REPRODUCTION 1 65 



Young women may well be on guard against the flashily dressed, boast- 

 ful, or swaggering type of man, because he is usually a vain, self-centered, 

 unreliable, or overcompensating individual, who possesses few qualities 

 that would make him a devoted husband or father. Habits firmly estab- 

 lished are seldom changed much by marriage, hence to expect a man's 

 emotional attitudes to be reversed by such a ceremony is to flout experi- 

 ence. If he is not an industrious, intelligent, considerate type before mar- 

 riage, there is no magic that will make him such when wedded. 



To the inexperienced young man perhaps the most dangerous girl is 

 a baby-faced, rather pretty, physically alluring, up-and-coming type, of 

 relatively low mentality. With our lax educational standards she not in- 

 frequently finds her way into the high school, or even through it and into 

 college, but she rarely lasts out the freshman or sophomore year. Like the 

 decerebrated frog of the physiological laboratory, her food-catching, swal- 

 lowing, and sexual reflexes, are normal, but she has little or nothing above 

 her ear level to make her promising material for a wife or mother. Fre- 

 quently such an individual is not only lacking in judgment and good taste 

 when it comes to the serious or finer matters of life, but sometimes she is 

 also wanting in the proper inhibitions which are indispensable to right 

 living. 



But this does not mean, of course, that the little wiles of young folk, 

 which are usually harmless, are to be condemned. After all girls are girls 

 and boys are boys, and down deep in his heart every Jack wants his Jill 

 and every Jill her Jack. And nature has so built us that the fulfillment of 

 these wishes — often unadmitted to ourselves — begins the forward march 

 long before we recognize that it's in motion toward its matrimonial goal. 

 When a girl reaches a certain age it is just as natural for her to begin prac- 

 ticing her little coquetry toward boys as it was for her to play with her 

 dolls earlier, or play "grownup," and what not. How else would she find 

 the right matrimonial pal in this serious though glorious game of life.' 

 And so back of the playful coquetry of the little Dorothys and Geraldines 

 who challenge and intrigue a boy's attention — often (not always) un- 

 known to themselves — there is a deadly earnestness. And girls, from the 

 sheer necessities of the case, are past masters of such arts when compared 

 with boys, since the outcome — home, safety, provision for self and chil- 

 dren, love — are of so much greater fundamental importance to them. 

 Nature says to them, "a mate must be had and you must attract," and the 

 game is on. 



Blame them for it? Heavens no! Bless them! Otherwise mankind would 

 go blundering through life missing most of its fineness; much of its worth- 

 whileness and practically all of its spice. Why quarrel with the way nature 

 insists on having things done? Who in his right senses would do away 

 with that judicious mixture of the sexes which gives so much tang to human 

 affairs? 



