WOMEN AND ENGLISH SENTIMENTALISM

Otago Witness, Issue 2817, 4 March 1908, Page 77

WOMEN AND ENGLISH SENTIMENTALISM

Vr- m By Constance Clyde.

1 It is "to Bernard Shaw that we owe the ' discovery regaining the sentimentalism of the English. The greater is the pity, therefore, that this sentimentalism concerns itself so little with woman. Com- ! mercially more honest than his American ; cousin, the English trader, builder, etc., j will yet show less hesitation in cheating I a woman ; indeed, he looks on woman as his lawful prey. When an Englishwoman begins any business scheme she needs to I take greater precautions than a man, as j j special effoits will be made to "do" her. | j Olever and experienced women will employ j 1 a lawyer where no man would dream of j doing so, because of these attempts. In [ ' the realm of charity the same tendency ] )is noticeable. The pauper man and the | pauper child excite sympathy to a degree I that is seldom extended to the pauper I woman. The unemployed male has his j frequent processioning, when he receives j largess from the spectators ; a largess that is not always conveyed home to his wife and family. The child again has its Christmas Tree in winter, and in summer j excursions by day or week "up country." Last holiday season several philanthropists j endeavoured to get up a society for the j purpose of sending overworked mothers for j a day to the seaside. " Many of those ' women," wrote a pleader, " have never \ had a glimpse of the ocean, and never j will unless charity affords them the oppor- ; tunity." No response, however, wa6 made to the request, though chaiity busied itself with men and children, tired horses, and stray «:ats just as usual. In the north country, however, woman possesses more power, and mothers as well as children are i assisted, to a happy day in the country. j V\ nat is the reason of this slight regard for women? Stiange as it may seem to j tay so, it is a consequence of our modern ( regard for motherhood. " Save, feed, and support the mothers." is the cry — nobly answered by such institutions as "the Provident Maternity Homes of our big cities. I When this cry is qualified, however, by ' the addition " for the sake of the children," in narrow minds a wrong sentiment is engendered. Said a well-known enthusiast, Miss Nora Wynne, editor of the only woman's political paper in London, last year : "Why always sacrifice this generation to the next? The fact that mothers regard themselves only from this | standpoint is no reason why we should [do so ! It is entirely the reverse. ' Women are human beings, and would fare better if they pleaded their humanity more | and their womanhood less." A somewhat j similar observation was made at the first formal meeting of the Male Suffrage League, a new convert to the suffrage cause, the radical earl, Lord Russell, being the speaker. Spite of our frequent boastings of the i British character, it is through sentiment, j Eot through justice, that many modern 1 reforms are primarily gained ; therefore I this absence of sentiment i 6 a serious j obstacle in the campaign that awaits the ' ' sex this year. Certain injustices threaten i the industrial woman very shortly unless she can make her voice heard. Herbert Gladstone, with the best of intentions, ' upholds the abolition of the barmaid, while even John Burns, the Labour member, has ' been overheard to say on the terrace of the House that after all "women hadn't much need for an old-age pension." The ! " living-in" system of shops is also ' threatened by another M.P., who does not ! quite realise the result of its abolition ( when female as&istants will be obliged to t provide themselves with board and lodg- I ing on the email sum of 10s per week. The conviction that women as wage- ! earners do not matter explains much of that suffragetting concerning which the past year saw so much. ' The general unfairness towards woman, as euch, was never shown more strikingly than during the trial of a certain young man, Robert Wood, lately acquitted of the j murder of a youns woman. It came out i

in the evidence that the accused, though innocent, had endeavoured to induce a girl SAveetheart to commit perjury on his Dehalf. Far from seeing this unchivalrous action in its true light, mob justice condemned the girl witness merely for telling the truth, showing that woman's lesser regard . for honour may be due perhaps to man's overt dislike of that virtue in her. A woman journalist waiting with the crowd to hear the verdict was amazed at the animosity expressed towards the female witness, who finally had to be escorted from the court under the guardianship of two policemen!