WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 264, 17 March 1911, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

(Conducted by "Eileen"). I DOMESTIC HAPPINESS. MEX AXD THEIR WAYS. ilea are essentially individualists. Every man generally studies his own interests in life, or, to use a common expression, looks after number one. Very few men ■ have the gift of making other people very happy. The ideal man of romance, so dearly loved by a woman, is never met with in real life. The actual man is not generally magnificent or romantic, and he lacks the courtly manners of the older time. Marriage, however bright its projpectt may be, is always a very serious and hazardous undertaking. Every one who marries runs the risk of having either an unsympathetic, uncongenial and unsuitable partner for life, or a very bud one, and the latter, misfortune is one qf the greatest horrors and curses of life. • Marriage is the most enchanting and the greatest of all lotteries. Its prizes are mostly small and few, and its blanks are many.. Marriage is the natural state of man and woman, and when people are well mated, a marriage of lqve is a very de--1 lightful state of human existence. WV men, consequently, generally prefer marriage to single blessedness. ;" The keynote* of .connubial bliss is very, strong mutual affection. ft is a very tender, considerate, thoughtful and very deep love which will live and shine brightly through all the trpubles, hardships and vicissitudes of life, !" Women who are petulant, argumenta- | tive, easily -offended, difficult to please, or of a worrying nature, do not generally made delightful wives. Mannish women, and very learned women, who are epmetimes facetiously called philosophers in | petticoats, seldom niake either very loving or lovable wives. Men who are very I excitable, irritable, restless and unsympathetic' frequently cause- their wives miieh misery and sorrow. Very good, kind and slweet women sometimes, unfortunately, marry very unkind and base men. ■• : ..;

The happiness of a wife must be made for her by her husband. Wives require sympathy and encouragement in their work, which is frequently very monotonous. -A; little JdiKlness-wall often induce them' to do'"wearisome work verycheerfully. Affection ..should not be. allowed to cool. A proverb says that little gifts keep love warm. A.woman who .has a good, kind and considerate husband has much to be; thankful for. In married life may be. seen the extremes of domestic bliss and domestic 'woe, or the sweetest of the sweets, and the bitterest of the'bitters of our existence. Happiness in married'life greatly depends upon temperament. If two opposite -'dispositions "are joined together in matrimony, they are in antagonism, and there can be little or no happiness. The causes of unhappiness in married life are numerous; but they are chiefly selfish-' nes, incompatibility "of temper, unkindness, jealousy, and lack qf affection. The two sexes sometimes cannot agree for the following reasons:— Women's minds differ greatly from those of men, and they are consequently unable to see some things from a man's point of view. Women's tastes are also very different from those of men. Women have their own particular and peculiar ways of reasoning. If «i woman is asked the reason of a particular thing, she frequently replies, "Because it is°" The contention that a thing is so because it is, does not satisfy a'man, and it. might irritate him considerably. Men dislike to attract attention or be staved at, but women generally like to be i the cynosure of all eyes. 'Women gen-1 erally very much love'shopping, but men J generally very much dislike it; . .'' .'

If a-man finds that his notions aro wrong, he will generally acknowledge his faults; but it is very difficult to convince a woman that she has mistaken ideas!— From "The Pathway to Happiness," by W.S.Hutton.

LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM AT NINETY. One entirely unexpected result of the 'introduction of old-age pensions lias been the promotion of matrimony among aged paupers in England. Within the past few weeks scores of elderly couples have left the workhouse-and married on the strength of their weekly allowance frojn the Government. Some of these old people have been in the workhouse for many years. In one case the man had been an inmate for over ten years, and to the "sweet young thing" whom he led to the altar the "House" had been her home for sixteen.

Some of the couples who have left the workhouse in order to start life again m a home of their own have reached an age at which one would have thought they would be entirely immune from love's-fever. At Lewisham last week, for instance, a man aged seventy-four took to wife a lady of seventy-eight, with whom he had fallen in love whilst thev were inmates of the.local workhouse. A still more remarkable case is reported from Chatham Workhouse, which William Hennin, aged ninctv-four, and I'anny Wad ham, aged eightv, left in order to set up house on their pensions I hey had both been married three times previously, so their apparently rash venture cannot be excused on the score of either youth or inexperience. It is to be feared that manv of these old people will live to regret the day the workhouse door closed behind them It may be possible for an aged couple to ivc decently on their joint pension in the country where rents .are a mere bagatelle, but it will be practically impossible for them to do so in Lo'ndon. or indeed, in any of the larger towns' where decent rooms unfurnished command 3s or 4s a. week. On the balance »f their pension the oid people cannot possibly live in anything approaching the comfort they enjoy in the work" house. There they were surrounded with every convenience, living i u spacious warm and well-lighted quarters, liberally ed adequately clothed, and, when Kick, had the advantage of proper medical attention and nursing, .„ u | generous treatment in the matter of diet.

The lot of these aged couples who have abandoned these things for the sake of Irecdoni, and are trying to "keep house" «»" His a week, is bound to be a hard