WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 321, 10 July 1912, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

(Conducted by "Eileen.") HUSBANDS TOO GOOD FOR THEI" WIVES TIIEY LONG FOR MEN' WHO WILL "BOSS" THEM. A well-known Californian merchant named Hirsch 'has recently obtained .1 divoree from his wife in most remarkable circumstances. Two years ago the lady deserted him because "she could 110 longer endure his perfections." As she would not come back to him, Mr. Hirsch sought his freedom, which was granted by the court. In his evidence the unhappy husband stated that he had given his wife every luxury, had never been jealous, had never spoken an unkind word to her, and neither smoked, used bad language, nor drank, and never stayed out late at night. "She frequently said she could have loved me if only I would beat her, or at Irast scold her once in a while," he added; "but I couldn't do it."

The late Mrs. Hirsch is not Tby any means the only woman who does not approve of kind and attentive husbands. A few years ago a Mrs. Evander Craig sued her husband for divorce because he was too good. "He loved me too well to make life with him endurable," was her astounding statement in court. "I expected my 'husband to be a strong oak on which I could lean. I did not want a man who gave me my way in everything." Her husband made a vigorous reply to this strange complaint. He said: "My treatment of my wife is not the kind she was accustomed to at her own home. When we were married she used to tell me of the heavenly happiness she was 'having compared with the time she had with her stepfather. Now she says she yearns for a man who will 'boss' her. About this oak-tree business, I am inclined to the belief that if a branch or two from some sturdy tree had been properly administered where it would do the most good from time to time, I eould have proved myself more woTthy of the title 'model husband.'"

An extraordinary matrimonial story was revealed in the Berlin courts a few years since. A man and a woman, both school teachers, became great friends and arranged to marry, in order that they should be able to help one another better in their studies. But it was agreed between them that, although legally wed, they should be nothing more than comrades. One day the husband forgot the terms of his compact and spoke very lovingly to his wife, at the same time kissing her hand. Snatching her hand away, she left hiin immediately .and applied for a separation, which, curiously enough, was granted to her.

» A Paris fashion paper, which started a correspondence in its columns on love, revealed the fact that many French women do not care for kind husbands. A very large number of the correspondents advised people never to marry for love, and one even went so far as to write: "You have no idea what a bore an affectionate husband becomes"; while another's opinion was: "Marry the man you hate; love is not of the slightest importance for getting married."

Doctors and lawyers have frequently commented upon the extraordinary fascination that criminals and notoriously cruel men are able to exercise over women, and the following statement made by a wholesale bigamist named Johnson amply bears out their assertions. Johnson was sentenced to seven years' hard labor in 1009 for bigamy, and he himself gave the names of no fewer than seventeen women whom he had married and deserted in the short space of four years. In a, written confession this man said: "The women I met fell in love with me after I had talked with them two or three times. I found it did not pay to be soft and sweet with a woman. Treat her somewhat harshly, be a little distant, and she will come to you."

HUNDRED THOUSAND SERVANTS WANTED NOT TO BE FOUND AT £75 A YEAR. New York, May 11. "Wanted, one hundred thousand servants willing to accept a wage of £5 a month," is the suggestive announcement made by Mr. Herman Robinson, Commissioner of Licences, in a special report to i the Mayor of New York (Mr. Gaynor) ; on the servant problem in this. city. ' Mr. Robinson quotes the case of a resilient at Mount Vernon,, a suburb of New York, who, in a garment factory, em- ! ploys hundreds of girls at an average wage of £ 1 a week, and yet is unable to find a girl willing to do general liousejwork in return for board and lodging and 25s a week. Practically every mar- !' ried woman of the middle classes here is now forced to do her own household S drudgery. Even a bribe of thirty and thirty-five shillings a week is inadequate to tempt girls into domestic service. Immigrant girls, says Mr. Robinson, have revolted against the slavery of the kitchen. They give the following as their reasons, among others, for preferring the far smaller wages paid in factories:—

"Servants can have no callers, or at least callers are frowned upon by their employers. A servant's work never ends, she lias no freedom and no time of her own. Girls in factories can sing together sometimes while at work, and flock together socially at night, but the servant is always lonely. Household ser- ! vice is too menial and undignified. A i girl may work :vnywhere else and call! herself a lady, but in the household! there is only one lady, and she is the: •employer. The servant is just a ser-; vant." j Mr. Robinson is convinced that the; drudgery of American mothers will never' be alleviated until they can consent toj treat domestic servants as other eni-i ployees are treated, with fixed hours for! the day's work and a certain number' of hours off duty every day. !'

AN ANTI-SUFFRAGIST. j Mrs. Henry Fawcett, L.L.D.. the lead-! er of the anti-militant suffragists, is onej of the most remarkable) women in Eng-, land. She is the widow of the Right Hon. Henry Fawcett, the famous Wind Postmaster-General, and it was her bantl. who first aroused her interest irj politics. Mrs. Fawcett's daughter performed the astonishing feat of coming out higher than the senior wrangler at Cambridge on one occasion. Apropos of the prejudice that exists on the questioi of admitting girl students into thai university, Mrs. Fawcett tells an ammsr ing story. At one time women could only be examined through the courtesy, of the examiners. A certain young lady named Glover wished to be examined in a tripos examination, but one of the examiners objected. Finally, however, he gave in, although he did not know the name of the candidate. Later, the examiners met to discuss the various papers. The gentleman who did not believe in women students at Cambridge was the first to speak. "Well, gentlemen," he said, "I don't know what result you have come to, but my best majn i is 'Mr. Glover'!" :