WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 168, 25 October 1910, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

(Conducted by "Eil»»n"). NOTES FROM LONDON WOMEN STRIKERS. London, September 2. The women chainmakers of Cradley Heath, to the number of 500, are out on strike, and attention to their plight, the poorness of wages paid for this, the hardest work and most uncongenial, surely, it would be possible for women to be trained to, should make many a woman prize her luxurious .lot. Their wage is 2Vj>d per hour, their work that of forging chains, and the strike is a consequence of some of the employers having refused to pay wages (2%d per hour) as provided under the Trade Boards Act. If ! necessary, operatives are prepared to strike for six mouths, as they are determined to be no longer associated with a sweated industry. The position of these women is desperate indeed. If they accept work they are blacklegs—they are enabling the employers to laugh at the refusal of other women to accept less than 2V»d an hour for their toil—and if they refuse work starvation stares them in the face. The majority of the employers profess themselves ready to abide by the new rate if the smaller employers will do so. but the latter in most cases refuse, and have been pressing the workers for signed agreements. It is because of their refusal to sign these agreements that the women are now idle. Practically every house in the slums of Cradley Heath has its chain-shop, with forge and bellows, wherein men, women and children toil feverishly forging chains. A correspondent to one of the London papers thus describes a woman he saw working recently at her trade:—

1 went into one of these, where a ] woman was turning rods of iron into plough-chains at the rate of 7s o'd per hundredweight. A baby hung in an improvised cradle from the -ceiling, and two other children, sickly and stunted, sat on a heap of cinders oil the floor. ■She began' work at seven in the morning. taking an hour for dinner and half an hour each for breakfast and tea, and never knocked off until after seven. All the time she was talking she went on busily with her work, beating the rod red-liot, bending it into shape of a staple with two or three quick hammer strokes, and then, having cut off the staple and passed it through the last-made link of the chain, hammering the two glowing ends together. Sweat poured from her face and arms as she labored. Her' hands and arms were covered with burns from flying sparks. Occasionally she would straighten herself, gasping for a fraction of a second to let a little air into her congested Jungs. WOMAN SMUGGLER.

A sensation has been caused in New York by the activity of the Customs officials with regard to at least one case in which a wealthy woman was caught smuggling. It is an old grievance in America, and the officers are determined to try and put a stop to it. Mrs. Adrian, the wife of a millionaire, and a personage herself well- known in the United States as a society light and philanthropist, was caught with a .£IOOO pearl necklace concealed in the plume of a costly hat. She has been formally charged with smuggling, and her husband has had to go bail for her appearance before! the Court to the extent of £ISOO. ' GREAT JEWISH ACTRESS. j The Swiss are about to erect a monu-l ment to commemorate the birth of Rachel, the great actress, in their territory. She was born in the Golden Sun Inn at Munf, in the Canton of Aargau. WOMEN SOCIALISTS. News from Copenhagen states that the second International Congress of Socialists opened there last week. There were 138 delegates from all countries of Europe and America, including twenty Englishwomen. After a resolution of sympathy with the 'Finnish nation had been adopted, a motion from the British Women Socialists' Bureau, of London, regarding the international action of women in supporting peace was discussed. Female suffrage was the subject of much exciting discussion.

CERTIFICATED LADY'AVIATOR. Millie. Outrieu, of whoso intrepid flying I had written before, has been added to the list of those who are officially recognised by the Aero Club of 'France as capable of steering an aeroplane. Mdlle. Dutrieu was at one time a great attraction in one of the music halls, where she was known as l; the human arrow," and performed a remarkable leap of 43ft through space on a bicycle. She had been fond of cycling at a very early age, and invented the leap herself. It was considered so -dangerous that the Prefecture of Police forbade it, so Mdlle. Dutrieu has taken to aviation as naturally as she did to cycling. The only other three recognised lady aviators are Mme. La Roche, Mme. Koechlin, and Mme. Franck. | MARRIAGE AT FIFTEEN AND " EIGHTY. | Statistics of the marriages that took', place in Scotland in one year recently show that no less than 3304 of the brides were under the age of twenty, some of them being only fifteen years of age. The bridegrooms varied from sixteen to eighty. The oldest spinsters were four, aged between sixty and seventy, who married bachelors, and ten of similar ace who married widowers. Thirteen bachelors over forty married spinsters of nineteen and less, while three bachelors of nineteen or less married spinsters of over thirty. Eighteen widowers of between thirty and forty, four of between forty and fifty, and three of between fifty and sixty, all married spinsters of nineteen and less, and two widowers of over seventv married widows of under liftv. OXFORD DEGREES FOR WOMEN. Lord Ctirzon's advocated ''reforms'' at Oxford if followed out may <lo something

to make women forgive the stigma east on votes for women. An Oxford man has prophesied, however, that there will l>e a Homeric fight again when the question of women's degrees comes before convocation. The county clergy will again swarm up to record their votes against the change, but he is inclined to think it will pass. It is certainly a manifest absurdity that women of proved talent, who have been taught in Oxford and Cambridge, should troop over to Dublin for a degree. X-RAYS FOR CONSUMPTION. The radiographers at thfee of the large general hospitals—Guy's, St. Mary's and the Royal Free Hospitals —have been lately investing the uses of the X-rays in the diagnosis of consumption, and some very important observations have now been made in regard to this subject. As a result of X-ray examinations of 1000 consumptive patients, the radiographer in charge of the X-ray department at Guy's has recently stated his opinion that the X-rays are an in'dispen- ] sable aid to the diagnosis of consump- I tion, and can locate the exact position at' which the disease is most active. THE IDEAL HUSBAND. Regarding the usual silly season discussion of ''Why Men Don't Marry," one weekly journal winds up its homily to women with the following:—"The bachelor with an ideal mother will never make an ideal husband. He has been overpampered for that. The nomadic bachelor. on the other hand, is content with the smallest of small mercies. Where a woman, therefore, is enabled to exercise a choice between a well-mothered baeh- , elor and a neglected one, there is but one , promising course open to her. Let her make a neglected man happv rather than , a happy man discontented."

THE WEARING OF HATS IN CHURCH The innovation of ladies taking their hats off during a religious service was introduced at the Port Adelaide Congregational Church on a recent Sunday evening. On the previous Sunday the pastor, Rev. Lionel B. Fletcher, said several people had stated that they had been unable to see him as the-,* sat together in the pews on account of the hats of the ladies. He added that he would be pleased if the ladies could make it a practice to remove their hats for the sermon in the evening, when the attendance was crowded. At the conclusion of Mr. Fletcher's remarks one lady removed her headgear, but none of the others followed the example.' During the following week the matter was the subject of much discussion, and there was considerable curiosity as to whether the feminine adherents would respond to the invitation the following Sunday. Early in the service a few ladies unpinned their Tiats and took them off, and prior to the sermon others, up to about one-third of those present, acted similarly. A divided choir met the eye, the contralto portion being minus their hats, while their soprano sisters remained in full head dress. No reference to the question of hats was made from the pulpit.

ENERGY AND GOOD TEMPER All women who have not any home duties to keep them occupied ought to have some outside interests. The women who are sweet-tempered and charming and kindly disposed towards humanity are the busy ones who work for their living or for charity, or are occupied at home with the duties of the home, An energetic and enthusiastically ambitious busjness woman, no matter how humble her occupation may be, has not the time for the pettiness that goes to make life a burden to all concerned among idile women. The woman who works is inevitably the woman who is in lier views. Her opinions are not riveted to any one point, and her experience in the business world gives her sympathy for other women workers • and causes her to help on those less fortunate than herself.

DULL HOMES. The dullness of some homes is dreadful. Their inhabitants seem to look on them as places wherein to eat and sleep, and possibly to quarrel, but not wherein to be happy. There is no gaietv, no brightness, no innocent pleasure there The evenings are long and dreary; bedtime comes as a welcome relief. The bad effects of such homes "on youn<* people who are growing up cannot be over-estimated. Overwrought by boredom, they seek amusements elsewhere and amusements, possibly of a less healthy kind than a cheerful, thoughtful father and mother would provide. Though girls endure boredom more patiently Mian boys, it has a bad effect on them. Their craving for excitement increases to fever. They come to hate the monotony, the dreary round of dreary duties imposed on them, and either cut themselves adrift, with no better rudder than their own foolish fancies on the ocean of life, by way of bein ? independent or marry the first man who presents himself, regardless of suitability, lneir brothers grow restless sooner- thev become impatient of restraint, and ea»er to spend all their time awav from home. Their parents see practically nothing of them, their tastes, their or associates, until some day their sudden disappearance, caused by wrong-doinc reveals to the world a sad history of temptations and bad companions.

THE RESTFUL WOMAN. The restful woman, who is always a pleasure to meet, never wastes her time and strength in useless regrets. However disastrous and unfortunate'the occurrence may be. since it cannot be undone she expels it from her thoughts altogether. Some people expend a vast amount of breath deploring past events which no amount of talking can undo. It means a sad loss of vital force, and the woman who is sensible reserves her vital force for present or future exigencies.