THE FLAPPER GIRL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4915, 14 December 1925, Page 4

THE FLAPPER GIRL.

HER CONQUESTS AND DEFEATS

(By “Peter the Hermit”)

The modern flapper is supposed to have arisen since the Great War. That is quite wrong. She first appeared in Eden when without even a fig leaf to cover her nakedness she tempted Adam to do what was wrong. She often appeared in the East. Wise King Solomon was surrounded by flappers. He had a thousand of them in his w ell. stocked harem, and they quite turned his wise head. Antony was no proof against the flapper, for Cleopatra twisted him about her fingers just as she wanted, and finally destroyed both him and herself. Cleopatra was winning and seductive. Her eyes were too keen and sparkling for poor Antony. But Augustus was too much for her. ' She conquered Antony and was in turn conquered by Augustus. The worst flapper I ever read of was the dancing maid who turned the head of that old capricious tyrant Herod. She was “some dancer,” and showed all her lithe form and scented body. Herod was “clean off his chump” as the New Zealanders would say, and for her sake, and at her request cut off a good man’s head. She had her victory but all subsequent history has painted her as a flapper—venemous, deceitful, cruel, and devilish. Henry VIII. of England was a “gay boy,” and fond of flappers, but in the end he amused, himself by cutting off some of their heads. I have no sympathy for Henry and like Freeman, the historian, I believe him to have been a revengeful brute. He tossed his hat in the air when one of his innocent flappers was killed, and next day he married again. Charles 11. was one of the gayest among ,a gay capital which swarme'd with flappers. Sweet Nell of Old Drury was a flapper of the first water, and and even “when old and wizened,” she could conquer her courtiers at will. And how many flappers were in the courts of George 11., Louis XIV. of France, and Catherine the Great of Russia. They were everywhere. They often had their conquests and often too their defeats. But the modern flapper is found great. She is seen in Queen Street, Auckland, in private boardinghouses, in hotels, and some times in tearooms. Her short knee skirts, her transparent silk stockings, her crossed legs, her delight in puffing at a cigarette, her loud (sometimes raucous) voice, her ready opinions arc her armour of offence, and if it wins an American sailor who wouldn’t break his heart to leave her in the midst of Ohio or New York, it is not in favour with the best of young men in New Zealand. The best men don’t like the flapper. They are polite in her presence,’but severely criticise her at her back. She doesn’t appeal; her bold display is vulgar, and she outrages all good taste. She never reads and she is consequently ignorant, but she has plenty of opinions, mostly nonsense. The flapper gets a victory of an hour or two, and her defeats are told in years. The best men like a modest, sweet-souled girl, whose talk is pleasant, charming, and wellinformed. They love the girl of high ideals, the good girl, innocent and truthful, unaffected and sincere. Such a girl has her conquests, but it is the conquests of the best men who love character and who can see the depths and beauty of a friendship which is worth having and which leads to happiness and a good life.