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Elizabeth Visits America by Elinor Glyn
page 37 of 164 (22%)
to be awfully happy, oughtn't they? But they often have nerves or some
imaginary disease or fad, and are frightfully restless, and Octavia says it
is because in the natural development of the female of any country, numbers
of these are really at the stage when they should be doing manual labour,
according to their ancestry, and so having nothing to occupy them and
living in every dreamed-of luxury, they get nerves instead. But I think it
is because they never have nice young men to play with, everyone being busy
working down town in the day time. We are told that even when the husbands
do come home before dinner they are too tired to talk much, and as I said
before nearly all the men, married or single, make you feel as good as
gold, so it is no wonder such numbers of beautiful Americans come to
Europe. I am quite sure if we had to lead their life we would turn into the
most awful creatures. It is greatly to their credit they remain so nice.

When you can get one or two alone to have a connected conversation they are
perfectly charming, and often very cultivated, and nearly always knowing
about music; but sometimes, supposing one is discussing a phaze of the
Renaissance, say, they will suddenly speak of something as belonging to it
of quite another period, and you feel perfectly nonplussed, it seems so
remarkable with the clever things they have just said they can make such
mistakes. Perhaps it's that they do not study any one subject very deeply.

One thing is noticeable and nice. The conversations everywhere are all
absolutely "jeune fille"; never anything the least "risqué," though it is
often amusing.

Among the "smart set" (do forgive this awful term, Mamma, but I mean by
that the ones who are "in the swim" and whose society is the goal of the
other's desire: I don't know what else to call them) they don't often tell
you about the Mayflower and their ancestors; though on Wednesday a
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