I am not going to deny, that in this land of beauty, (a land to which a certain cardinal, many centuries ago, gave the appellation of _the native paradise of angels_!) we shall find the fair “Fitted to shine in courts, or walk the shade, With innocence and contemplation join’d.” There are many lovely women of all ranks in England who merit this encomium: but I am not writing an eulogium on these happy exceptions; I feel it my duty to admonish the general race of my female contemporaries. To the rising generation I especially address myself; and when the young belle in her teens listens to the suggestions of experience, perhaps the advice may not be quite so unpalatable, when she understands that it comes from one who has studied the graces at more than one of the courts of the Bourbons; and, since their dispersion, has followed the flight of elegance wherever it was to be found. The _awkward, reserved_ air of the early part of the last century has given way, not to _grace_ and _frankness_, but to an _unblushing impudence_, which is the very assassin of female virtue and connubial honor. Think not I am too severe, ye indulgent mothers! regard me not as a cynic, ye thoughtless daughters of imitation! I mean not to arraign your hearts, but your manners; I seek to pluck the garb of Phryné from your chaste and Christian shoulders. Who, that is an actress, when called upon to perform the part of spotless _Virginia_, would rush upon the stage half naked, dancing, rolling her eyes as if intoxicated, and flirting with every officer of the _pretorian guard_ who crossed her path? In such a case should we not call the actress mad? or say, “If such were Virginia, he performed a rash and unnecessary act, who avenged the insulted person of such a wanton on the first magistrate of Rome!”