AUSTRALIAN CHIVALRY.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2432, 1 December 1892, Page 3

AUSTRALIAN CHIVALRY.

English ladies who have had occasion to reside in the Australian colonies complain bitterly of the want of gentlemanly courtesy and deference to womankind which characterises the native Australian. It is not denied by anyone, male or female, who has lived in the colonies that the conduct of the men, more especially the young men, is characterised by an offensive boorishness that is utterly unknown either in Europe or America. Ladies complain that men, rushing hurriedly along a street, come into collision with them and knock them on one side without a word of apology. If there is the slightest pressure for entrance into a railway train the men push in before the women, using their superior strength in a most unmanly manner. This is not only recognised by the European visitors, but is the subject of indignant comment by the better class of colonists, and the papers which represent them. The Melbourne Sun, writing on this subject, laments that the emancipated woman of the nineteenth century, with all the advantages of her position, should be treated with the degree of rudeness which marks the typical young Australian. Speaking of women, its says : “ She meets him—and beats him—in class and college, in literary and artistic circles, in office and in mart, and thus, as a rival, forfeits the claim to special considetation which she enjoyed as a dependent.” But, on the other hand, it is to be remarked that nowhere have women pressed to the front more successfully than in America, and yet in no part of the world are they accorded more respect and deference. In America her simple womanhood is entitled to the attentions which she receive from the other sex. In Australia, on the contrary, whether in the street car or in the railway carriage, a place is never yielded to a woman, except in a fashion which makes her feel that courtsey offered in so ungraceful a manner is an insult, whilst in a crush at a ticket window the question of sex is utterly ignored. Even in the ball room we are informed that the young Australian wears the garb of a gentleman but in too many cases forgets to make his manners correspond with his costume. It is suggested that the Australian women have failed to claim that respect and deference which Europeans and Americans admit that the sex is entitled to ; and it is even stated that in too many instances they may have taken tone from their masculine friends, instead of setting the social standard themselves.

It is singular to account for the divergence between the Americans and Australians in this matter, but the social habits, whether for good or evil, are so readily followed by the rising generation, that it is important in the highest degree that they should not be allowed to become permanent; and we cm see no other to enforce women’s mission to define and elevate the tone of society than that the ladies should insist, as far as lies in their power, upon the observance of a courteous manner towards themselves, and ignore those who treat them as they should not be treated.—-The Queen.