WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 203, 6 December 1910, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

(Conducted by "Eileen"). WOMAN'S ROLE AS ARCHITECT. COMFORT FOR HOUSEWIVES. London, October 21. "Would houses be better designed for comfort, particularly the comfort of the housewife, if they" were designed by women? "If there is one subject more than an-1 other in which a, woman's talent is required it is domestic architecture. Thousands of mistakes have been made for want of her household knowledge," said Lord Kitchener at the final meeting of the International Town-Planning Conference.

Yesterday the Daily Mirror obtained some feminine ideas on the subject, and discovered in what way the man-designed house falls short of the standard they desire. | The first women seen gave the following list of mistakes in the average mandesigned house:— 1. Kitchen built as far away from ■the dining-room as possible, causing domestics great inconvenience. These rooms should adjoin if possible. 2. Steep flights of stairs in awkwardpositions. Doors which open the wrong way. 3. Pantry built near kitchen fire, so that perishable goods spoil. Larder or pantry should always face north, away from the fire, where is also no sun. 4. Small windows—house sometimes built to fit exported window-frames. Windows should be casement variety, so that plenty of air can be admitted.

Mrs. Elizabeth York Miller, the wellknown novelist, said she thoroughly agreed with Lord Kitchener that there should be more women architects. | "Look at the average London basement kitchen," she said. "Could anything more uncomfortable and vault-like be devised? jit never seems to occur to the male archiIteet that the position of the kitchen fireplace and the sink are matters of importance—he puts them anywhere. "And even in little, neat-looking villas •where there are no basements the architecture of the whole house is perfectly crazy—from the housewife's point of view."

One of the few lady decorative advisers in London was also interviewed by the Daily Mirror.

"A woman," she said, "would naturally pay more attention to the interior of a house than a man—a branch of architecture which is often sadly overlooked nowadays. An experienced London architect told the Mirror that a woman <had a perfect right to qualify as an architect. "One may be articled to an architect for three years for a premium varying from £IOO to as much as £3OO. On the other hand, one may go through a course of three years' training at about £4O per annum." . "HYGIENE AND MORALITY."

Miss Lavinia Dock, a registered nurse, who is a settlement worker of New York City, and who is secretary of the International Council of Xurses, has written a book called, "Hygiene and Morality," for the avowed purpose of educating women as to the terrible dangers which threaten them and their children from the social evil. The time for silence is past, Miss Dock says, and safety lies in knowledge which will lead to prevention.

The book opens with a clear description of the diseases -which result from illicit intercourse, and proceeds to show that these dfeeases are carried to multitudes of innocent, unsuspecting wives, and frequently visited .upon helpless children, 'with consequent life-long weakness and suffering. The regulation of vice is shown to be entirely inefficient as a protective measure, and to that system is attributed the existence of the white slave traffic. Miss Dock mercilessly exposes the evil doings of law-makers who have souglht to make it easy for men to prey upon the defenceless daughters of the poor. She gives a history of the noble work I of Mrs. Josephine Butler in England, and I shows that when Mrs. BuUer sought to have the evils of prostitution entirely eradicated only a very few men could be found willing to assist her. The double standard of morality, and false medical teaching, are cited as bulwarks of the evil traffic. When women entered the medical profession a change came, and now the best physicians are leading in a campaign for public education in sex-hygiene. The relation 'between alcohol and the social evil is brought out, and medical authorities are quoted, who ascribe to alcohol drinking the relaxing of the moral sense, with stimulation of the sexual impulse. One of the quotations is from Pontoppidan, who says: "Abstinence and temperance movements must be taken as important allies in the prevention of venereal disease." Miss Dock warns parents not to give alcoholic drinks to their children if they would have them pure in thought and in personal habits. '

Two chapters are devoted to measures for prevention, for the author agrees with Dr. Prince-Morrow, who says: "It is not a question of making prostitution safe, but of preventing the making of prostitutes." The first essential for prevention is full, open and serious instruction for all classes of society upon present conditions; instruction with the most emphatic and positive information tha,t these terrible venereal diseases are a •direct result of prostitution. If the societies now seeking to educate the public are to succeed, they must .have the active support of every right-thinking man and woman. There is much of vulgar prudery and hypocrisy to .be overcome, as well as dense ignorance. Nothing can better serve the interests of unprincipled men than the false modesty with which all matters relative to sexhygiene (have been treated in the past. The author-then in an exalted tone speaks of the sacredness of the reproductive functions, so horribly debased by man. Children must be included in the educational campaign, and here the methods advocated by the W.C.T.U. Department of Purity long ago are given as wise and necessary, with the addition of instruction later in schools in connection with biology and physiology and nature study. The author says: To leave little girls in ignorance of the dangers they may meet is as wicked as it would be to ex-J

pose them to wild beasts. That kind of sentimentality which regards the ignorance of children, in the face of the worst of perils, as desirable or lovely, is as sickly as unsafe; it may be even a treacherous sentimentality. It would seem to be beyond contradiction that the age at which the laws cease giving protection to little girls should be the age at which they are to l>e armed with the knowledge which will help them to protect themselves."

She says Again: ''Young men may now be taught, with the authority of science, that the same virture which is desirable for their sisters is good for them, and that 'physical necessity,' like drug habits, only grows coarser and ranker by indulgenec and weakening of the will-power.—Union Signal. IRISH COOKERY. There is a change coming over Ireland in regard to food and cooking, as in other matters, states Mr. Robert Lynd in his recently-published "Home Life in Ireland." Cookery is now being taught as an art in the technical schools and elsewhere, and if the tables of some of | the farm-houses are not sensibly the more agreeable, it is because the conservatism of the people holds out against new-fangled things, even when thev are sweet to the taste. I heard of one instance in which there was a more absurd cause for the new talents being left to rust without use. A farmer's daughter in the South, having returned home with her training in cookery, was permitted amid some excitement to prove her gifts in getting ready the mid-day dinner. She prepared a magnificent steamed pudding, the like of which had never been seen in the house before, and her father glowed with enthusiasm at the end of the meal. "We must always let Mary do the cooking after this!" he cried, and the happiness on the children's faces echoed him. All the greater was their surprise whan the woman of the house, 'hearing this, suddenly lifted lip her voice and wept. "Oh!" she lamented, wringing her hands. "After me cooking and slaving for you for twenty years! And now to have my own daughter put against me!" and she finished with a flpod of tears. Stunned by the new twist things had taken, the family made haste to comfort her. They weren't thinking-about what they were saying, they explained; they were only meaning to tell Mary how they liked her cooking.