There is this delicacy and innocence that scents the story, which is a very feminine incense. When this "feminine aroma" is inhaled, we can directly feel that the story is written by a female, and from a female's point of view. The very structure of the setting (the fairy-tale-like touch) is a part of a young girl's perspective on life.
Part of the feminine color in this story is the way it focuses on female fashion, age, customs and traditions---in short, all are part of feminine subjective experience. The focus on fashion is revealed when Leila enters the ladies" room. There, the ladies were fixing their looks by seeing to their hair, tucking handkerchiefs into their clothes, and smoothing their gloves. Also, fashion terminologies suggesting the female world are used, such as "invisible hairpins" and "powder" (p.41). Traditions and focus on age concerning young ladies is revealed when it is hinted that a girl would be exposed to society at the age of eighteen (usually in order to fetch herself a husband).
The female voice in "Her First Ball" is mostly depicted in the tone of the story---the tone of a mature lady. It is in the form of a mature lady's talking about her memories of her attendance to her first ball(and that is a very evident suggestion of feminine experience). This is one characteristic of female writers" works, which cannot be found in a male author's writings.
Mansfield, speaking in the story from the experience of a mature lady, could be criticizing feminine youth at the same time she is reminiscing it throughout the story. Although the eyes of Leila see beautiful things, there is still a sense of superficiality to her views that is criticized in the story. The criticism is brought by the ugly middle-aged man who frustrates Leila. Leila, like many of the young girls her age, is floating in a world of dreams, not looking out into the real world, not realizing the harshness of life.
