A WOMAN DRESSED AS A MAN.

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 19, 4 August 1894, Page 9

A WOMAN DRESSED AS A MAN.

REFUGE FROM DOMESTIC SERVICE. A startling discovery was recently made at a place a few miles from Invercargill —none other than that a person who had passed for several months as a man was, in reality, a woman dressed in. male attire. How she came to adopt this course- —one not without precedent in the history of her sex —will be gathered from a brief reference to the circumstances in which she found herself a few months ago. Her husband left her, a young married woman, and went to Australia. She entered domestic service, but for some reason or other, a prejudice exists against the employment > of married women in that capacity, and when it accidentally became known that she was not single, some unpleasantness ensued, and she left. She tried another place, with the same result. She found that hex work as a servant was practically never done —it was work all day long, and sometimes till late at night, and she determined on a bold stroke for freedom and independence. In pursuance of her design she purchased a complete outfit of men’s clothing, consigned her old garments to the flames, donned the garb of a “ lord of creation,” and having thus crossed the Rubicon, fared forth in search of work. She secured an engagement as a farm labourer, worked with horses, followed a plough, and went through the regular routine of farm life. On several occasions she went on the “ wallaby ” with her swag, and in no instance did those associated with her discover her secret. She played her part so well that she even went in for smoking and swearing a little, so as avoid being singular I Rather rough on the average farm labourer, was it not P After the discovery of her sex, some Good Samaritans interested themselves in the young woman, and she has returned to feminine dress, and been placed in fitting employment.