, just as she is. Just as she is she is much
above the level of the thing he would love had he not her to claim his
rapt attention. Man smiles at woman's weaknesses, but if he thought of
his great meanness of soul when his mercy and fidelity are in the scale
against her own, he would look grave and troubled. She dresses with
expense and variety, because it is the first ordinance of her master.
Her very love of dress is the sign and seal of her intelligence. If it
be folly, arraign man at the dock! Says

STAID OLD DR. JOHNSON:

"We see women universally jealous of the reputation of their beauty, and
frequently look with contempt on the care with which they study their
complexions, endeavor to preserve or supply the bloom of youth, regulate
every ornament, twist their hair into curls, and shade their faces from
the weather. We recommend the care of their nobler part, and tell them
how little addition is made by all their arts to the graces of the
mind. But when was it known that female goodness or knowledge was able
to attract that officiousness, or inspire that ardor, which beauty
produces wherever it appears? And with what hope can we endeavor to
persuade the ladies that

THE TIME SPENT AT THE TOILET

is lost in vanity, when they have every moment some new conviction that
their interest is more effectually promoted by a ribbon well disposed
than by the brightest act of heroic virtue?" Listen to the praise of
practical John Ledyard, whose word has the solid ring of fact about it:
"I have observed among all nations [that he had seen, the statement not
being applicable to a majority of the savages] that the women ornament
themselves more than the men; that,

WHEREVER FOUND, THEY ARE THE MOST CIVIL,

kind, obliging, humane, tender beings; that they are ever inclined to be
gay and cheerful, timorous and modest. They do not hesitate, like man,
to perform a hospitable or generous action; not haughty, nor arrogant,
nor supercilious, but full of courtesy and fond of society;
industrious, economical, ingenuous; more liable, in general, to err than
man; but