AUGUST 409 



from this point of view I think I have something to 

 suggest. 



The questions that are constantly put to me on this 

 subject by girls more or less young prove to me that a 

 great part of the difficulty arises from the injudicious 

 ignorance in which they are allowed to grow up. Let us 

 begin at the beginning. A young girl of eighteen or nine- 

 teen once said to me : ' What is the harm of kissing ? ' 

 And it is not altogether an easy question to answer if the 

 girl herself has no feeling about it. When I was twelve 

 years old my mother deliberately explained to me that for 

 girls to kiss boys and men was childish and infra dig. ; 

 that grown-up women thought most gravely of kissing, 

 and reserved it for those they loved very much, and who 

 had asked them to marry them. This gradually puts the 

 matter on a sounder basis. We have to be much older to 

 understand that ' kisses are like grains of gold and silver 

 found upon the ground, of no value in themselves, but 

 showing that a mine is near.' On the other hand, some 

 girls may think in perfect innocence that a kiss means 

 a great deal more than it really does, especially as it is 

 generally taken, not given ; and I have even heard of a girl 

 of seventeen who thought she was so lowered by having 

 been kissed by a man that she was bound to marry him 

 to save herself from disgrace. So one girl takes it ; an- 

 other may think, having once begun, there is no going back, 

 and the onward course is the only possible one. To 

 another, one accidental kiss may be only a great help and 

 protection, teaching her by fear to understand and distrust 

 herself. This state of ignorance ought never to be in a girl 

 who has reached a marriageable age. If the stopping of 

 kissing is desirable at twelve, it is equally important that 

 at fifteen or sixteen the mother or an elder sister or some 

 kind friend should explain the facts of Nature sufficiently 

 to prevent for ever the possibility of such distorted notions 



