loped.

"The great danger to the beauty of American women does not lie, as the
writer of the Post contends, in an overworking of the physical system
which shall stunt and deform; on the contrary, American women of the
comfortable classes are in danger of a loss of physical beauty from the
entire deterioration of the muscular system for want of exercise. Take
the life of any American girl in one of our large towns, and see what it
is. We have an educational system of public schools which for
intellectual culture is a just matter of pride to any country. From the
time that the girl is seven years old, her first thought, when she rises
in the morning, is to eat her breakfast and be off to her school. There
really is no more time than enough to allow her to make that complete
toilet which every well-bred female ought to make, and to take her
morning meal before her school begins. She returns at noon with just
time to eat her dinner, and the afternoon session begins. She comes home
at night with books, slate, and lessons enough to occupy her evening.
What time is there for teaching her any household work, for teaching her
to cut or fit or sew, or to inspire her with any taste for domestic
duties? Her arms have no exercise; her chest and lungs, and all the
complex system of muscles which are to be perfected by quick and active
movement, are compressed while she bends over book and slate and
drawing-board; while the ever-active brain is kept all the while going
at the top of its speed. She grows up spare, thin, and delicate; and
while the Irish girl, who sweeps the parlors, rubs the silver, and irons
the muslins, is developing a finely rounded arm and bust, the American
girl has a pair of bones at her sides, and a bust composed of cotton
padding, the work of a skilful dressmaker. Nature, who is no respecter
of persons, gives to Colleen Bawn, who uses her arms and chest, a beauty
which perishes in the gentle, languid Edith, who does nothing but study
and read."

"But is it not a fact," said Rudolph, "as stated by our friend of the
Post, that American matrons are perishing, and their beauty and grace
all withered, from overwork?"

"It is," said my wife; "but why? It is because they are brought up
without vigor or muscular strength, without the least practical
experience of household labor, or those means of saving it which come by
daily practice; and then, after marriage, when physically weakened by
maternity, embarrassed by