Women the World Over

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 405, 13 July 1928, Page 5

Women the World Over

IN SOUTH AFRICA The first woman solicitor in Johannesburg is Miss Hannah Greenburg, and she was admitted to the side-bar at the Pretoria Supreme Court on April 11. She qualified for admission 18 months ago, but had to postpone her entry into legal practice; until she was 21. She came of age on April 10. YOUTH AND TALENT A recent photograph of Mo llie Pan ter-.Downes, the versatile young

author, who wrote her first novel. “The Shoreless Sea,” at the age of 16 and instantly made a name for herself.

THE CRITIC ON THE HEARTH

Many famous men owe much of their success to their wives. Mrs. Edgar Wallace, wife of the widely-read novelist, plays an important part in de-

ciding whether her husband's work is to be submitted to his publishers. She is an expert stenographer and was for a time Edgar Wallace’s private secretary. Since her husband took over the direction of the Apollo Theatre, London, where his play, “The Man Who Changed His Name,” is being produced. Mrs. Wallace has become its general manager. In her spare time she has other interests and is an owner and breeder of racehorses. AN INVENTOR The United States boasts an inventor who has been dubbed the female Edison. She is Miss Beulah Louise Hendry, and she has been granted 43 patents on articles ranging from engine valves to dolls. SCULPTURE Lady Hilton Young, whose first husband was Captain Scott, the Antarctic explorer, has been elected an Associate of the Royal Society of British Sculptors. Her work is well known in England and tfte United States, and includes statues of many notable people. Her London home—Leinster Corner House, Bayswater—is the house in which Barrie wrote the greater part of “Peter Pan.” MAGNITUDE IN ART

It is rather incongruous to think that an illustrator of fairy stories should climb ladders and undertake the painting of an asbestos theatre curtain, yet such is tlie case. Mrs. Grey Wornum, of St. John’s Wood, has just completed, single-handed, the painting of the curtain for the Welmyn Garden City Theatre, England. It is said to be the largest painting ever accomplished by a woman artist, for the curtain —the only one of its kind in existence—is 40 feet long by 20 feet wide.

THE NEW-YOUTH SNAG

WHAT MODERN PARENTS HAVE DISCOVERED There is a snag in this sublime business of keeping young “for the children’s sake.” The closer parental and filial comradeship So confidently anticipated as the result of combating middle-age is a wash-out. There is still, as ever, the old insuperable barrier of sheer Anno Domini between real Y'outli and its bravo counterfeit. True, there are fewer reserves between parents and adult children in the modern home. Topics once tabu are aired en famille in households addicted to frank and facile discussion, where pukka Y'outli is determined to impress the New Y'outh with its juvenile capacity" to take care of itself. But in the matter of comradeship eager to share its leisure with kindred spirits, the New Y'outh comes off rather badly in its pathetic attempts at hopnobbing with the younger generation. It may learn the same dancesteps, share the same tastes, or affect to share them, in modern art, music, drama, sport and hobbies generally; but such sharing seldom approaches tlie do-it-together stage. Y’outli gavorts with Y'outh; “galleries” -with Y'outh; golfs with Y'outh. New Youth is expected to do likewise with its own contemporaries. No matter how bright its accomplishments, how genuine its sparkling joie-de-vivre, such triumphs over the sere and yellow must be enjoyed with its own age and its own kin. The shadowy finger of Anno Domini draws the old uncompromising line of demarcation between the New Y'outh and its traditionally true-to-type-immemorial progeny.

The son of one of the cleverest, most entertaining, youngest-hearted men I know —a middle-aged corruscator at the dinner-table, the bridge-table, and on the golf course none the less prefers the jejune society of his medicalstudent pals to the companionship of a father who could steal all his best girls from his callow heir if he dyed his white locks. Only when funds are low, does the son assail the paternal peace. Similarly, the daughter of one of the most fascinatoing, up-to-date and intellectually gifted New-Youth mothers of my acquaintance, is the adoring slave and bosom comrade of one of the most stupid little feminine entitles who ever typified the ghastly boredom of good looks minus grey matter. Here, too, filial rapprochement expresses itself most completely in pleas to foot extravagant dress bills. True, I know of one family where NewYouth parenthood is permitted the privilege of its grown-up son’s and daughter’s company on holidays abroad. But, once again, the explanation is simply and adequately financial. And mother and father are frequently lost on the road, so to speak, as the dining-and-dancing hour approaches. Better face the snag. We are as we were: the begetters of those blithe young aliens who keep middle-age smilingly but firmly at bay. Like to like. Y'outh to Y'outh. It is the old unchanging story. New Y'outh must gather its late-sown harvest of protracted joys with the brave gleaners of the same autumnal sheaves.