4
THE BATTALION.
ure of man It is the custom that proclaims woman’s eleva
tion from primeval subjection to man. Wherever the broad
sunlights of civilization quickens the triumphant march of
science, throws new lustre of light around the votaries of lit
erature, or removes the scales of medseval ignorance from the
vision of legislators, the pleasurable practice of flirtation
flourishes with its merry laughs, winning glances and coquet
tish strategy.
When the darkness of the middle ages hung over a benight
ed world enwrapping man in a gloomy cloud of bigotry, and
religious as well as political slavery, such a feficitious mode
of enjoyment as flirtation was unheard ot. No refined feel
ings or tender sensibilities swayed the human breast. Wo
man was considered as a mere dependent instrument of man’s
pleasure, subject arbitrarily alike to his esteem or neglect,
totally incapable of uttering one word of complaint under the
most degrading seclusion from society.
It. was only when the tree of liberty had taken root in the
monarchical constitutions of Europe protecting with fostering
care by the shade of its lofty branches the rights of man from
theburninsr rays of tyrany. When the sails of a liberal com
merce whitened every ocean and established an inseperable
connection and tie between the great family of nations was
the custom of flirtation inaugurated by the polished denizens
of our modern cities.
It was during the prosperous reign of Louis XIV in the
courts of France that it was ushered into existence. It was
in the frescoed salons of Versailles that the star of woman’s
influence and social power appeared with radiant light above
the horizon before darkened by a cloud of bitter prejudice
obscuring the brilliancy of woman’s charms. Before the
gilded nails of St. Germain had been a scene of aristocratic
prostitution, daily infidelity to matrimonial vows, woman
was a mere blank in society,a beautiful form harboring often a
gigantic intellect, but condemned by rude custom to silence
in the presence of man.
Woman, doomed to hopeless seclusion, had no pride to
cherish. Virtue, a mere abstract ideal, becoming dormant