Yet, paradoxically, at the same time a female was expected to show innocence,ignorance of the world, meekness, lack of opinions,general helplessness and weakness-her principal charm No wonder then, that a Victorian girl, though most often very skillful as far as acquiring a husband is concerned was less so in practical skills a perfect wife should be endowed with
Considering the lifestyle of Ernestina, a daughter mollycoddled by her affluent parents throughout her entire life, and her typically female, according to the Victorian standards, character, she probably wouldnt succeed in performing these duties, which we unfortunately never learn because of her engagement being broken. ž My parents, my friends-what am I to tell them? That Mr Charles Smithson has decided after all that his mistress is more important than his honour, his promise, his. -she exclaims to her, now, ex-fiance and knows that the only way to take revenge on Charles is to deprive him of a gentleman status,the possible žremedy for abandoned fiancees. The girl's shock to her fiance's breaking engagement is nothing more but another confirmation how important it was back in Victorian times for a woman to be married as marriage was practically the only means for her to gain some social status, be socially accepted amd useful.
The truism that ž a woman's place is at home was very strongly encouraged, even taken for granted, and the strict division between žthe public sphere, which women were of course denied access to, and žthe domestic sphere, a domain of wives and mothers, made it even easier to propagate this belief. A woman's status was firmly established-she was given quite an important role within the family,was to provide moral guidance for children and spiritual support for her husband to whom however she was always subordinate and inferior. In short, Victorian women were essentially relative, rather than autonomous, beings defined only in relation to a husband and their children.