This Northern picture is a veritable nineteenth-century spectacle. Side by side with it was the other society, also covering a vast domain, that was in many respects a projection of the eighteenth century into the nineteenth. It had much of the conservatism, and preserved something of the manners, of the eighteenth century, and lacked a good deal the so-called spirit of the age of the nineteenth, together with its doubts, its isms, its delusions, its energies. Life in the South is still on simpler terms than in the North, and society is not so complex. I am inclined to think it is a little more natural, more sincere in manner though not in fact, more frank and impulsive. One would hesitate to use the word unworldly with regard to it, but it may be less calculating. A bungling male observer would be certain to get himself into trouble by expressing an opinion about women in any part of the world; but women make society, and to discuss society at all is to discuss them. It is probably true that the education of women at the South, taken at large, is more superficial than at the North, lacking in purpose, in discipline, in intellectual vigor. The aim of the old civilization was to develop the graces of life, to make women attractive, charming, good talkers (but not too learned), graceful, and entertaining companions. When the main object is to charm and please, society is certain to be agreeable. In Southern society beauty, physical beauty, was and is much thought of, much talked of. The “belle” was an institution, and is yet. The belle of one city or village had a wide reputation, and trains of admirers wherever she went—in short, a veritable career, and was probably better known than a poetess at the North. She not only ruled in her day, but she left a memory which became a romance to the next generation. There went along with such careers a certain lightness and gayety of life, and now and again a good deal of pathos and tragedy.